Evelyn Reynolds

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    5 Alternate Ways to Ask Your Employees “Are You Okay?” 

    As HR professionals, we’ve felt the intense impact & pressure COVID19 has had on our companies. We’ve had to re-structure and organize our operations, re-visit our strategies, put in place new training and regulations… whilst also dealing with living in a pandemic! Every news station is discussing the changing workforce, and it’s true the workforce has been disrupted in a manner we’ve never experienced before, but what about our employees? Can’t the same be said about our workers? The global pandemic has had a drastic impact on the mental health of individuals, with a shocking 1,000% increase of individuals calling mental help hotlines.
    You know that feeling when you’re in a terrible headspace but you’re uncomfortable letting yourself cry or complain in your current environment…there’s been countless times where someone has attempted to comfort me and the fireworks have let loose. Whilst it’s comforting to know someone cares, it’s also uncomfortable to feel so overwhelmed. And, whilst your intentions are coming from a place of care, you may cause tension if you simply ask “Are You Okay?” because this sentence has connotations of implying there’s something wrong with the disheartened individual. Fortunately for us, there are other ways we can show our support.
    1. Buy them a coffee.
    It doesn’t have to be a coffee, but you know what I mean. We’re humans, and we have the tendency to overthink and work ourselves up over our emotions. The more we think about them the more intensely we feel them which is a vicious cycle. Sometimes, all it takes is a small act of compassion to pull you back to reality and center you…so, when someone buys a ‘coffee’ for you, you begin to focus on their act of compassion and slowly the negative thoughts and feelings you had to seem fainter. This is a great way of showing someone you care about them, and you acknowledge they need some support- WITHOUT being overbearing. If you’re working remotely, like most of the world, you can still do this! Heard of Uber Eats or DoorDash? Maybe even ‘Jimmy Brings’ if they need some serious cheering up…
    2. How can I support you?
    If you know (or sense) your colleague or employee is going through a rough time, you already know that. You know they aren’t okay, so what is asking them ‘are you okay’ going to do? It’s not beneficial and draws attention to their seemingly off demeanor. What you need to do is show your support. Give them a helping hand, and cut to the chase. We’re nosy beings.. we love to know all the nitty-gritty details of someone else’s life and drama, (hence the huge market for reality TV), but don’t get your curiosity confused with your intentions. Skip the chit chat, ask them how you can support them. Ask them what they need from you. By showing them you want to give them something, it takes away the tension of them having to approach you and ask for something (which is very hard to do).
    3. Mention a concern, then approach.
    This one is a bit tricky but works well if executed in the correct situation. I think the best way to explain it is with an example… Imagine this scenario;
    Your work colleague comes to the office noticeably not themselves. They always say good morning and have a chat before diving into work- but not today. If they’re not themselves, they aren’t going to act the way they normally would- but SOMETIMES that’s exactly what they need to do! You aren’t strangers, you can still approach them… “ Hey, you seem a bit distant today, how are you going? What did you get up to over the weekend?”. YOU take initiative, just because someone’s seemingly unsettled it doesn’t mean they aren’t human beings with social instincts.
    Reach out, if they wanted to talk about their feelings they would tell you but the reality is they don’t owe you any explanations, and you shouldn’t want one. If you care, the only thing you should be concerned about is their wellbeing and how you can make a difference.
    4. You can vent to me if you want.
    You shouldn’t want to pry, you shouldn’t aim to get the latest tea, BUT you should offer to listen. Everyone is wired differently, some people don’t want to talk about what they’re feeling and others are dying for someone to vent to, but don’t want to be a burden and unleash a heap of negative thoughts on someone else. It never hurts to offer your time and attention, usually we’re able to think objectively and see our situation from a different perspective when we speak out loud and air our thoughts. When taking this approach on board it’s important to remember the ball must always be in their court, don’t overstep, and don’t be forceful.
    5. Open-ended questions.
    The biggest concern with asking “are you okay?” is the minimal room for a response. “Yes, I’m okay” or “No, I’m not okay”. Either way, neither of these responses offer insight into the mind of your colleague or employee. Therefore, what’s the point of asking them? You’d need to ask them another question regardless of their answer… so skip the useless closed-ended question and start with open-ended questions. You provide them with an opportunity to elaborate and express themselves how they want to. You’ll receive more in-depth and insightful answers that’ll enable you to continue the conversation and hopefully discover what is disrupting them and how you can help.
    These are a few alternate ways to check in with your colleagues and your employees. Now’s the time we need to step up and look out for one another, we’re all in the same boat so there are no excuses. You know what you need, thus you know what your peers need. We must step up and be proactive rather than reactive, the wellbeing of our employees shouldn’t be forgotten or overlooked in these times of distress. Check-in before you regret not checking in.
    A list of help hotlines
    Mental Health America 1-800-273-TALK (8255)
    Crisis Services Canada 1-833-456-4566 toll-free
    Lifeline Australia 13 11 14
    HopeLine UK 0800 068 4141
    Cassandra Diamantis is the Marketing Specialist at My Recruitment Plus. Cassie writes content that aids HR and recruiters efficiently recruit, onboard, and lead. Her company aims to modernize recruitment and onboarding processes through enterprise-grade technology and round the clock client success support.

