What do you do to care for and feed your staff?
“THESE are the times that try men's souls. The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of their country; but he that stands by it now, deserves the love and thanks of man and woman.” – Thomas Paine
I’m curious as to how you’re doing as a leader? In our blog last week, I shared some tips about caring for yourself as well as caring for your team.
What challenges do you see on your teams?
What difficult circumstances is your organization facing?
What are you doing to lead your team through these challenging times?
Before we moved into this crisis, our national unemployment rate stood at 3.5% (February 2020). Last week, 3.3 million people filed for unemployment; that’s 5x higher than the previous record set in 1982. We were worried about recruiting, retaining, and engaging our top talent just a few weeks ago. Now we may be facing record unemployment for months due to the pandemic. Your ability to lead and engage your employees over the next year will have a direct impact on how much loyalty and engagement to expect from your team over the upcoming years. I know we are all racing around trying to understand what is happening in our workplaces, but please do not forget to engage and connect with your team members.
Here are some of the best practices we’ve been hearing for the past two weeks from organizations around the world:
Getting Zoom for everyone and doing a daily huddle for 10-15 min. in the morning:
This is the place to do a quick check in. Give context to what’s going on in the business, provide recognition, and take questions from your team.
Daily 5-10 minute check-in with each individual member of your team:
Start with personal, listen well, and ask them how they’re doing. Next, ask them about their desired outcomes and what you as a leader can be doing to help them reach their desired outcomes. You can always close with what tasks need to be done, but start with relationships.
Start an online book club:
Take a leadership book or topic that applies to your business and have everyone read one chapter of the book. Have them explain their chapter in 2-3 minutes so that you can read several books during this time of crisis. Close the time with 2-3 takeaways from each person and what are they committed to doing?
Pick a 5k race for the fall:
Have people run and/or walk on their own during the upcoming months while providing support for each other. Conclude with a celebration once the 5k is completed! Even during this pandemic, you can walk, run, and support one another.
Schedule happy hour discussions for a Friday afternoon:
Everyone can bring their own type of drinks, but you’re not there to talk business. Talk about your week, do some recognition, and celebrate some happiness that you have found during this challenging time! (i.e. Mine is getting to see the kids do puzzles and board games together…with no fighting!)
We are all unclear how long this will go on so try to make checking in daily/weekly with each direct report your new normal. Take care of yourself and let us know how we can help you.
