Wayne Turmel, Author at The Kevin Eikenberry Group

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Coaching & Developing Others, Leadership, Long-Distance Leadership

10 Tips for Supporting Good Mental Health on Remote and Hybrid Teams

As a leader, you need to be aware of the mood, stressors, and overall mental health of your team. Talking about these things is fine, but most organizations only pay lip service to the topic. As a Long-Distance Leader, you can help set some rules, but the most powerful thing you can do is model these behaviors yourself.

Straight from the pages of The Long-Distance Leader, Revised Rules for Remarkable Remote & Hybrid Leadership, here are ten things to consider when creating a healthy workplace environment.

Set Boundaries:

Activity: Establish a "work shutdown" ritual. This could involve a specific time each day when you log off from work and engage in a personal activity, such as reading or going for a walk.
How to tie it into your workflow: Use calendar blocking to mark off these times and communicate them to your team, encouraging them to do the same.

Schedule Regular Breaks:

Activity: Implement the Pomodoro Technique—work for 25 minutes, then take a 5-minute break. After four cycles, take a longer break (15-30 minutes).
How to tie it into your workflow: Use a timer app to remind you to take these breaks and encourage your team to adopt this method as well.

Practice Mindfulness and Stress-Reduction Techniques:

Activity: Dedicate 10-15 minutes each day to mindfulness meditation. Use apps like Headspace or Calm for guided sessions.
How to tie it into your workflow: Consider starting team meetings with a brief mindfulness exercise to set a positive tone for discussions.

Stay Connected:

Activity: Schedule weekly "virtual coffee chats" with team members, where work discussions are off the table, and personal connections can be made.
How to tie it into your workflow: Use a rotating schedule to ensure everyone gets a chance to connect with different team members.

Seek Feedback and Support:

Activity: Implement a monthly feedback session where team members can share their thoughts on leadership and team dynamics.
How to tie it into your workflow: Create a safe space for open dialogue, perhaps through anonymous surveys or dedicated time in team meetings.

Invest in Professional Development:

Activity: Identify online courses or webinars relevant to your leadership role (e.g., emotional intelligence, conflict resolution).
How to tie it into your workflow: Set aside time each week for learning and share insights with your team to foster a culture of growth.

Utilize Technology Mindfully:

Activity: Designate "no meeting" days or specific hours during the week where no video calls are scheduled.
How to tie it into your workflow: Use shared calendars to block off these times and encourage the team to focus on deep work without interruptions.

Promote a Culture of Well-Being:

Activity: Start a "wellness challenge" within your team, where everyone shares their self-care activities (like exercise, reading, or hobbies) and supports each other.
How to tie it into your workflow: Create a dedicated channel in your communication platform (like Slack) for sharing wellness tips and successes.

Recognize and Address Burnout:

Activity: Conduct regular one-on-one check-ins focused on well-being, not just performance. Ask open-ended questions about how team members are feeling.
How to tie it into your workflow: Use a structured format for these conversations to ensure they remain focused on mental health and not just work tasks.

Engage in Physical Activity:

Activity: Organize a weekly team fitness challenge, such as a step count competition or virtual workout sessions.
How to tie it into your workflow: Use fitness apps to track progress and share results, fostering a sense of camaraderie and accountability.

By implementing these specific activities, leaders can create a supportive environment that prioritizes mental health, not just for themselves but for their entire team. To learn more about how to become a great Long-Distance Leader, take advantage of the book or sign up for our Long Distance Leadership Series open enrollment programs.

Leadership, Long-Distance Work, Organizational Leadership

What’s a “Right to Disconnect” Law?

Do you answer work emails after hours and on weekends? Do you resent it? Maybe it doesn’t make any difference to you. But what if it was against the law to expect you to do work outside of agreed-upon hours? A growing number of companies have passed “Right to Disconnect” laws. Here’s a short article to give you context.

The latest country to join the list is Australia. It joins a list of (currently) ten companies headed by France, Ireland, Brazil and Argentina. These laws vary, but the gist of them is that you cannot be punished or be at an employment disadvantage because you don’t do work-related activities outside of regular office hours.

The reasons for these laws are obvious. First, there’s the notion that people get paid for work as agreed, and anything that goes beyond that should be compensated. This remains a controversial point when hustle and “going above and beyond,” are considered badges of honor and employers will gladly take advantage of every ounce of discretionary effort employees provide.