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    7 Crucial Communication Strategies for Working Remotely 

    Unfortunately, it seems as though Australia has yet to eradicate COVID19. While we expected this, we still need to continuously review and update our business operations to ensure maximum productivity.
    The most significant difficulty regarding working from home is the lack of face to face interaction, which can cause communication issues. Fear not, I’m here to help you work from home with maximum communication capabilities!
    1. Listen
    Many employers and employers underestimate the power of listening when, in fact, attentively listening to your colleagues is a crucial factor in effective communication. Without excellent listening skills, you can’t effectively communicate! The two go hand in hand. Make sure you listen to whom you’re speaking to, and are responsive. That means acknowledging what they’ve said and providing feedback or verbal and non-verbal cues.
    2. Hold Open Meetings
    Bleh, we hear meetings and instantly zone out! We’ve all been there… our eyelids getting heavier and heavier…. then slowly closing halfway through a meeting. We need to be stimulated! That’s why open meetings are the way of the future. Open meetings provide all involved with a chance at holding the mic and expressing their opinions and thoughts. This interactiveness ensures engagement and effective communication.
    3. Communicate with humor
    What’s the difference between humans and AI? Simple, humans are emotive and creative. Use it!! You can have friendly banter, and develop friendships with your colleagues. In fact, you work better with people you have relationships with! There’s a higher element of trust, therefore taking on board constructive criticism. You can make jokes to get your point across and incorporate sarcasm when needed. It’s a good idea to maintain a balance of professionalism and personalism.
    4. Email
    While companies more often than not use casual communication platforms such as Zoom and Slack, to maintain a level of professionalism, you should send confirmation emails! For example, if you’ve spoken to a college and given them a brief, recap that discussion in an email, so there is hard evidence that acts as a deterrent of miscommunication. As well as this, if you schedule a call or meeting, you can send a confirmation email to add it to their calendar to avoid any mishaps! Yes, emails are old news in the world of technology… but it doesn’t mean they aren’t effective!
    5. Training
    Let me make this clear, training DOESN’T HAVE TO BE BORING. You can incorporate visual aids, such as; videos, gifs, images, and graphics. With the current pandemic, it’s important now more than ever, that your employees are up to date on all business operations and expectations! This assists communication strategies as it makes it clear what is and isn’t acceptable. All employees receive the same information, therefore resulting in uniformity amongst behavior and communication. You can end the training sessions with quizzes… heck you can even incentivize employees with a prize for the individual with the greatest correct answers!
    6. Set scheduled hours, and STICK TO IT.
    There are multiple elements to this. Firstly, set one-on-one meetings with your employees and colleges, and make sure you’re on time! Nothing screams unprofessionalism more than showing up late to a meeting. You wouldn’t do it if it were face to face, so don’t do it if it’s online.
    Secondly, set scheduled hours! Working from home is beneficial if managed correctly. It allows you to balance your social life and working life, with a mix of activities and sunshine. However, it also can reduce effective communication channels if not managed correctly! To combat this, set scheduled hours. This can change weekly but should be a set period of time that everyone is available online. Thus, during this time, everyone is assured they can contact whom they need to and receive immediate feedback and responses.
    7. Encouragement and feedback
    You can be critical, but you must be constructive! No one appreciates their work being criticized without any useful feedback. Give your feedback but offer valid reasons and suggestions. You and your colleagues are a team; therefore you are responsible for supporting and encouraging one another! You can express your thoughts kindly, be considerate, and effectively communicate. If you’re simply bagging out your colleagues’ work, it’s plausible they’ll stop listening to you and detest coming to you for advice.
    To quickly summarise all the above, here are your QUICK TIPS.
    DO: Be fun and humorous
    DON’T: Let your jokes overtake your professionalism
    DO: Be honest
    DON’T: Be emotionless, you’re human and being emotive is a strength. Honesty with a side of emotion, please! Use it to develop relationships and effectively communicate
    DO: Set the tone- what’s acceptable and what’s not!
    DON’T: Incorporate swear words or extensively slang- be professional.
    There you have it, all you need to know about how to communicate effectively.
    Communication is key my friends. Implement your strategies and watch the good times roll!
    Author: Cassandra Diamantis is the marketing specialist at My Recruitment Plus.

