by Peter A. Arthur-Smith, Leadership Solutions, Inc.®

“As remote working stretches on, companies are encountering its limitations,” by Chip Cutter, Exchange Section Article, Wall Street Journal, July 2020

Right on the heels of our post-Pandemic crisis, so many organizations are left to decide: ‘Do we pull our people back to the office or let them stay put at home?’ There are at least three main options: pull everyone back into the office, let everyone continue working from home, or let those who wish to return to the office do so while others continue working from home.

Since it’s always difficult to satisfy everyone, the answer likely lies within the nature of your leader-manager team. As managers are inclined to be systems and process oriented and leaders are prone to be people and progress oriented: the former will presumably feel more comfortable with everyone under their watchful eye administering day-to-day procedures. On the other hand, leaders will adapt to whatever makes their people feel comfortable to produce their best work output; all within a consensus framework and effective working principles.

Let’s take a further look at these two people-activity styles. Given an ongoing work assignment, managers – largely on their own – will project the numbers they want, plan in detail how those numbers will be achieved, organize their workers to produce those numbers, direct their workers and support staff to efficiently sustain those numbers, and control everything-everyone to ensure those numbers are produced on time and within budget. This often leads to rather regimented systems that their people ‘have to’ go along with. Such an approach more-or-less demands that their people are office based as much as possible.

Leaders, on the other hand, take a different stance. They work closely with their team members to envision what needs to be accomplished within a given timeframe, position effective resources, logistics, and support to facilitate success, engage their people through innate motivators to give of their best, collaborate with everyone around them to help ease their team’s way forward, and orchestrate the necessary momentum to more than accomplish what’s required. An approach like this leaves it open as to whether their team members are in the office or work from home. Either way, when their people are properly led, they will produce their best effort and ‘smarts’ because they ‘want to’. Only what’s best for their own personal safety and well-being is vital.  

Newspaper headlines shout, ‘End of the Office? Not so Fast!’ Despite the surprising success of working from home – not so surprising for this writer – there’s a chorus building to pull people back to the office at their earliest. That chorus complains that projects take longer, training is tougher, and hiring-integrating new people is more complicated. It also points out that people are less connected and that younger professionals are not developing at the same rate as they would within an office environment.

Reflecting back on our earlier manager-leader comparisons, this all sounds like typical smoke-screens that managers will deploy to have staff back under their watchful eye as soon as is practicable. They prefer having people at their fingertips and ensure they are toeing the party line. Having control every step of the way is extremely important to them.

There is one important activity that leaders will utilize with remote working that managers would rarely use. Leaders will pull their people together, preferably in person, if not by Zoom, every two weeks or monthly. This could either be in the office or at a convenient location where they can properly socially distance with masks on. By ensuring their team

members are properly prepared and their meeting is appropriately led, they will have an enjoyable and fruitful session.

Not to dismiss the manager’s ‘poetic’ rather than real reason for pulling staff back to the office as soon as possible: let’s consider what leaders would do to offset their issues:

» Projects take longer – Since leaders take due time to allow their people to fully visualize and embrace what needs to be done: then, assuming they have the right resources available, they will do whatever is necessary to complete their projects in a timely way.

» Training gets tougher – By using In-Team Discovery sessions – which includes using Zoom where required – people can educate each other in team settings by sharing know-how and expertise; and provide ongoing feedback.

»Hiring-Integrating New People – By allowing existing team members to interview candidates also by Zoom, where necessary, they can help their hiring leader arrive at a consensus perspective. If there is the possibility of socially-distanced team meetings, any finalists can be invited there, too. The ‘wisdom of the crowd’ often pays off when hiring new people.

Pursuit of these suggestions, in conjunction with two-weekly or monthly in-person sessions, means there will be little issue with connectedness. Leaders will also be in touch with their people fairly regularly for appropriate reasons and will encourage team members to connect with each other where necessary. Either through in-person or ‘In-Team Discovery’ sessions with Zoom, team members can gauge how younger professionals are developing. Where necessary they will team them up with colleagues to help them along. Their overall Team Leader will also watch any rookie’s progress, too.

So the reality is that proponents wanting people back in the office is a likely red herring to cover for their own leadership shortfalls. During the lockdown, Inc magazine interviewed a company owner who started his business back in 2008 during the Great Recession. Right out of the box he had his people working from home. The company has now expanded to 800 strong and they still don’t have any offices…and all is well.

Even prior to COVID days, leaders naturally empowered their people, encouraged camaraderie in or out of the office, and treated their team members with enormous respect. Additionally, they always ensured their team had a compelling purpose, enabled them to achieve valuable milestones, and encouraged them to strive for mastery in their own domains.

It’s about time executives started treating their people like adults. They can then call on those adults to work with them to meet their constraints, as well as take advantage of their opportunities. All of this would be much better than complaining about the hand they’ve been dealt; probably an excuse for their inability to really motivate and pull their people together to meet any challenges. They should start viewing their people as incredible resources – as they did when they first hired them – rather than just ‘pairs of hands.’

In the end, it doesn’t particularly matter where a person’s office is, as long as they have access to quality leadership!

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