There’s a second reason, and it’s actually the one cited in the legislation. There are social, psychological and physical challenges created by the increasing overlap of work and personal life due to remote work and digital communication tools. The aim is to address concerns about employee well-being, reduce burnout, and ensure a better work-life balance by setting clear boundaries. Constant digital availability is associated with mental health issues and, ironically, a decline in productivity.

We aren’t going to pass judgment on the appropriateness (or not) of mandating employer/employee relations. What is important is that this is a sign of the rapidly changing workplace, and an attempt to create new rules of engagement for employers and employees alike.

We are in the middle of the most seismic change in worker/employer relations since probably the early twentieth century. Just as overtime and other workplace laws created a new normal in what work looks like, we are now facing a new workplace without clear rules. Technology, the ability to work remotely, and a movement to reclaim work/life balance don’t fit neatly with some of the existing legislation.

There may be a time when legislation helps create a new normal. We may decide such laws aren’t necessary because people can decide for themselves how much of their personal time to invest, and companies can set their own expectations. At the moment, it’s every company, employer and employee for themselves.

The hope is that discussing the matter will result in honest conversations, ending up with clear expectations that help us all navigate the new world of work. If you have questions or want to talk about what this means to you and your team, let us know.

Coaching & Developing Others, Long-Distance Leadership, Teamwork & Collaboration

Two Types of Goals Make For Great Teamwork

Teamwork, in its purest form, is simply a group of people working together towards achieving a common goal. Like most things that sound simple, there’s a lot to unpack. This is particularly true when the team isn’t co-located. How do you help everyone understand and stay focused on the goal? It helps if you realize that there are two types of goals.

When we say “goals”, we usually talk about the big picture. “We’re going to double revenue in the next year,” is a goal. You can tweak it, define it, and make it SMART, but ultimately that’s the goal. These are referred to as RESULTS GOALS.

When everyone on the team is in the same place at the same time, a good leader will keep people engaged with that goal. It will be discussed often, used in coaching conversations, and information shared with everyone so the whole team is aware of how they’re doing in their quest for that result. Everyone knows what they should be doing.

When we work separately, though, it is a little easier to lose focus. Not everyone may receive the same information in the same way at the same time. Conversations may be less frequent or consistent. Remote and hybrid work allows for people to do their own work at their own pace and in their own style. But is that way of working consistent with hitting the team’s objectives?

The more frequently, clearly and consistently we ensure alignment, the better our odds of success. But we don’t want to micromanage people or take away their initiative and innovative ways of getting the results we seek. Here is where the second type of goals come in. We call those PROCESS GOALS.

Simply put, a Results Goal is “what needs to happen.” A Process goal is more of a look at “how it gets done.” The success of a results goal is determined at the end of the term or project. Did we double sales or not?

There can be a long time (if it’s an annual goal, that’s 364 days where things can be done very right or very wrong) between setting the goal and declaring victory. By identifying the process goals along the way, you can help keep everyone focused on the big picture without getting overwhelmed or lost in the details.

On remote or hybrid teams, agreeing on process goals allows the leader and team to set milestones, check-ins, and a communication cadence that works for everyone. The leader can get information they need on an ongoing basis to see if things are moving as intended or not. They don’t need to wonder what’s going on, or feel like they are micromanaging, because the check-ins and measurements were agreed to early on. Knowing you have to give your boss a bi-weekly report is different than having her pop in your IMs unscheduled, wondering how things are going.

Process goals allow teams to monitor progress, check assumptions and identify problems early enough to fix them.

What are your teams’ goals? Have you settled not just on WHAT needs to happen, but how it will work? This will give employees the chance to use their drive and good judgment while receiving the coaching, feedback and assistance they need. Leaders have a clear picture of what’s going on even when the work isn’t happening under their noses. They can demonstrate trust, motivation and support to all team members, even those who aren’t in the same space.

We go into this in more detail in the updated second edition of The Long-Distance Leader, Revised Rules for Remarkable Remote and Hybrid Leadership.

Communication & Interpersonal Skills, Long-Distance Leadership, Long-Distance Work

Hybrid Work: Balancing Synchronous and Asynchronous Tools

Real hybrid work is not only balancing who does what work where (should we be in the office three days a week?). For a truly hybrid team, we factor in time. This means we change the question to: What work needs to be done with everyone at the same time, and what can be done when it makes sense?