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    Create a Sense of Belonging Within Your Organization

    Belonging is a feeling. None of us wants to participate in communities where we don’t feel good, welcome, or appreciated. We certainly won’t invest our full effort unless—and until—we’re vested in this manner. Of course, what makes us feel welcomed differs from person to person.
    When possible, people leave places where they don’t feel belonging. They proactively move to where they do feel it. At the end of the day, any thriving organization wants to create a feeling of belonging among its employees. Otherwise, you’ll never get the best from your team members.
    What creates belonging?
    Research indicates that belonging shows up when we experience two feelings:
    Feeling valued (or needed) by the entire group or some part of it.
    Feeling that we’re a fit for what’s needed in the community and the environment that’s been created.
    Reflecting on the past 20 years of research and practitioners’ experience, we say that the feeling of belonging usually arises when participants experience some of the following feelings, at some level:
    Accepted
    Welcomed
    Valued
    Cared for
    Appreciated
    Possessing insider understanding
    How can we create these feelings?
    To produce these feelings, a community must provide an experience in which participants can notice they are accepted, welcomed, valued, cared for, appreciated, or in possession of insider understanding.
    Successful leaders generate positive feelings in their employees and colleagues. Though this can seem like a magical task to some, after you’ve learned the principles that make communities work, it will sound more achievable. To start:
    Understand it’s a first-person experience. As a feeling, belonging is experienced internally as a first-person experience. These experiences are difficult for a third-person observer to measure, but that difficulty makes the experience no less critical.
    Many first-person experiences, particularly those that are important in relationships (and the world), don’t lend themselves to quantified measuring, such as a mother’s love or the trust in your neighbor. Measuring belonging is similar to measuring a mother’s love.
    Promote the “inside view.” You can magnify a sense of belonging by helping community members share insider understanding, which simply means sharing things insiders understand that outsiders do not or cannot.
    Here’s an example: Melissa Allen is a retired firefighter captain. She shared how much she appreciates spending time among other firefighters in her community because they understand the complexity, pressure, and passion that often comes with the role. The firefighters share a never-spoken understanding and compassion for one another. This is so strong that Melissa notices that if a firefighter’s spouse joins the group, the conversation changes. This isn’t because spouses aren’t welcome or loved. It’s because they never share the insider understanding that career firefighters gain.
    Usually, when we seek out people who have shared an experience similar to our own (fighting cancer, living overseas, running a marathon), we’re searching for this shared insider understanding.
    When an organization embraces the principles of building community, employees are drawn in because they share some values more intensely than do outsiders. We want to feel understood by the people who share our values. We want to see that the people inside understand this more than the people outside of our community.
    Be selective. By the way, this is one reason why a community can’t succeed if it accepts anyone, anytime, with any values. So be careful to recruit people who not only embrace your organization’s core values but also fit with your culture.
    Charles H. Vogl is an award-winning author, speaker, and executive adviser. Carrie Melissa Jones is the founder of Gather Community Consulting. Their new book is Building Brand Communities: How Organizations Succeed by Creating Belonging. Learn more at buildingbrandcommunities.com.

