Many of us work in a hurried, reactive environment. We tactically respond to what's coming at us each week, each day, even by the hour, like the game of Whack-a-Mole. The pace is not sustainable. This approach is causing exhaustion for managers and even for our most engaged team members. 

I hear from managers about the disorder that happens in the workplaces. They are tired, bewildered, and don’t know how to fix the system that they created or in some cases inherited. While doing the great work of delivering client projects, helping earn new business we sometimes forget the critical work of developing a team and sustainable systems to make the work and workplace thrive. So, we live in this place of antiquated systems, tools, processes and wonder how to unravel this ball of yarn, but then another client deliverable is due and the job of working on the team is set aside.

I know the place that you’re in, and the feeling of overwhelm. 

You might be managing from a reactive stance if some of these situations sound familiar;

• News among the team, and the company, often travels through the grapevine and rarely comes from management.

• Some people are in the know about important company info, while others, who are equally qualified, remain unaware. This causes discontent but let me point out that it also causes equity and proximity issues. 

• The team is not aligned on priorities.

• Team members may struggle with loneliness or lack of connection individually or with each other.

• The work feels transactional, and employees feel like a cog in the wheel of a big production with little personal benefit.

In an impulsive environment, we can fail to communicate important details with our team. This leaves employees, managers, directors, and even senior leaders occasionally in a confused dark space and often leads to frustration at its best, and active employee disengagement at its worst. If you’re familiar with the eNPS score, actively disengaged team members are considered “detractors”. They are actively not promoting your workplace. In fact, usually, they are actively complaining about it to their friends, neighbors, in line at the coffee shop, and those complaints are like poison to coworkers. Very few companies can withstand a trend of actively disengaged employees.

Here’s the bad news: the outside world might not get any less chaotic any time soon.

But the good news is that you can create a calm, stable work environment anyway by proactively leading your team. Sounds great ... but who has the time for that?

I get it, making this kind of change to move away from chaos can feel like one more overwhelming thing in a long list of overwhelming things. And I’m not going to lie, this kind of change does take a lot of effort upfront. But it pays off in stability, consistency, innovation, and performance.

(And just in case that’s not convincing enough for you, if you don’t make these changes, you’re creating an unsustainable future for your team and risk employee dissatisfaction, productivity, and regrettable turnover.)

The key to success? Consistency.

I’ve noticed in two decades as an HR professional that the teams and leaders who harness a methodical, intentional approach to communicating and leading a team have stability in their workforce. Consistency is the key. Identify how you want to lead and manage your team and stick with it.

And if you do nothing else, host a regular team meeting.

It’s not that this will magically solve your problems overnight, but you have to start somewhere, and I recommend implementing an effective team meeting. If you're not already hosting a team meeting, start with a consistent and dependable one. Or, if you have one but it feels stale or fruitless, reinvent it.

The benefits of a healthy, transparent, and dependable team meeting are palpable, here are a few from my experience working with mid-sized businesses:

• Connections thrive among the whole team  

• Team members develop a strong level of trust in their manager that they are knowledgeable about the happenings in the business

• Together, teams can solve problems, it’s not just for the manager and the individual who has the problem

• Brainstorming power multiplies in team meetings   

• Employees report feeling a sense of belonging

• Crosstraining and employee development thrive  

Above all: do not cancel your team meeting! 

The meeting can only work if you actually have the meeting!

Even if your agenda feels light, and you simply come together to bond, and follow through on your promise of hosting a team meeting, that’s a win. Don’t be the manager who cancels the meeting at the last very last second, or shows up and says, “Well, we don’t really have anything on the agenda this week, so...” Set a proactive agenda to effectively communicate important information with your team. It’s a simple, wide-reaching, and effective way to infuse stability and tip your culture in a positive direction.

Not sure whether your team meetings are worth the time? (Or maybe you’re pretty sure they are not?)

I’m here to help.

