CEO & Founder of Rock. Kenzo writes about the future of work, distributed teams, and how you can enable anyone to work from anywhere.
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In the face of a global pandemic, organizations have been reminded of the importance of employee health and well-being, two things that are closely tied to employee engagement and provide the foundation needed to run a productive organization. But despite the fact that 96% of companies around the world have provided some form of additional resources in response to Covid-19, only one in six employees feel more supported right now.
Supporting employee health and well-being is intimately linked with the challenges of working remotely during a pandemic. New ways of working require new ways of thinking, which is why now is the time to assess how your organization approaches remote work and ensure you're taking steps to support your people truly. Below are my tips for getting started:
Consider adopting asynchronous communication practices.
Instead of fixed working hours and hosting an onslaught of videoconferencing calls, consider embracing an asynchronous approach to remote working. This means letting your employees organize their work in a way that they feel would best help them avoid burning out. The potential benefits for employees — and, in turn, your organization — are clear:
1. More day-to-day flexibility: One of the most significant benefits of asynchronous working is that it gives employees the flexibility to structure their workday in a way that supports their overall well-being. Too much face-to-face communication can contribute to stress and fatigue and leave very little time for actual work. This feeling of always trying to catch up can also make it difficult to prioritize time for well-being.
Make better use of asynchronous collaboration to put some degree of control back into the hands of employees. In turn, they’ll be able to dictate the pace of their working day and break it up in a way that fits with the other demands of their day-to-day life. Some examples of what becomes possible with an asynchronous approach to work include:
• Starting the day with half an hour of exercise, yoga or mindfulness.
• Taking a short walk when you’re feeling stressed or overwhelmed.
• Assisting with childcare or helping your children with schoolwork.
• Scheduling your weekly therapy session during the day.
2. Less pressure to work long hours: There's a common belief that working longer hours makes you more productive. However, this can manifest as "presenteeism," which the Cambridge Dictionary defines as, "The act of staying at work longer than usual, or going to work when you are ill, to show that you work hard and are important to your employer." This is something that can carry over into the world of remote working, with many employees working longer hours and trying to maintain an online presence.
Asynchronous communication can help break the link between maintaining an online presence and how productive you are as an individual because it switches your focus from the number of hours worked to results that were achieved. These results will vary depending on the job role, but whether it’s customer satisfaction, inbound leads or the amount of revenue you’ve generated for the business, this focus on results encourages people to work smarter, not harder, for your business.
However, keep in mind that taking an asynchronous approach doesn’t eliminate the need for your organization to provide health insurance, employee assistance programs and other forms of health and well-being support.
And last but not least, introducing asynchronous communication doesn’t mean you need to drop real-time communications. I simply mean the latter should be more the exception than the rule. From my perspective, it’s time to incorporate new ways of working for remote and distributed teams: asynchronous by default and synchronous when needed.
Build a culture that prioritizes health and well-being.
Providing the right kind of support for health and well-being is a lot like trying to lose weight: It only works as part of broader lifestyle changes. In the case of organizations, that means changing the values, beliefs and cultural norms that guide employee behavior. Here are just a few ways that can be accomplished:
1. Provide mental health training for managers. Managers are the link between the top and bottom of your organization, which is why it’s so important for them to take a proactive approach to health and well-being. Training can give managers the tools to spot when someone else is struggling.
2. Lead by example. An important aspect of cultural change is setting an example at the top of your organization. It can be difficult for people to know if a new behavior is truly acceptable unless they see it modeled by someone in a position of authority.
Establish policies that reflect your cultural values.
Change takes time, but you can accelerate this process by committing to health and well-being through your company policies. Whether you begin offering employee assistance programs or banning videoconference calls on a Friday, your policies reflect your intentions.
Employee health and well-being are an essential part of running a successful business, which can be enhanced through an asynchronous approach to remote working. But the only way to make that happen is when you’re intentional about the policies you introduce and the behaviors you encourage.
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