Hybrid work is a great way to overcome time zones on scattered teams and reduce the need for everyone to gather at the same time to do work that could be done better when people are at their physical and mental best. For this to work, we need to figure out not just what work needs to be done when, but what tools will help you all achieve the best results.

As a refresher, synchronous means, “at the same time.” Tools that meet this criteria include real-time use of Teams/Slack, texting, live webcam and web meetings. It also includes (stick with me) telephone and meeting in-person in real time. Crazy, right?

Asynchronous is defined as “not existing or happening at the same time.” This means chat messages that don’t need to be immediately responded to, ongoing discussions on topics where people can contribute when it’s a good time for them or they’ve had time to think about their responses and emails (I can’t stress this enough- email is NOT a synchronous tool).

Use Synchronous Tools When:

Real-time oral conversation will get the best results. Brainstorming, reaching consensus, answering questions are often achieved well when people actually talk to each other.
There is confusion over a goal or you seem to have reached a dead end in trying to solve a problem. We all know how endless email or chat threads can be frustrating and eventually unproductive. Getting together physically or on a web meeting can cut through some of the frustration and help everyone focus on results.
You need an answer to a question from a subject matter expert. No matter where you work there are times when you know someone has information you need. The more complicated the question, the more likely reaching the right answer will require back and forth, whether that’s oral conversation or a chat exchange.
You want team members to interact with each other for team-building reasons. Human beings build relationships by real-time communication and working in rich ways that enhance verbal, vocal and visual understanding.

Use Asynchronous Tools When:

Time isn’t the primary factor. Not everything requires your teammates to drop everything and respond. Questions that don’t need to be answered this second or require the responder to research, think or just be back at their desk can be handled asynchronously.
You want to give people time to respond to enhance the quality of their thinking or give everyone a chance to respond. Real time brainstorming is great, but studies find that we often give more thoughtful and insightful feedback, and hear from everyone equally, when people don’t feel the pressure to respond immediately. Time to think and craft a thoughtful answer is often underrated.
When you need an answer RIGHT NOW. This might feel like a contradiction with what we said earlier, but simple answers to simple questions can be answered with technology. AI and chatbots are going to play more and more of a role in helping people get information they need in a hurry and get back to work. If it’s noon in Singapore, you don’t want to be waiting until the folks in the New York office are at work to find that file you need.

As we contemplate the future of work, it will be important to consider not only where work gets done, and who does it, but when it happens. A real hybrid approach is thoughtful about these things and not simply trying to recreate the “everyone-in-the-office-at-the-same-time” experience.

For a FREE PDF booklet of 25 tips from the updated The Long-Distance Leader, Revised Rules for Remarkable Remote and Hybrid Leadership, check out KevinEikenberry.com/25tips.

Long-Distance Leadership, Long-Distance Work, Organizational Leadership

Okay, Let’s Talk Amazon’s Decision

By now, anyone interested in remote work has heard about Amazon’s announcement that all administrative folks must go back to the office five days a week. Reactions out in the world have ranged from, “This is the end of remote work,” to “Jeff Bezos is the devil and will pay with everyone quitting.” What is the upshot of this decision? I don’t know and neither do you so sit back and let’s talk about it like grownups.

Based on the article, what do we actually know?

Beginning in 2025, all Amazon office staff are expected to work in the office five days a week.
There is going to be a substantial downsizing of staff (mostly middle management, the most likely group to work from home) and the average manager will have 15% more direct reports than they do now.
The company is going to increase the number of desks and workspaces in their offices. Amazon is not known for its luxurious accommodations and physical spaces already. They may become even more spartan. What will that do for people’s desire to work remotely at least part of the time? Time will tell.
The stated reason is that they are trying to avoid the “Day 2” mentality, a dreaded term inside Amazon that symbolizes corporate stagnation and they feel people are more energized and innovative when they are physically together. Anecdotal evidence says there is a short-term uptick in collaborative behavior whenever circumstances change (it went up during the first days of covid despite being remote, for example. Same with initial Return to Office efforts. Change generates new thinking and energy. Over time these behaviors tend to revert to the norm.
They will track badge-swipes to monitor and enforce the new rules. Amazon has always had some of the toughest employee-monitoring rules in industry. This isn’t new.
There are the predictable complaints and gnashing-of-teeth about increased commute time, work-life balance, and dictatorial policies driving turnover. The easily outraged will be outraged and vocal, the meek will shut up and do it for at least a while.
I’ve spoken to several workers in Seattle who don’t work for Amazon but are worried what this will do to their commutes as thousands more people will be on the roads. Seattle commutes are a bear as it is.

