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In an earlier story, I reflected on the impact of the covid lockdowns on the team and, in that moment, the prioritisation of the team's personal needs over business outcomes.

 

All too often, leaders and managers believe their sole focus must be, at all times, to the benefit of the business and view any divergence away from this as not valuable. These leaders and managers typically fall into the group that I deem ‘transactional and motivated by self’. 

 

The reality is that any investment you make to connect to your team, individually and collectively will absolutely be to the benefit of the organisation… long term.

 

The last two words ‘long term’ are what is important here. Connecting to your people, understanding why they do what they do, accommodating this in a balanced way will buy you respect and loyalty that will come into play when the going gets tough for your business. 

 

It is poor social economics to sacrifice team trust and culture for short term gain. Important to note, if you ‘hurt’ one in a tight knit team, you will be hurting all. That can irrevocably damage culture and ultimately business performance. 

 

So how do you connect to your people? This is different for different people. I will talk about what works for me but it might be different for you.

 

In my early leadership years, I believed that there needed to be a clear separation between leaders and workers. This caused me to create a work personal that was formal, a bit detached and somewhat clinical. In other words, I was acting like a bit of a dick!

 

Whilst I thought I was ‘managerial’, the reality was that I was seen as aloof, serious and a bit awkward. Basically I was uncomfortable acting that role and it came through in my persona.

 

Moving forward a few years, once I discovered the authentic me was more effective as that other persona, I discovered the connections with my teams were deepened and became much more productive. Because of this deeper connection I could actually have harder conversations and constructive dialog with teams around performance and delivery. 

 

One of the key changes for me was that I showed vulnerability. If I was having a bad day, if asked I would share this. Conversely my team would also share their bad days so it helped me gauge if there were systemic issues within the team dynamics that I needed to address. Allowing this vulnerability was a very difficult thing for me to do. I have been described as a ‘very controlled’ person so unpacking and exposing weakness on my part was challenging, but once I did, this behaviour was reflected back to me through my engagements with my team, through heightened respect and trust.

 

The above comments do come with a warning. There is a fine line to be walked between being vulnerable and being seen as weak. Maintaining the balance between colleague to colleague conversation and leadership discussions is essential. 

 

I have on the odd occasion ‘created monsters’ in that team members misread my openness as a mandate to challenge. This requires swift action to correct if you have an influential team member ‘butting heads ‘ with you. This can cause disruption to the underlying culture of your teams and start unravelling the trust you have built up over time. Sometimes, it is the right time for these people to take up new opportunities elsewhere.        

 

Never be scared to lose a person. The next person will come with different knowledge, experience and perspectives, all of which will enrich your business in a different way.