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    WFH: How to Keep Your Team On Track

    Working from home is great, but it also comes with many unique struggles that can impact productivity and hinder growth. According to Buffer’s 2019 State of Remote Work survey, 17 percent of respondents reported that communication and collaboration as their greatest struggle working remotely while 8 percent of workers said that motivation was their biggest adversity.
    Tuning into your team’s struggles and integrating preventative strategies like these will help you promote wellness and productivity for everyone. Before you get started, make sure that you have some time to set aside and ask for feedback. Although these tips are a great way to combat many of the common remote work challenges, it’s best to personalize your approach so you can address the most pressing barriers to productivity in your company.
    Use Public Task Lists
    Every employee will have their own itemized agenda for the day, but a team-wide task list will help coworkers stay connected and more conscious of how they spend their time. Collaborative software can drastically enhance productivity for a remote team by eliminating the need for cross-platform communication; instant messaging, progress tracking, goals, and project deadlines can all share a common space.
    Working from home removes the pressure to perform that a physical office provides; this pressure is not negative, and it’s a fundamental aspect of a strong workflow for many people. Recreating that environment on a computer is a challenge, but remote team software like Basecamp, Asana, and Fellow make it easier.
    Hold Midday Meetings
    Halfway through the day, motivation starts to wane. People think more about dinner plans and Netflix than their current tasks, which results in many simple and easy duties being pushed to the next day. To prevent this from creating a decline during your work hours, hold a meeting shortly after lunch to talk about what’s been accomplished so far and set goals for the last half of the day.
    Acknowledging accomplishments first, however small, has two immediate benefits. First, it shows employees that you are aware of what they do each day and not only see but appreciate their effort. Second, hearing about what others have done can reinvigorate employees and inspire them to refocus and try their best for the last few hours of their shift.
    Setting goals and connecting them across various divisions or individual workers creates a sense of unity. Teamwork boosts remote team morale and inspires everyone to take pride in what they do. Rather than slogging through tasks, they are able to see the bigger picture and know that even the mundane items on their to-do list have greater significance.
    Check-in With Everyone Regularly
    Only hosting virtual meetings or sending out reports won’t keep a team close together. As the leader, you need to model engagement and hard work by routinely reaching out to your employees. Every hour, send a message to your remote team. It doesn’t have to be a major ordeal to be significant. Something as simple as, “Hey, team. How are we doing so far?” can go a long way.
    Employees who struggle to motivate themselves at home will be more likely to prioritize work when they know you are actually paying attention. It’s easy for people to slip into the mindset that their contributions don’t matter; give some extra one-on-one attention to any members of your team who are falling behind or appear distant.
    Focus on Your Own Routine
    Make sure that you are practicing good remote work habits while helping your team stay on track. Wake up on time each morning, get dressed and eat a nutritious breakfast away from the computer. Stress the importance of a healthy work-life balance by sharing personal tips and tricks with your team.
    Self-care is difficult for many leaders because they always focus on solving everyone else’s problems; you may get so involved in monitoring and managing your team that your own productivity falls to the wayside. By optimizing your own schedule, you’ll put yourself in the best possible mindset and mood to guide your team with the level of patience and compassion they need.
    Work Together
    Live editing in G Suite can make many projects happen ten times faster. Rather than waiting for individual team members to review, edit, or offer feedback, let everyone connect at the same time and achieve goals together. Working as a group not only gets things done faster but also promotes a strong collaborative culture. Teams are built through shared experience, which means you must emphasize the importance of real-time communication when working remotely.
    If your work can’t be done in G Suite or another collaborative platform, consider hosting daily scrum meetings. This project management philosophy is primarily used in software development, but it can be adopted by any team and help streamline the work process.
    Use Incentives
    As you build a remote team, it’s important to consider ways you can connect their virtual professional life into the real world. Small incentive programs can do just that. Monetary rewards for a job well done can make people feel more connected to their work; other incentives are social and include short shoutouts during meetings or mentions in team emails.
    Personalize incentives to match your business’s line of work and your team’s personal style. Vary your rewards but make sure everyone is always aware that they’re on the table and available to anyone; the point is to make everyone feel like a part of a team, not cause tension or competition.
    Final Thoughts
    Be patient with your team and know that change takes time. Reach out to the workers who are performing the best and ask for their secrets, and speak with those who struggle the most. Rather than immediately trying to correct them, seek to learn about their challenge so you can support and guide them to greater achievement. And don’t forget to prioritize your own well-being along the way.
    Brandyn Morelli is the co-founder of HelloCecil, a SaaS platform helping small businesses make smarter hires through video interviewing.

