In “Remote Work Revolution”, Tsedal Neely shares actionable steps and tools for navigating the enduring challenges teams and managers face today.
Tsedal Neeley is the Naylor Fitzhugh Professor of Business Administration at the Harvard Business School.
Tsedal Neeley believes that virtual, distributed, and global work will become significant parts of work arrangements that will expand our repertoire, skills, and performance.
Earlier this week, we participated in “Remote Work Revolution” launch celebration where Tsedal Neeley and Bill George, Harvard Business School Professor and former Medtronic CEO, discussed the lessons from the book. We would like to share some highlights with you.
Remote work has measured benefits.
One key benefit is that remote lets us do concentrated, focused work. Studies show that asynchronous schedules help agile teams (the fastest-growing type of teaming) be more creative and produce more.
Trust, a key driver of productivity, CAN be created virtually.
Tsedal Nealy introduces a new concept — Trusting Curve.
There are two types of trust:
(1) Swift Trust – To achieve this type of trust, you only need to know if people are competent and dependable.
(2) Emotional Trust – This type of trust is grounded in the belief that an individual takes care and concern for others.
Emotional trust is the type of trust that every manager and team member needs to worry about. The good news is that it can be developed remotely. In fact, physical proximity does not equal emotional proximity and trust. There are two main ways to develop it:
(1) Self-disclosure
Share a bit of yourself — your values, inspirations and thoughts — in small increments. When people do this, others feel that you are relatable and approachable.
(2) Empathy
Allow for informal interactions that build empathy. The best leaders seek to know what’s really going on.
Feeling fully included is the most important thing in hybrid work.
Ensuring that individuals connect with each other even if they are not together is every manager’s responsibility. As a leader, you must develop the discipline of inclusion.
– You need to watch air time and make sure that every person gets a fair share of it — no matter if they are in the office or joining virtually.
– Also, people with perceived lower status (for example, junior colleagues) should be invited to speak first.
Work model has to align with your actual needs and not your fears.
Hybrid and remote work models are going to be the future so long as we have confidence in our employee base. Old work styles are gone, but there is a risk that some organizations will want to retain control.
Instead, ask yourself: To what extent does our critical task depend on people coming in? If the critical task can be done remotely, you CAN make modern work styles work. Trust your people and you can thrive given you built new norms and developed the discipline of inclusion.
To drive cohesion, promote common goals and purpose non-stop.
Cohesion means that everyone knows their true north and it is aligned with the company’s true north. Launch and relaunch are particularly important. Every 6 to 8 weeks, leaders need to talk about the shared values, norms, and goals with their remote or hybrid teams.
These ideas from “Remote Work Revolution” resonated with us at Teamraderie as we believe that modern remote/hybrid/global work styles will be the future. Teamraderie virtual experiences are designed to cultivate emotional trust, inclusion and cohesion in teams.
You can reach out to us at team@teamraderie.com or visit our experience finder if you would like to learn more.