Check out my on-demand course, Building Blocks to an Effective Team Meeting. It’ll set you up for success with a downloadable course agenda and the exact components to include in your regular team meeting agenda.

Running the Manager Training Series is one of my very favorite things to do ... but I’m not going to lie, this cohort last year had me at the brink.

We were talking about department meetings in general, and they had sooooo many questions.

• ​What would I include and not include?

• Who should run the meeting?

• Should they have a prepared agenda?

• Should the manager hosting the meeting be the only one talking?

• Is a team builder or icebreaker even necessary for an established team?

• What about notes or minutes, if yes, who should take them?

• And, on and on...

This line of questioning went on into delirium. But it did make me ponder their dilemma. Learning about the higher-level stuff was great. But they also wanted to know precisely how I would structure a departmental meeting if I were hosting one.

By the end of the line of questions, it was clear that they wanted my EXACT FORMULA for an effective team meeting. And, friends, this is how The Ideal Team Meeting​ formula was incubated. 

Later that day, I scratched out my ideas and added them to our private LinkedIn group. You know what? It worked! 

The next week a participant said, ​"​Hey Amy​,​ I tried your ideal team meeting format and it worked! Starting with that team builder that you recommended the format worked for my team.​"​ 

Thanks to this cohort, I’ve been deliberating on making more guides like this for SIX MONTHS. Over winter break, I recorded an on-demand that answers the question of exactly what you should include, how, and why. This also led me to plan a series of related classes that will support your curiosity in taking a deeper dive into some management tactics that we talk about at a high level during the ​M​anager ​T​raining ​S​eries.

And now, I’m very pleased to announce that Building Blocks to an Effective Team Meeting is ready and available for you to make your meetings that much better.

I’ve tested this with a few clients, and here is what one of them had to say:

"The Building Blocks to an Effective Team Meeting course hit the spot in terms of giving both conceptual and actionable guidance to address my current needs. I'm adopting The Ideal Team Meeting Agenda and adapting it to meet the needs of my senior leader meeting."

— David Weiner, CEO, Social Studies School Service

So if you’ve ever been in a meeting that’s less than great (or run one yourself!) check it out!

A practical guide to more empathetic management

McGeachy Consulting, LLC

Have you noticed that people are a bit more ... edgy in the workplace these days? From your direct report being moved to tears by well-meaning constructive feedback or that one person everyone tip toes around because they never know what might set them off, the world of work has definitely changed.

Organizational Development leaders have been talking about empathy and connection as qualities of inspiring leaders for some time but now, in this post-COVID era, when people are returning to the office, working hybrid, feeling overwhelmed, possibly even burnt out, pulled in many directions, empathy and connection seem vital to positive relationships at work.

But does it really make a difference? And how do you make it happen?

Short answer: yes, and practice.

The Center for Creative Leadership has found that “Empathy in the Workplace is positively related to job performance.” That's relevant to everyone, managers and individual contributors. Also they noted that managers experience two boosts to their performance by practicing empathy. First, they were viewed as a better supervisor to their direct reports. And, "Managers who practiced empathetic leadership toward direct reports were viewed as better performers by their bosses."

How to be empathetic in the workplace:

A lot of it comes down to how you interact in conversation with the people around you. Something as simple as using empathetic statements can really make a difference. For instance, when someone...

• shares bad news with you

• expresses a complaint (even if it's about you!)

• discloses their feelings or fears

...consider saying something like,

• I’m so sorry, I don't even know what to say right now, but I'm glad you shared this with me

• It makes sense that you feel ___________.

• It sounds like you've done everything you could

• I'm sorry you're experiencing this right now

• I understand how you feel

Empathy vs. sympathy

It’s also important to note that we’re talking about empathetic here, not sympathetic.

Empathy is digging into your painful past, pulling up your own feelings similar to what the person just shared with you, and responding. I know I'm in empathy with someone when I physically feel it in my chest. When someone shares that their family dog has passed, my body immediately pulls up those aching feelings, and I goes straight to empathy. “I'm so sorry to hear that. I don't even know what to say, but I'm glad you told me.” And then I usually say something like, “Let the ugly tears flow”, because I know from my own experience that it's healthier to let them out than hold them in. 