With all of that, there are some points that need to be made that are relevant:

The golden rule applies: the person with the gold makes the rules. Amazon is free to make whatever choices it wants. Despite its cutting-edge computing systems, the business is largely a 20^th Century factory model. Stuff arrives in the warehouse, gets loaded on trucks, and humans deliver the products, 24 hours a day, worldwide. The majority of people were already working on-site. This announcement mostly affects admin and support services.
Turnover doesn’t scare them. Amazon’s turnover rate is 150% and has been for years. Yes, that’s mostly drivers and warehouse people, but when you’re looking at a pretty big reduction in staff, giving people a reason to quit (with a big savings on severance and benefits) is not a bad plan.

Despite all the yelling and drama, I am going to predict certain things will remain true:

The majority of people will fall in line. After all, nobody wants to be unemployed and the resume-boost of working for one of the world’s largest employers will always be tempting to a percentage of workers.
There will be temporary chaos and some turnover, which in this case is as much a feature as a bug. The company is expecting many of these people to go anyway. As we say here in Las Vegas, “everyone knows someone who USED to work at Amazon.”
There will be more pressure than ever on managers, especially first and second line managers, as their responsibilities will increase and there will be pressure to, if not lessen turnover at least not to make it worse. Leadership development will be critical, and it remains to be seen if there are plans to boost L and D efforts to match the changes. There will be less working from home, to be sure, but managers will have more reports in other locations or on other shifts. There will be an increase in remote and asynchronous work the higher you go on the org chart.
We will see the return of “stealth remote.” Before Covid, many offices were a third empty even though people supposedly worked there. Reasons such as sick kids, car trouble, and having to finish a project uninterrupted to meet a deadline will return. Some will be legitimate. Some will be excuses. Lying to the boss has always happened, it should never be institutionalized. We’ll see the rise of “coffee-badging,” where people come in in the morning, swipe their badge (because it’s being monitored) have a cup of coffee or a short meeting with their colleagues then leave. Whenever an unpopular and strict policy is introduced, there is a cottage industry in workarounds and ways to game the system.

We are in the middle of a seismic change in the worker-workplace relationship and the pendulum will swing wildly between tight in-office mandates and loosening of the rules as companies figure out what they need to serve their customers, maintain profits, and create the culture they desire. Companies like Amazon will decide what they want to be, and workers will decide (as much as the economy, geography, and circumstances allow) where they choose to work.

It is all rather predictable. That doesn’t mean it’s not going to be stressful, messy, and weird. What everyone should be thinking about is how will leaders adjust and cope to changing circumstances and are they prepared to lead in a variety of ways for their own (and their employer’s) sake.

Long-Distance Work, Organizational Leadership, Personal & Professional Development

How do you Develop Long-Distance Leaders?

As we become more accustomed to remote and hybrid work, it can feel less novel and more of the norm. That doesn’t mean it comes naturally to people. How do organizations and people in Learning & Development help grow leadership skills that translate to the new way we work?

As we said in the first edition of The Long-Distance Leader and amplified in the new updated version, there are no silver bullets to building this capability, but there are some questions you can ask yourself and your leadership to determine a path forward.

Here are some of the questions you must know the answers to in order to create a leadership development plan:

What kind of company do you want to be? Does your current culture support that vision? Having a clear picture of how a remote workforce fits into the future you want to create is important. Your remote or hybrid situation has probably changed and will continue to evolve. You must keep coming back to this question, as the answer changes over time.
What behaviors do you expect your leaders to exhibit? What skill gaps exist? Odds are that you expect leaders to act like, well like leaders, regardless of where their people work. Traditional leadership skills like communication, delegation and coaching are as important as ever. But the new world of work adds nuances to those skills. Can you communicate in an email or text message so that people feel included and informed. Do you coach people over Zoom as effectively as you do in your office? Find out what skills are needed, and how remote or hybrid work impacts those skills.
What is your plan for developing and supporting your Long-Distance Leaders? Will the Organization support remote team members? Too often, there isn’t a plan to support the new way of working except to “add a course,” or send people to a training class without context and a clear purpose for those attending.

