If you can’t manage Remotely, you are in trouble…
The belief that you can only manage in a building at a certain address is officially obsolete. Tim Cook the CEO of Apple had this shoved in his face when a petition was sent from a huge number of employees stating we are not coming back to your 5 billion dollar building to work. We want to continue to work remotely. About 41% of all workers surveyed said they don’t want to come back at all. In another survey 74% said they preferred to come into the office on a very limited basis. On the other hand 72% of managers want their people back in the office. Uh oh! Maybe in time they can turn the Apple Park building into a museum on how we used to get work done.
We used to believe when you built a skyscraper there was a formula for the acceptable number of deaths per floor erected. We used to believe that pilots could only be trained in airplanes. The races could not mix in the military. And we believed homosexuality was a form of mental illness.
These were widely accepted “truths”. Then alternative declarations were made, research was done, and all these historical “truths” evaporated. Technology had to be created, safety harnesses, flight simulators. Old mind sets had to be changed. Military discipline won’t disappear if you mix the races, prejudices and biases had to be confronted. Psychologists and psychiatrists had to look at the overwhelming evidence that their historical theory was quite simply wrong. Technology, research and training shifted what was considered possible.
Never together again? I can hear you protesting “but John I have been Zoomed within an inch of my life!” To that I would say, yes exactly. We are over collaborating. I would submit managers have Zoom meetings 7 hours a day because it gives them the illusion of control. Hey, we ran companies quite successfully without every employee in a meeting 7 hours a day. So why do we need them now? As I am told constantly by clients: “with 7 or 8 hours of Zoom calls when am I supposed to get my work done?”
Remote communication is in its infancy. Technically everyone needs a high-quality mic, headset, camera and lighting. We need to have monitors, so people look life size not postage stamp size on my laptop. Good ergonomic chairs or stand-up desks too. And please have your camera at eye level. I don’t need to see up your nose anymore! But that’s the easy stuff.
It’s harder to get managers to stop being control freaks. If you are uncomfortable communicating via Zoom, get over it! I was extremely fearful of switching to courses online after 40 years of doing it in-person. Yes, there was a transition period. My goal is to make virtual as close to in-person as possible without the hotel and airfare. The reviews have been amazing. Way past my expectations. Having said that I just did the Advanced Men’s Course© in-person in Ojai, California. The atmosphere of being in a place where deep introspection is easy, is sometimes required to produce the result. But courses like Managing Corporate Change© or Productive Relationships© via Zoom in 4-hour blocks taught every other day so people have time to apply what they have just learned has huge advantages. And nobody has 2 days of down time traveling.
We still promote managers who are technical experts and idiots when it comes to people. John Halbertam wrote in The Reckoning, “ historically in the automotive industry they promoted people to be supervisors because they were big enough to beat up their reports.” We still see managers who control employees through intimidation only now it’s all psychological torture, because they don’t know how to manage people. Employees now have all the advantage in the Great Resignation. People don’t have to put up with lousy management and they are quitting in the highest numbers in history.
If your managers can’t build great relationships across a diverse workforce virtually, your company is in trouble. If your managers are stuck in historical paradigms of what management looks like, your company is in trouble. If managers are not aware of their prejudices as to gender, race, sexual preference and the rest your company is in deep trouble. The good news is we can help get you out of trouble if you so desire.
While I am here, keep your employees’ hours to a maximum of 48 hours a week. That is the number Jeffery Pfeiffer’s groundbreaking book Dying for a Paycheck demonstrates one can work without developing chronic illnesses. The choice is very clear kill projects, or you will kill your people. If you aren’t smart enough to know that sick, exhausted employees are less effective than healthy, rested people who have time to be with their families you don’t deserve the best talent, nor will you get it, in today’s world.
As always, we invite your comments.
