Support your employees who can’t return to the office

Chances are that you have employees who fall into the high-risk group for coronavirus and who may be unwilling or unable to return to an office when you reopen. Managers need to develop a specific plan for these employees. Support their ability to continue working from home, if possible. While working remotely isn’t ideal for everyone, the pandemic has shown that it’s doable for many — and it can even be beneficial. Allowing high-risk employees to continue to work remotely has the added benefit of reducing the number of people in the office, making everyone on your team safer. Make sure that any employee who continues to work remotely still feels included. Consider implementing a policy that if one person calls into a meeting, everyone joins by phone, even if it’s from their desks. This will allow your remote employees to feel fully included. The ongoing safety and welfare of all employees — but particularly your most vulnerable — needs to be at the top of every manager’s priority list. This is an unprecedented moment, and you should be prepared to make unprecedented accommodations.

(This tip is adapted from “Office Reentry Plans Must Account for Medically Vulnerable Employees,” by Rebecca Zucker.)

Don’t just give feedback; engage in a conversation

When giving feedback, you might assume your role is to tell your employee what you see, but it’s far more effective if you engage in a two-way conversation. Start by asking questions about their strengths. For example, you might say, “tell me about a time this month that you felt energised,” or, “what have you learned about yourself from working on this project?” Asking employees to look back on these moments helps you better understand what it took to get there — and what it will take to get there again. When employees hint at a challenge, try to draw out their concerns. You might ask questions like: “what outcome are you trying to achieve? What have you tried so far to get there? How have you handled similar challenges in the past?” Then, help them shape the path forward. Let employees offer ideas about next steps, but steer the conversations and offer concrete feedback. Close with questions like, “how do you think you’ll act on this?” and “what would happen if you tried this?” The best feedback helps your employees understand and build upon their strengths — and perhaps even see themselves in a new way.

(This tip is adapted from “Good Feedback Is a Two-Way Conversation,” by Joe Hirsch.)

Set ‘communication hours’ for your team

When your team is working remotely — and possibly on different schedules — people can feel like they’re expected to be online all the time. But this lack of distinct downtime isn’t good for you or your team. As a manager, it’s your responsibility to establish communication norms while encouraging people to continue to work flexibly as needed. Define clear “communication hours,” for example, from 8am to 6pm, when team members are expected to check and respond to messages. Outside of those hours, encourage them to change their settings to “do not disturb” and to send messages using the schedule feature of their email. Develop a plan, such as calling or texting, for urgent or time-sensitive communication outside of these hours. This way, people can comfortably shut off other channels, like email or Slack. Plus, the act of calling or texting a teammate is likely to make the sender pause and think, “do I really need this person now, or can it wait until tomorrow?”

(This tip is adapted from “The Downside of Flex Time,” by Maura Thomas.)

Balance your emotional intelligence

Solving big problems and making critical business decisions often requires you to activate different parts of your brain: the analytic network, which helps you solve problems and make decisions, and the empathic network, which enables you to scan an environment and be open to new ideas. To learn how to toggle between the two, start by figuring out which network is your “go-to.” Are you more likely to focus on concrete facts and probabilities? Or do you tend to reflect more on your emotions and the emotions of those around you? Practice exercising the neural network that isn’t your default. For example, you can develop your empathic network by spending 15 minutes each day in a conversation where you’re focused on understanding the other person, not solving their problem. To work on your analytic network, you might schedule specific time periods to complete certain tasks and then hold yourself accountable, even if you don’t have firm deadlines.

(This tip is adapted from “The Best Managers Balance Analytical and Emotional Intelligence,” by Melvin Smith, Ellen Van Oosten and Richard E. Boyatzis.)

Published in Dawn, The Business and Finance Weekly, August 10th, 2020