“Talent wins games, but teamwork and intelligence wins championships.” – Michael Jordan…

The whole will always be greater than the sum of the individual parts isn’t it? While most of us, will agree with this, the important issue to be addressed is keeping your flock chirpy and fluttering in a black swan event.

As per Mckinsey Global Institute, productivity improves by 20 to 25 percent in organizations with connected employees .

We aim to offer an inside out perspective on this by first analysing the problems that the changing work styles create. We then offer some potential solutions by talking about practices that we have adopted during these times.

What problems do we envisage?

Corona has affected different economies in varying measures. The responses have also varied from a relatively less strict form to a complete lockdown depending upon the infection growth rates. Most of the workforce across companies have had to work from home (WFH). The problem is multifaceted with the following issues requiring consideration.

Lack of mobility (A boon or a bane?)

Most employees would have complained about the travel times to their offices given the traffic situation in metro cities across the globe. For people who are required to do inter-city travel or international travel, too much of travel has always been a challenge. The too much has been reduced to a zero in most cases. The trade-off between too much and too is based on the desire to socialise at work.

A vast majority of the world’s 2.7 billion workers – 80 percent – don’t sit at desks and are harder to engage (Source: The Rise of the Deskless Workforce report)

A normal working day is spaced out with multiple tea/ coffee based conversations about anything and everything.  They are an accepted mode of socializing, connecting and letting your frustrations out. Outings, fun-Fridays, team lunches are again various ways of getting people together in an off-work scenario. Not getting to mingle and have those informal conversations is quite damaging to employee’s morale. Each of such interactions during normal times whether they are had with your own small group or larger gatherings in the company is a way of resetting to zero or clearing the pent-up energies. The monotonous nature of the current work scenario has cut-off off this behavioural side of the work environment.

Unstructured work environment (Flexibility or rigidity?)

The flexibility offered through work from home options in normal times has been replaced with a rigidity manifested through working in an unstructured environment.

The workforce has typically been used to a structured work environment in terms of office timings, dedicated workspace and a daily work schedule which is peppered by weekly offs. 

In the current situation, the boundaries between professional and personal space have merged. This has led to:

• Inadequate non-office time- people login in the morning and continue till late since they are connected online. Contrary to the belief the WFH scenario has resulted in less family time than otherwise
• Unstructured day routines- employees who were comfortable with set morning, afternoon and evening routines are witnessing a disruption leading to lack of productivity
• Workspace issues- outside of IT and ITES workforce (used to WFH), few employees are struggling with the issue of disturbance free dedicated workspace in their homes
• Increased stress levels- unstructured work environment has increased the stress level  though it does provide food for thought  to create and implement new ideas

Contraction of work

Productive work has reduced in many organizations. This has resulted in:

• Boredom – many people are finding it difficult to deal with the change; too much reduced to a little. The initial reactions on relief gave way to concern in the extended lockdown period.  The adage, empty mind is a devil’s workshop has come true once again resulting in lack of focus and low productivity. A gallup study found out that costs of disengaged employees is ~ $ 300 billion annually
• Questions on sustainability – Many companies have resorted to pre-emptive measures from a sustainability perspective. From promotion and bonus deferrals, to compensation realignment to employees being offered sabbatical to eventual job cuts, the responses triggered by COVID are graded on a continuum. This again has had a cascading effect on productivity. 41% of employees listed job security as the most important reason to stay in a company (Willis Tower Watson Study)
• Employee retention – While the job market isn’t very favourable in the current times, the top performers will always be in demand and may look out further causing a dent in organizational productivity. Highly Engaged employees are 75% less likely to be looking for a job compared to actively disengaged employees (Bonusly’s employee engagement and modern workplace report)

What have we done?

Employee motivation methods are defined as the “psychological forces that determine the direction of a person’s behaviour in an organization, a person’s level of effort and a person’s level of persistence”. 

In order to take care of the problems leading to an adverse effect on employee motivation, we offer a three-pronged solution to deal with the issue. The solutions though not unique have been implemented with all seriousness which has made the difference. The three solutions are behavioural and physical interventions to up the skill levels, feed important information and make them persist enough by taking care of their desire to socialise. The solutions have also helped to reinforce couple of our values which are believing in a “Caring meritocracy” and an “Open and honest communication.”

Presented below is our account of the solutions which are:

Keeping them engaged

Lack of productive work needs a suitable replacement. We thought it fit to utilise the available time to upskill our employees. In the normal course, the HR department would take care of the trainings, however, to make everyone participate and hear it from the horse’s mouth, we had leadership (including our CEO) get down to explaining the basics. In our case it meant trainings on aspect such as business problem solving, effective client communication and project management refreshers. Even the seniors in the teams were not spared from these sessions.

Rigor of these sessions was exciting. Most sessions had maximum of 40% theory and the remaining time was the practice. The practice wasn’t a one of exercise. Most participants were doing three to six iterations over few days to perfect the output. Each of the iterations was checked by the trainers themselves.

Many of us admitted that the training possibly was more difficult than a real-life scenario but then it ensured that the thrill which was missing was more than compensated. Additionally, the seriousness of the sessions meant that everybody took home something tangible which they understood and practised. Also having the executive leadership talk to the team multiple times one on one was also an experience to cherish.

The training sessions helped the employees unleash their full potential. The trainers were able to condition an individual’s approach to a new engagement and thought process to approach it.

Keeping them informed

The COVID timing coincided with our semi-annual performance review (SAPR) cycle. We were in the midst of our SAPR discussions when COVID and its repercussions started to unfold.

The SAPR discussions were conducted as usual focusing on one’s strengths and developmental areas. This obviously meant that the business operations would continue to happen in the normal course. From a liquidity and expense management standpoint, there were deliberations in a closed group but communicating those was again a priority.

We conducted a townhall to keep our employees informed of the management decisions. The objective was to get rid of the grapevine and remove the unnecessary panic about sustainability. Even outside of the townhall, some of the juniors reached out to the seniors individually to know the “inside” story and the real motives. This has been our way of promoting an open and honest communication.

Keeping them connected

Finally, the most important element of our motivational package is our online fun events. The fun Friday activities are now conducted twice a week, over online conference call. After all you do not take breaks only on Fridays isn’t it? We have had around six such sessions until now and are obviously looking for more.

We started with Alias (a modified online version of dumb charades ☺), played Pictionary and then celebrated Easter by drawing and designing Easter eggs. We also had a modified painting competition and the latest round had people guessing each other’s secrets and their identifies through childhood photographs.

On one hand while our respective creative abilities were pushed to the hilt, on the other it provided the much needed escape route to vent out and socialize on a regular basis. These activities have been even more fun filled than the usual fun Fridays. Also, unlike the training sessions which were conducted with utmost seriousness the online sessions saw lot of leg pulling, side banter and the fun filled exchanges which made it look like a normal workplace.

Closing remarks

We believe we have been successful as a team in tackling the addressing the problems that this article highlights. The lockdowns may continue, but for us the life will go on as usual dealing with a bunch of highly talented and exciting young professionals. After all,

“I don’t want to be a product of my environment; I want my environment to be a product of me.”  – Frank Costello

About the authors

Shravan Potnis is a director in Sutra Management Consultancies. He brings to the table an experience of over 19 years and more than 75 engagements in the areas of risk management, strategy and analytics. He is passionate about creating and nurturing young talent.

About us

We are a business consulting firm, which uses analytics as one of its core strengths to deliver value to clients across the globe. We come with a rich experience in consulting in the domain of marketing, risk, strategy, corporate finance and process improvement. To know more visit us at Sutra Management Consultancies website.