Going back to the office. Continuing to work from home.
It would be nice if for once we would not make out of this an ideological dilemma. There are good arguments for both sides, and when you think about it, it is not really a dilemma. Managers just need to find the courage to ask their employees where they prefer to work, and then follow up to make sure that their choice is respected.
There are different ways to contribute to the success of an organization.
Things that stall a (professional) relationship: sarcasm, passive-aggressive messages, dominating the conversation, lack of communication, inappropriate comments, delays with no explanation, losing your temper, unilateral decisions, power moves, keeping score.
Things that advance a (professional) relationship: helping, saying I am sorry, asking for a chat when there’s a misunderstanding, listening, asking open questions, sharing mistakes, starting with how are you? and tell me more about that, telling about how you feel.
Thinking about that relationship that’s making your workdays miserable, are you stalling or advancing it?
When you are taking decisions that will impact (negatively) others, it’s not a bad thing to ask yourself: Do I really have to?
Often things make a lot of sense on paper: cutting costs, increasing profits, getting some surplus to invest in expansion. But is it appropriate in the here and now? Can it be avoided? Can the policy be changed?
Of course, decisions like these are rarely taken lightly. Just make sure you are considering all perspectives, not just the one that is more common, easier, more anticipated.
People do not always have good intentions. For your wellbeing, though, you will be better assuming they do.
If you don’t, you are left wondering.
Was that comment directed to me?
Does that mean they are not happy with my performance?
Are they not replying because of what happened last quarter?
This is a tiring excercise and you have better things to invest your limited resources on.
Assume good intentions, take note of what you feel (confusion, frustration, incompetence, insecurity), and discuss that face to face when possible.
We know, from our own experience as employees, that people perform better when they are engaged. And that engagement means different things to different people.
Yet, despite us knowing that, we keep running companies in a standardized way that kills engagement.
We ask people to do shallow work. We keep them busy with emails, internal chats, and meetings. We manage from the top down. We regard productivity and (physical) presence as the same. We do performance reviews with a checklist. We assign titles and roles, so that we can look at nice pretty boxes and feel in control. And every now and then we throw a party to cheer everybody up (better if under the influence of alcohol).
The thing that I find most perplexing, though, is how much small and medium companies (the vast majority of companies out there) adhere to the same trite script.
They are the ones that are actually better positioned to change these practices. They are the ones who could make of their differences a decisive factor when seeking and retaining talent. They are the ones who could truly have a personal approach to engagement, and be flexible enough to make it feel as if each single employee would belong.
Just because your target is to grow, it does not mean you have to follow in some other company’s footsteps.
Doing that is actually killing your chances of growth.
You've got this 