Certainly training (we can help with that!) is part of the answer. So is creating context and systems in your performance management process that encourage learning and addressing the specific needs of remote leaders.

Creating great long-distance leaders is going to take time and support throughout the entire company.

Coaching & Developing Others, Leadership, Long-Distance Leadership

Getting Honest Feedback as a Long-Distance Leader

As a leader, you know that giving feedback is critical to your team, whether they are remote or in-office. Positive feedback, corrective feedback, atta-boy/girls are all critical. We also know that it’s harder to do effectively when you are in a different physical space than your team. Imagine how much more difficult it is to get the feedback WE need as leaders.

Yes, we need feedback as well. Never mind our egos that scream for positive reinforcement (I ran the heck out of that meeting, didn’t I?) We don’t know if we are getting our message across, supporting people with what they need, or building (or eroding) trust unless there is a feedback loop of some kind.

As we pointed out in our book, The Long-Distance Leader, Revised Rules for Remarkable Remote and Hybrid Leadership, there are two problems with trying to get feedback as the leader:

We often don’t ask for it, or think about who it should come from.
People who “answer to us,” don’t usually feel empowered to give feedback, especially if it’s unflattering. Even if we ask nicely for their thoughts, the notion that you can fire them is always lurking in the back of their mind.

How can we get the feedback necessary to do a good job without seeming needy or setting up a stressful situation with our team members?

Start with existing evidence. Before seeking input from people, take a good, honest look at the situation yourself. How do you feel about it? What evidence supports your opinion (good or bad?) Have people indicated there may be an issue that needs addressing? Examine your own actions and attitudes. That way you can be more neutral in receiving information that may not support your ideas or put you on the defensive.
Identify people you trust. Not everyone is going to give you equally valid feedback, even when you ask for it. Developing a network of people you trust to be honest and proactive in offering you positive and negative reinforcement is critical. Trusted advisors can come from any part of the organization. You want people who care about you and your success, people with greater technical expertise than you have, and anyone with first-hand information that you may not possess or have access to. Your team has people on it who understand what’s really happening on the ground and what the team says about themselves. Be careful with this last point. You are looking for a trusted source of information, not a police informant.
Ask open-ended questions. You are looking for honest, constructive feedback so you can keep doing what works, and perhaps alter your behavior if needed. Simple yes/no questions aren’t great for getting those results. “Do you think this will work?” is likely to tell you what you want to hear. “What haven’t I thought of?” or “Based on what you know, what other information should I have?” Especially if you have a trusting relationship with the other person you’re more likely to get actionable, candid answers without making them feel like they are being interrogated.
Shut up. Didn’t see that one coming, did you? But if you seek input, you need to be willing to listen to it and assess it after the fact. If you want to be a better receiver of feedback, people need to know you’re going to listen and judge it fairly without repercussions to them. A couple of things to consider:
- Let them speak first. If you start with, “here’s what I think…” you’ve already told people what you expect to hear from them. Ask them for their input first.
- Ask clarifying questions. People don’t always tell you what they’re thinking the first time. They might be afraid you’ll react negatively, get your feelings hurt, or think badly of them. Drill down on what you’re told to get very specific examples, or to give them the chance to expand on their initial thoughts.
- Evaluate and process the information fairly. Receiving feedback, especially if it’s bad news or counter to our expectations, may create more stress than necessary. Listen objectively to what you hear. It may help to use the PIN technique: Start with the positive aspects of what you heard, identify what’s interesting: unexpected or might need clarification. Then go to the negative reaction. By starting with the positive first, you are less likely to leap to being defensive and give the feedback a fair hearing.

On a remote or hybrid team, feedback may come by webcam, voice, or a single line in a chat message. That’s fine, just make sure that the more explanation, clarification is needed, or potential for miscommunication exists, the richer communication is required. Webcams may be better than text for some of this.

A lot of this you are already doing when offering feedback to others. It’s not only fair, it’s imperative that we get feedback as well.

Leadership, Long-Distance Leadership, Long-Distance Work

The “3 Os.” What’s Changed and What Hasn’t?

