Employers and business leaders are working out the best ways to bring their teams back to work. The roadmap and the budget tells us that restrictions will largely lifted by late June and that Government support for furloughed workers will end in September.
The challenge businesses will have is understanding, and then meeting, the needs of the expectations of their staff post-pandemic. People will have had different experiences this past year and outlooks may have changed. Here are just some scenarios that might need managing:
- Tension between furloughed and non-furloughed staff
- Work from home converts and those who want to get back into the office
- Changed priorities and expectations of employees
- Mental health challenges
- New techniques for managing virtual teams
I specialise in working with teams when there has been a structural change to people’s working arrangements. Corporate decisions were often a cause e.g. M&A activity that would filter down and affect people’s everyday jobs.
In that way COVID has been no different. Something outside of the control of the individual has impacted their working environment. There is a likelihood that performance may be affected.
How to successfully reintroduce teams
If you are bringing teams back into your business, or creating new teams and want to create a solid foundation, it could be daunting and I can help in several ways.
- Firstly by supporting leaders to understand and manage their own responses to their transition to the new world of work. Putting them in a stronger position to support this change for their teams. This involves exploring their own concerns and understanding what is involved in creating psychological safety for all within the return approach.
- Secondly, identifying where providing certainty is possible and honesty where it is not. I would help with the revisiting of team goals, measures and behaviours to give everyone the best opportunity to be successful in the new environment.
- Thirdly, we would examine and take the lessons from remote/virtual working and apply them to the predicted new mix of combined office attendance and remote working, applying the best practices and skills of both. Wherever people are connection and communication are kept at the front of mind for all.