COVID thinking – practical case studies about learning, changing and making a difference

Like most self-employed people, I’ve spent the last 6 months working hard to pivot my business.  My first year was a joyous round of face-to-face engagement on an individual and team basis.  But that doesn’t suit anymore.  COVID forced a critical moment of transformation for me and for many.  Transformation – both personal and professional – is at the heart of my practice so I hoped I’d be good at this.

I’d spent 6 weeks in Australia in February and March 2020 running some brilliant, full-on, face-to-face workshops for Australian universities.  Just before lockdown, I landed in Heathrow with a beautiful memory of the power of personal engagement.  I wondered how soon, if ever, we would return to that way of working. I wondered too how you could begin to create that kind of impact and atmosphere in a digital space.  Since then I have rapidly learned and carefully deployed every tool in the Zoom tool box to enable me to translate the TKCC trademarks of fun, full connection, high emotional intelligence and transformational outcomes into the digital arena.  With slight adjustments some existing contracts translated easily into new ways of working and some totally unexpected and previously inconceivable work opportunities arose. 

Universities and schools are tackling unanticipated, extraordinary and highly complex challenges; they have bravely unfolded their new style academic years in a very turbulent and shifting context.  The UK Government has announced yet another 6 months of social restriction and home working.  And I’ve found myself reflecting on what I’ve seen so far in 2020, what I’ve learned about how to help in strange times and what I have to offer my sector right now. 

Case Study 1: It’s not all Gloom on Zoom: shaping a vehicle for true courage and digital magic

When it looked like the global pandemic and our national politics had pushed us all back behind closed borders and strict boundaries, a powerful and irresistible desire to remain connected surfaced across the globe.  Richmond Associates and CASE Europe asked me to facilitate Zoom gatherings of our communities of practice.  I’m not sure any of us understood at the beginning quite how extraordinary these gatherings would become.  Initially they were a platform to share pain, explore coping strategies and generally seek solace and consolation in a crisis.   But they soon took on a much more creative, energised role.  Inspiration and aspiration emerged.  Debate and discovery became the exciting tone.

For CASE, I initially brought together senior higher education marketers in the UK and Australia.  But that quickly unfolded across the time zones in between and we were joined by peer group across Europe, New Zealand, South Africa, Hong Kong and Singapore.  From 8am London to 7pm Wellington senior HE marketers the world over gathered.  They had heard about the calls and they wanted in.  Once in, they stayed.  As participants commented ‘we are all in the business of recovery not restoration’.  ‘Things are going to change and we want to be right at the heart of the action”.  “Let’s hear, share and learn from how the world is dealing with this”

With Richmond Associates we gathered an invited community of fundraisers, International Schools and Arts organisations from across the globe.  The emerging pattern was similar to the HE marketers.  Initial shock and confusion soon shifted into an uplifting determination. Probably the most energised and inspirational call I facilitated involved the Arts organisations.  One of the most COVID affected communities displayed the clearest, most ambitious, intentions to find ways to survive and thrive.  Their creative, forceful response to their situation was as breath taking as it was practical.  I left the call feeling as high as ever I did after a face-to-face encounter.

I’m very clear that none of these meetings would have happened without the COVID crisis as a catalyst.  I’m also clear that people would not have travelled the thousands of miles involved to hold these meetings face-to-face.  At times of crisis we adapt quickly and grasp the new opportunities and tools we need to survive. I hear and understand the potential for Gloom on Zoom.  Video conferences can be the kiss of death to creativity and engagement BUT I have also experienced and facilitated the most extraordinarily inspirational meetings.  Characterised by emotion, connection, intensity, clarity, ambition and courage. 

Lessons learned:

Emerging truths across the piece suggested that many of the current problems existed long before the virus emerged and should have been tackled long ago.  it was clear to many that Corona hastened and magnified trends that had long been visible.  Backs against the wall, our communities of practice are mighty impressive; they know now is the time for total clarity and the big questions. What is the role and relevance of your organisation in the new world? What is your core purpose? What solutions do you offer? What can you do to help as much as what help do you need? What is your story and are you telling it well enough to the right people? 

The bandwidth for communication and our ability to make meaning is definitely different when its digital but this new way of working is undoubtedly here to stay.  I can’t see the same appetite for endless long haul travel if and when that becomes a possibility.  Indeed, new and bigger horizons open up when travel isn’t on the cards. It does make you wonder about why it took a global crisis to trigger this new, intimate, expansive, climate and time friendly, approach.

As we head into another 6 months of homeworking in the UK, we need to spend time getting better at it.  Zoom can be a vehicle for true courage and global magic if we do it right.  I can help with that as I’ve learned how to encourage the courage and facilitate the magic

CLIENTS:

Richmond Associates:

Richmond Associates is an executive search firm specialising in the recruitment of fundraising teams. With offices in London, Singapore and Sydney, Richmond Associates prides itself on its global reach and local knowledge of the fundraising profession. For many years, through Roundtable events, it has brought together fundraising leaders across the not for profit sector to discuss common challenges.  While previous gatherings were limited by the ability of attendees to travel, the pandemic offered an opportunity to successfully take these conversations virtual and ultimately bring people together from around the world.

CASE:

With offices in Washington DC, London, Singapore and Mexico City, CASE (the Council for Advancement and Support of Education) is the global non-profit association dedicated to educational advancement—alumni relations, communications, development, marketing, and advancement services—who share the goal of championing education to transform lives and society.

Case Study 2:  Emotional intelligence and deep personal encounter in team digital development days - listening to the small voice

When COVID hit, I had been talking to MakeUK for over 6 months.  I was privileged to attend their brilliant, first ever, all staff away day in Birmingham in January.  I was asked to reflect on a piece of work that would address the question  “How can MakeUK best support and empower staff to become even more engaged in driving organisational success?