By noteworthy contrast, a sympathetic response would be something like; “At least it was only your dog and not a family member” (Ouch!”, or worse, “That will save you a bunch of money on dog food and vet appointments (double ouch)”. You know you have defaulted to using sympathy when the words at least are included in your response. 

Here are a couple of real-life examples to help you really integrate the difference:

Empathy in the Workplace, McGeachy Consulting, LLC

If you take away one thing from this blog, put a sticky note on your desk, reminding you not to use the words "at least" if you intend to be empathetic. And, watch yourself when you try and one-up someone’s situation when a dose of empathy would be beneficial instead.

I'm practicing using empathy to build better connections with people, I hope you will too. Our workplaces, and the world, need it.  

And, of course, if you’d like help in developing your managerial skills for this new world of work, I’m here to help. See how we can work together here.

Imagine you’re an employee who doesn’t fit within the traditional binary restroom designations. Imagine also that you want to do what’s right, use the ‘correct’ restroom, but there is no right designation for you. You are a respectful and conscientious employee. What should you do if you need to use the restroom in a workplace that only has binary bathrooms available? 

It’s a dilemma.

Most workplaces were configured with a women’s restroom and a men’s restroom and if you’re lucky those are single-stall facilities. In that case, you have the option to make them all gender-neutral and equally available to all, regardless of gender. 

Unfortunately, it’s often much more complicated than that. Workplaces that have a men's restroom and a separate women's restroom with many stalls make it difficult to transition to a more accommodating facility. 

It’s worth making the change though –– and here’s why.
It might surprise you that OSHA (Occupational Health and Safety Administration) has something to say about workplace restrooms. OSHA requires workplaces to provide adequate restrooms for the number of employees onsite. In their best practice document, they go further to say that, “All employees, including transgender employees, should have access to restrooms that correspond with their gender identity.”

That leaves entrepreneurs with a chance to get creative, and yes, invest some cash into facility reconfiguration. Each workplace will have its own challenges, space, and existing facilities making the approach to solving your dilemma purely custom. One example of a creative solution is at the Moxy Hotel, in Portland, Oregon. They have one restroom for all, with floor-to-ceiling walls for each stall, and a communal handwashing station, making the entire facility gender-neutral. They have vibrant music pumping into the restroom creating a hip vibe, for a restroom.

Given the makeup of your facilities, you will need to engage your creative thinking brain.

Do note that 12% of Millennials identify as nonbinary and Millennials make up 35% of the US workforce. You should assume that there are nonbinary or transgender people that make up your workforce, or customer/client base, even if you are not aware.

The All-Gender Restroom sign at the Moxy Hotel in Portland, Oregon.

When should you prepare your workplace for people who are trans and nonbinary? Yesterday.
It should be done before your workplace returns to the office. Imagine how it feels to be in an office that does not have a proper facility for you. This puts undue stress on individuals, impacts performance, and impacts relationships at work. What is an employee to do if there are only gender binary restrooms available?

Keep in mind that a transgender or nonbinary employee who does not have access to a restroom that matches their gender identity does have a valid complaint. That is likely a capital D complaint, Discrimination.

How to create a more inclusive restroom at your facility
Put your creative brain to work. Don't do this work alone. Reconfiguring restrooms at your workplace is a challenge for creative problem solvers, those who are willing and able to collaborate with a team, and yes, cash will be needed. A proactive approach is most certainly more inclusive, more humane, less frustrating, and more cost-effective than a discrimination lawsuit. 
 

Comment Below

Join me in making workplaces more inclusive by sharing your experience about a workplace that has reconfigured restrooms to meet this need. What great solutions have you experienced? Please share in the comments below.

