Good Leadership Works No Matter Where Your Workforce Is

How leading 1,600 colleagues from another continent prepared me for today’s remote work reality

Does distance really make the heart grow fonder? That’s what managers everywhere are asking these days.

With the Delta variant triggering a new wave of concerns about returning to the office, remote work remains the norm, with many employers planning hybrid models down the road. It’s an arrangement many have come to embrace. In PwC’s latest U.S. Remote Work Survey, more than half of employees said they would prefer to work remotely at least three days a week even after the pandemic is over.

For all the benefits of a distributed workforce, however, some business leaders fear the downside: unsupported employees, loss of productivity, communication breakdowns and a lack of company culture. According to a recent Gartner survey, just 47 percent of managers feel prepared for their evolved role.

As new as this challenge feels for some, it’s familiar to those of us who led a distributed workforce even before the pandemic. As Human Resources Director for Commercial, Indirect Channel and Americas at BT Global; I support 1,600 employees in the Americas —from my home office in the United Kingdom.

Throughout the pandemic, I’ve been reminded of what it takes to keep the fondness in manager-employee relationships. As it turns out, the approach that works from an ocean away applies equally well to the short distance between cubicles—thanks to technology.

Saying that empathy is vital to healthy leadership is a bit like saying, exercising is vital to a healthy lifestyle. Almost everyone agrees, but few follow through: In Businessolver’s sixth annual State of Workplace Empathy survey, only 25 percent of employees said they feel that empathy is sufficient at their organizations.

To close the gap, we need to demystify empathetic leadership. Empathy is a skill, after all — and one you can learn.

I find that something as simple as regular check-ins goes a long way. It’s how you stay attuned to people’s individual needs, which is more crucial than ever since not everyone will manage their workloads at home the same way.

In their book, Compassionomics, physicians Stephen Trzeciak and Anthony Mazzarelli describe studies in which doctors had compassionate conversations with patients. Though each conversation was extremely short—less than 40 seconds—the researchers measured a significant decrease in patient anxiety and increase in health outcomes.

So empathy doesn’t necessarily take substantial time commitments. It’s about being intentional in the moment — or even the minute.

Do companies need to rethink KPIs, or key performance indicators, for remote staff? It’s a question I am asked almost daily. The answer is yes. And no. Performance measurement should always be reviewed by objectives, not time spent.

Research shows that team members spread across multiple time zones often end up working longer hours to accommodate others’ schedules. If I meet with a team in California at 2 p.m. my time, they’re on at 6 a.m. their time. Add the demands of childcare and schedules at home, and the result is low productivity and burnout. We need to accommodate for non-traditional hours and asynchronous work.

But if I can’t see my staff—whether that’s in the office or by a green dot next to their name online—how do I know they’re being productive? This line of thinking is a root cause of presenteeism: when employees are on the job but not truly productive. Unlike absenteeism, which causes companies to lose four days each year per employee, presenteeism costs them 57.5 days—over 14 times more.

When the focus is on being present, but employees aren’t given the support they need to be at their best, it ultimately costs companies drastically more.

Communication breakdowns are notoriously costly for companies, and remote work only heightens the risk. Managers often compensate by communicating more: more meetings, check-ins and status updates.

Instead, leaders should focus on precision and establish exact expectations. Think back to Aristotle’s elements of circumstance—the classic “Who, what, when, where, why?” Those are questions every manager should answer. Who should do the work? What exactly needs to be done? By when? Where should it be delivered? And it is always helpful to explain how the deliverable fits into a bigger picture, so that employees see the significance of their work.

Continuous engagement can help, but it doesn’t mean micromanaging or having extraneous meetings. It means being supportive and efficient—regularly communicating that you are available to answer questions and care about the well-being of your staff. Being in lockdown has enabled us to learn so much more about our colleagues, not only in their working life, but their home and personal lives too. Use this opportunity to really connect even more with your teams, not only by asking if there is “Anything I can do to help?” and How is your bandwidth?” but check in on how things are at home. Be connected, be personal, and go much further than “What’s the ETA?” or “Can you give me a status update?”

As many of us have discovered over the last year, managing remotely can feel isolating at times. But you’re not alone—technology is your ally.  

At the click of a button, I’ve used BT’s collaboration tools to really connect with my team. Being able to see them instantly, getting to know their children, their dogs being on calls, how amazing US homes really are, has truly enabled us to connect as a team and has brought the BT values of being personal, simple and brilliant to life. Collaboration tools can really help global leaders connect with their teams all around the world and help foster a culture of connectivity. Nothing can beat human face-to-face interaction, but whilst that is still challenging during the global pandemic, technology can help ensure that personal connection is there like never before.

Technology plays an outsized, but often overlooked, role in a distributed workforce. A recent Emergence Capital survey showed that 96 percent of employees point to communications as the number one area where technology is most needed. Yet 60 percent are unsatisfied with what they are provided at work. In fact, 56 percent report using their own personal technology to fill the gaps.

To be sure, collaboration software is a must. A multi-channel, multiplatform communication approach creates avenues for your people to stay on the same page. Using technology to link the team together will create a “digital community” where everyone is included.

It’s tempting to reduce culture to the most playful or indulgent aspects of office life. But that’s a misunderstanding of culture and how it fosters connectivity. Things like foosball tables and in-house chefs are what former MIT professor Edgar Schein calls “artifacts.” Real culture is about your organization’s deeper beliefs and behaviors. And technology allows you to build those even with a distributed workforce.

Some people think remote work works because of technology. But technology alone isn’t enough. It’s the marriage of nimble digital tools with sound management principles that works best — proving that, yes, distance can make the heart grow fonder.