MakeUK is a fascinating, energetic membership organisation for the UK engineering sector.  It works to support, develop and advocate for engineering companies of all sizes. A new leadership team had just launched an ambitious new strategy and wanted to ensure staff felt engaged, motivated and energised about the organisation’s future.

MakeUK has an unusually diverse and dispersed staff group.  When I first met them there was a major centre in Aston to train apprentices, lawyers and HR experts throughout the UK – many home based – to offer professional support to their members, a venues team with a significant programme of internal and external events to manage, a large central HQ in Westminster and an EU lobby team in Brussels.  Many staff spent more time with members than they did with their MakeUK peers.  It was an interesting challenge to reflect on how to engage such a community.

We had planned a small face-to-face away day in May and had invited a group of the right staff from across the dispersed geographical and professional strands of the MakeUK team to attend.  It soon become clear that a face-to-face meeting was out of the question.  Initially we saw no alternative but to cancel the event but soon decided to go ahead with a digital half day instead.

I used every Zoom tool to facilitate a fully interactive 4-hour video conference to consider How can MakeUK best support and empower staff to become even more engaged in driving organisational success?  The intention of the day was to unleash the best ideas staff have about how to make a real difference to Make UK staff engagement at a time of change and turbulence.  Staff worked hard to imagine, explore and develop practical ideas that might help.

Everyone on the call was profoundly affected by the pandemic, some people involved were furloughed, others had received risk of redundancy letters.  This created a particular context for the day that was explored early in the meeting.  People clearly felt emotional, anxious and on a ‘rollercoaster’.  To their great credit all participants engaged fully, optimistically and wholeheartedly with the central question. The Make UK staff on the call were passionate about their organisation and cared deeply about its future success.  Quick fire, small group, discussions allowed the 17 best ideas to emerge and those ideas were then given a priority for action by the overall group.  The report was submitted to leadership and the first 4 ideas were implemented within days.

The staff involved clearly valued the process, they said:

“there was a real human touch today that isn’t always part of my day now”

“this was a great way of working, can we do more meetings like this please”

“I’d love to see the Executive Team take part in this sort of day”

“this is a great step forward and I was very pleased to be involved”

“it was a great forum for discussion”

“I particularly loved the break out groups and the opportunity to meet lots of new people in a small group”

Lessons learned:

It seems emotional intelligence and deep human encounter can be achieved on video conference calls. Even at the hardest of times, team building and staff engagement days can flourish with  the new tools.  Digital debate, difficult discussions and thoughtful decision making can co-exist in an event that is both fun and effective.

Also – it seems Zoom might better facilitate engagement with voices ordinarily not heard.  I  witnessed the opportunity for both intimacy and group engagement and saw that Zoom, especially in small break out groups, can be less intimidating than being in a large room with a big team.  The quiet, unconfident voices emerged and were heard. Whatever happens in the future, this style of staff consultation adds a new and powerful growth tool to the toolbox, one that places more emphasis on the facilitation and the facilitator skills.

CLIENT: 

MakeUK

Make UK is a membership organisation that champions and celebrates British manufacturing and manufacturers. It builds a platform for the evolution of UK manufacturing

Case Study 3: the value of coaching in a crisis, recognising the power of human frailty and vulnerability

 

Being a work coach is always a privilege.  Witnessing and supporting the deeply human challenges of leadership is humbling.  Being a work coach at such a time as this has been extraordinary.  Mostly I sat alongside people as the unbearably unpredictable and shockingly unthinkable exploded into their lives.  Institutions  looked to their leaders for clarity and reassurance when the capacity to offer either was in very short supply.  People were overwhelmed and tearful and I was pleased to see that as it seemed the only sane response to what was going on. Human frailty was much in evidence.  I helped create a confidential space to think and, at times, to despair.  People gave honest vent to the fear and anxiety they were keeping from their teams as they rapidly and resiliently started to make sense of what next.  Holding on to the long-term interests of the institution, its staff and its students in the tsunami of the immediate and overwhelming crisis was not easy.

I offered free coaching via LinkedIn to anyone who felt they needed it – an offer that was taken up in those first few weeks and months by people as they tried to roll with the crisis. I found it hard to watch my community struggle and not to be at the heart of an institutions at such a time.  This was one thing I could do to help

Additionally, I had the very greatest pleasure of working as a work coach with the CASE Asia Pacific Graduate  Advancement interns as they started their year-long programmes in Australian universities.  Imagine starting your higher education career in a crisis and in lockdown.  They are a remarkable group of young people trying to navigate uncharted waters.  My COVID work coach lens has spanned the professional generations from first few months in higher education to leading through the biggest work crisis in your 30-year university career.  It’s not easy for anyone.

Lessons learned:

What I know now I think I have always known.  Coaching helps.  I was lucky enough to have the very best work coach for the best part of 20 years so I can testify to its benefits.

From what I see the people who are navigating this complexity best are those who are not afraid to acknowledge and show their human frailty.   Honest human emotion and transparency helps when there are no easy or obvious answers.  Perhaps the ability to be vulnerable is one of the greatest leadership behaviours and one that is ironically often still held to be a sign of weakness.  These days, I think we all need to be a ‘bit more Jacinda’.  One of the most impressive global leaders of our age, Ms Ardern said:

“One of the criticisms I've faced over the years is that I'm not aggressive enough or assertive enough, or maybe somehow, because I'm empathetic, it means I'm weak. I totally rebel against that. I refuse to believe that you cannot be both compassionate and strong”