One of the most useful models in the first edition of The Long-Distance Leader was the 3O Model. This simply says that for work to be done remotely, we leaders need to remember Outcomes, Others, and Ourselves. As we get ready to launch the updated version, it’s important to ask ourselves, what’s changed and what hasn’t?

What likely hasn’t changed is the Outcomes we want to achieve. Your business probably serves your customers in much the same way you were before 2018 (assuming you were around.) The outcomes—the work you, your organization, and your team do— is likely the same as ever. Customers need to be served, reports written, parts ordered. What we do is much the same as ever. How we do it has changed.

Some of these changes are obvious; others are more subtle. People have had time to reexamine whether work needs to involve long commutes, living close to the office, and time away from the family.

How leading Others has changed

Leading others, either in a fully remote or a hybrid manner, requires us to adjust to the model we would follow for in-person work. How much we trust each other, how we coach our people and how we attract and keep top talent are part of the job. Here are some of the factors that have changed over the past few years:

Employee engagement. Before the pandemic, one of the objections to remote work was employees wouldn’t be as engaged as they are when they are co-located with their peers. In fact, in many cases engagement actually went up when people started working from home. Some of this was due to the sense of mission and helping each other through a crisis. Now we find that people who work remotely or in a hybrid environment and like it, are your most engaged employees. Of course, those who are disengaged are more distant and uninvolved than ever.
Retention and Turnover. It wasn’t surprising that the return to the office has been chaotic. It meant changes in lifestyle, childcare, and even commuting costs. If people want to work mostly or completely remote, there are few barriers to changing jobs, and flexibility in work hours and locations is the most requested perk of new employees.
Relationships that defy distance. The team must intentionally create connections, which we’ve known forever. Having some people in the office and others remote can create unintentional schisms. Proximity bias, perceptions of favoritism, and unintentionally excluding people from decisions and important conversations can happen more easily than we think.

How we tend to Ourselves has changed

As hybrid work takes off, leaders often find themselves stretched thin. Flexible time is great for employees, but it may mean your day begins earlier and ends later than everyone else’s. Too many leaders sacrifice their own time and energy for the sake of the team.

Some of the ways you can take care of your mental/physical health are:

Protect your time. Treat yourself like you do your employees. Set boundaries around when you respond to messages, guard your family time, and take vacation and personal time.
Model realistic expectations and behavior. Use and stand by your out-of-office notifications and status updates. If you write emails at odd times, set your system to send them out at a specific time in the morning so your team doesn’t get messages in the middle of the night and panic.
Make time for your team. Remote employees can’t poke their heads into your office to see if you’re available. Try setting up set office hours where, for a few hours a week, you are available to those who aren’t where you are.
Schedule rest and exercise, and eat like a grownup. As the old saying goes, you aren’t any good to anyone else if you’re not good to yourself. Nobody will begrudge your taking care of yourself, and it may even inspire others to do the same.
Continue to learn and grow. Learning new skills and taking part in training can make you better, faster, and more efficient. It is also fun and challenging to give your brain some exercise. Don’t think of it as a cost, think of it as an investment in you and your team.

How we focus on Outcomes, Others, and Ourselves may have changed over the last few years, but the importance of doing it remains the same. Check out more in our updated edition of The Long-Distance Leader, Revised Rules for Remarkable Remote and Hybrid Leadership.

Long-Distance Leadership, Long-Distance Work, Personal & Professional Development

Why Remote Work is Hard on Trust

Trust is critical to successful remote and hybrid work. If you don’t believe that your team is working away when you can’t see them, it can lead to micromanagement, constant meetings, unproductive check-ins and redundancy. Even with the best of intentions, doubt and suspicion can creep in. But why?

When we work in the office with people every day, we get a thousand little cues about how they work, and what they’re working on. Also, IF they’re working, which is often deceptive since we know plenty of people who look busy and achieve nothing. But the sights and sounds of business help put our doubts to bed. Furthermore, we know that if they have questions or get stuck they can always find us to get answers.

But when we don’t see each other in action, there’s a lot of what I call “white space.” If we assume positive intent, that won’t matter for a while. If Mary says she’s working, you believe her because she’s a good person and so are you.

Until something unexpected happens. How many deadlines get missed, or unusual comments get made on meetings, or just creepy feelings in your gut tell you something’s up do you have to experience before you begin to doubt yourself and your team?