Early last year, a client came to me with difficulty retaining talent, a high turnover rate, and overall a feeling of employee disengagement. They were not using tools to measure or collect data about engagement. Based on both intuition, turnover numbers, and an HR Audit (including interviews with employees) we had enough touchpoints to develop a strong understanding that the workforce was disengaged. Anytime a workforce is disengaged business leaders should be worried about employee retention and its opposite, employee turnover.

The cost of turnover

It might be important to note that turnover has enormous ripple effects on a business. It takes time to recruit new team members, train new hires, and get them to their most productive state. A business that has high turnover is almost never fully effective because they have too many team members who are not working at complete capacity. The toll turnover takes on existing staff can be suffocating in terms of the workload. 

You can quickly understand this if you imagine a restaurant; consider the plight of a micro restaurant that has a server, cook, and a dishwasher. What if their turnover rate is 33% and their dishwasher has quit. That leaves the cook and server to manage the entire restaurant until a new dishwasher can be hired and properly onboarded to full productivity. The cook and server might be able to manage this for a short time period however, it will take a toll, cause them to work more during their shift, not be as focused on their customers and they might even drop the ball more often. This results in long wait times, orders that are inaccurate, unhappy customers, and exhausted, overworked employees. This example translates to other businesses too but the chaos may not be as obvious to leaders or clients.

The national average for turnover in 2019 according to Salary.com was 19.3% across all industries. That means that 80.7% of the workforce remains in place over the period of time that is measured; a month, a quarter, a year. The opposite of turnover is retention, ideally, a business would have a retention rate of 80.7% or better (some turnover is healthy). If it’s lower than 80.7% it can cause issues with productivity and overall well-being of the workforce. Also, understand that turnover can vary by industry and it might be helpful to understand the turnover rate in your particular industry. 

Why is it important to measure turnover and retention?

If your small business is experiencing heavy workloads, unsatisfied employees, perhaps a lack of engagement, a good place to start is to examine your turnover and retention rates. Conversely, if things are going really well at your business it might be that your workforce is fully productive and your retention rate is excellent. A positive retention rate is an attractive number to share with potential new hires, investors, and business collaborators. This will give you the data to help understand the dynamics of your workforce as opposed to going off of intuition or a hunch. A good best practice for small businesses is to track this quarterly and annually. 

Taking action to overcome problems with your small business employee turnover

Last year my client implemented an employee engagement tool that measured both eNPS (employee net promoter score) and employee engagement. Having new knowledge of live data (it was a weekly tool) helped this business understand their areas of opportunity and slowly, over the next 12 months, they were able to deliberately make decisions, implement new tools, policies, and a mindset of employee value and development, that has changed their workforce. Employee retention is up by 34.3%, employee engagement has consistently shown improvement and is currently up by 10%, and the eNPS has improved by 46 points all in a 12 month period.  

“Employee retention improved by 34.3%, employee engagement improved by 10%, and the eNPS improved by 46 points. Employee engagement tools are a great resource to help impact employee retention for small businesses.”

The eNPS score has been the last target we have tried to impact and largely this is just getting started. However, by changing many of the other behaviors and tools it has had an impact on eNPS.

These improvements are not by accident or good fortune. Using tools to understand your workforce can help provide information and data so that you know exactly where to invest. In this situation, a combination of an HR Audit, utilizing an employee engagement tool*, and effective leadership had a profound change on the retention rate and overall employee engagement.

If retention and workforce uncertainty keep you up at night, let’s fix that. Contact Amy.

* Examples include; TinyPulse, Officevibe, 15Five, CultureAmp to give you a few examples. McGeachy Consulting has no affiliation with any of these companies.

Amy McGeachy, PHR, SHRM-CP

HR Consultant to small and medium sized businesses in Oregon and Washington.

Amy McGeachy is an HR Consultant and the Founder of The Exceptional Workplace, a newsletter to help small business leaders stay focus on proactive HR and People Practices. Never miss an issue - join HERE.