In a perfect world, we would accept what people said and always assume the most positive intent. How’s that working for you?

The fact is humans need almost constant confirmation of our positive beliefs in order to maintain them and keep doubt and suspicion at bay. In its most extreme forms, that can take the form of keyboard trackers, activity monitoring, and constant reports. That can in turn erode the employee’s trust of their manager and organization.

The thing that we need is proof. We need enough evidence to support our positive beliefs or correct negative suspicions, otherwise over time we’ll begin to lose trust. Specifically, we need evidence in three areas:

Purpose and Alignment. Trust is only possible if everyone wants to accomplish the same things for the same reasons. If the manager and organization are focused on outputs, and the employee is focused on accomplishing the tasks they are best at or most enjoy, there will eventually be conflict and working at cross purposes. Does everyone on the team know what the goals are and what’s expected of them?
Competence. This is where we often fall into micromanaging tasks and tracking behaviors. Are people doing good work? Are they competent or are they flailing around? Often you don’t know until deadlines are missed or the quality of the work causes problems. Leaders need to make sure people have clear expectations, and there are (relatively noninvasive, unproductive) ways of measuring output that give enough information to be proactive without being onerous.
Motivation. If we are honest, most of us understand what we are supposed to be doing and know how to do it. The problem is that for reasons big and small, good and ridiculous, we just don’t want to. Motivation is hard to quantify objectively, but leaders need to check with their people regularly. Have there been changes in behavior and engagement on meetings? Have people gone radio silent? Are they doing the bare minimum? Use your one on ones to ask real questions about how people feel about their work, their colleagues, and the team. These will be some of your more uncomfortable conversations, but they are important.

If people are aligned and share a purpose, are competent and motivated, it is easy to maintain trust.

How are you (and the members of the team) getting the evidence needed to build and maintain trust on your remote team.

We talk about, and share a simple graphic model for trust, in the updated version of The Long-Distance Leader, Revised Rules for Remarkable Remote and Hybrid Leadership. It is available now for pre-order and will be available everywhere September 17.

Long-Distance Leadership, Organizational Leadership, Personal & Professional Development

Remote Leadership Isn’t Rocket Science (But it Kind Of Is)

You’ve heard the expression, “it ain’t rocket science.” When it comes to being a long distance leader, we believe that’s true. But it got me thinking about rocket science and working remotely.

As the release of the updated Long-Distance Leader, Revised Rules for Remarkable Remote and Hybrid Leadership approaches, I’ve gone back and looked at some of what we said in the original. This quote always stood out to me:

In visiting with leaders from NASA (a.k.a. rocket scientists), Kevin asked

which was more complex—rocket science or leadership. The response was

swift and simple - leadership was the clear and decisive winner. The group

explained that in the world of building rockets, they can determine a right

answer; they know the equations and formulas. They explained that if they

put the right numbers into the right formulas at the right time (and check

their math), they will get the right answer.

This took me down a rabbit hole of great moments in astronomy and rocketry that took place on distributed teams:

The James Webb Space Telescope sounds like one big thing, but in fact it involved locations in thirteen countries to get it built, and the sites that monitor it are in the US, Australia and Spain.
The international space station has the ultimate hybrid team running it. The space station was not designed to be disassembled, and current interdependencies between each segment of the station prevent the U.S. Orbital Segment and Russian Segment from operating independently. There are control centers in Houston, Texas and Roscosmos in Moscow, Russia. Talk about communication challenges.
NASA has 23 tracking stations around the world that have to work in harmony on space flights, satellite tracking, and other mission critical functions. You think your team is diverse? Try having offices in Shoe Cove Newfoundland, Antofagasta, Chile, and Tanarive, Madagascar.

What makes all these systems work (and forms the basis of rocket science) are two factors.

There are facts grounded in mathematics that are immutable. Math is math, facts are facts, and there are things with absolute right (and wrong) answers.
Communication, trust and relationships between people are imperfect but critical. Objective rocket science can’t happen without people, imperfect as they are.

Similarly, your team gets things done by having clear metrics, KPIs and goals. None of those things mean much if there isn’t trust, communication and engaged people.

You can learn more about our updated, revised version of The Long-Distance Leader, Revised Rules for Remarkable Remote and Hybrid Leadership by joining us at KevinEikenberry.com/LDL.

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