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    Why the Time Has Come for a Four-Day Week

    The coronavirus pandemic has changed every aspect of our lives, and it’s had a particularly marked effect on the way we work. The largest flexible working experiment ever conducted has taken place out of necessity, and the early signs are that it will leave a lasting change in work culture. More workers than ever before have been able to fit their work-life around their home life by working at different hours – increasingly necessary due to childcare commitments during the closure of schools. With 44% of UK workers set to request permanent flexible working policies (according to research from Direct Line), there are no signs that it’s going away anytime soon.
    The four-day week has always been a popular topic in the flexible working discourse, and although it has been adopted by some employers, it hasn’t yet gone mainstream. Here’s why its time has come.
    Employee wellbeing
    A secondary effect of the coronavirus pandemic has been its effect on our mental health. Months of anxiety, coupled with increasingly difficult economic conditions and less contact with friends and family, have unsurprisingly taken their toll.
    As countries seek to kickstart their economies again, any steps that will safeguard the mental health of workers need to be seriously considered. Figures from the ONS show that 17.5 million workdays were lost due to mental health problems in the UK in 2018, for example, underlining the drastic impact mental health problems can have on the economy as well as the workers themselves.
    Mental health and employee wellbeing, in general, have always been one of the principal driving forces behind the four-day week. It’s seen as an important step towards a greater work-life balance, allowing for effectively a three-day weekend each and every week. Workers would have more time to recover from a stressful work week, freeing up that time and energy to pursue other hobbies and interests that can be beneficial for their mental health. With work-related mental health problems increasingly widespread, measures such as this are more important than ever.
    Increased productivity
    The four-day week not only makes sense in terms of mental health – but it also benefits the company’s bottom line. Although, as fewer hours are worked overall, the expectation might be that production (and therefore profits) suffer as a result, the opposite is actually true.
    What the four-day week experiments reveal is the importance of the quality of the hours worked, rather than necessarily the sheer quantity of those hours. Happy workers are productive workers. What’s better: an engaged, rested, happy employee working for 30 hours a week, or a burned-out employee working for 40 (or even more)? You can probably guess the answer.
    The human brain is not a machine, churning out hours of equally productive work hours, but a sensitive organ with complicated needs of its own. To run at its maximum, most productive capacity, it needs rest. The same principle can be seen in a normal working day. Working for eight hours straight, with no break, will produce worse quality work than a smaller number of hours that have been split up with breaks. Such is the power of a break for the brain.
    Now is the time
    The coronavirus pandemic has only strengthened the case for a four-day working week. With unprecedented public health and mental health challenges, a struggling jobs market, and an ailing economy, it’s time has truly come. Workers will be happier and more productive, and the wider economy will also benefit. With an extra day of leisure, domestic tourism will also benefit – workers would have three days to recharge their batteries instead of two, giving them the time and energy to go further afield at the weekend and contribute to the wider economy.
    It may seem like a radical step, but so did the move away from a six-day week of 12 hour working days. Rigid, traditional ideas around work culture can be difficult to break down, but these should not stand in the way of positive progress – both for employee wellbeing and the productivity of the company as a whole.

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    Is Your Business Falling into the Gender Pay Gap?

    Is your company forward-thinking and proactive in creating a positive and fair working environment, or being dragged down by old-fashioned institutional values?
    One example of a deep-seated structural inequality is reflected in the Gender Pay Gap. Fifty years after the 1970 Equal Pay Act proscribed discrimination by gender in the workplace, women still earn on average 17.3 less than men, proving that progress is happening very slowly.
    As with so many areas of business, it pays to take an active stance and embrace positive change. Working towards equality in the workplace doesn’t just look good on paper – it creates more opportunities for diverse skills and talent, boosts employee morale, productivity, and retention rates, and makes for a more positive working culture.
    Either strive forwards or risk falling behind. Bosses need to acknowledge the scope of the Gender Pay Gap both generally, and within their own company infrastructures. They must then take more active measures to generate more inclusive work opportunities for all.
    The Gender Pay Gap: A Cross-industry Issue
    There are various historical, social, and systemic factors at play when it comes to inequality in the workplace. Discrimination can sometimes be overt and conscious, but unconscious bias can also affect management decisions, company infrastructure, and working cultures, to alienate minorities accessing better work opportunities.
    That’s why it helps to take the evidence of workplace inequality into account, to be aware of how widespread issues such as the Gender Pay Gap are. For example, the career experts at Resume.io found that, even in 57 jobs that are typically dominated by women in terms of numbers, men are paid more in every field.
    The statistics, taken from ONS figures for 2019, show that there is a significant disparity in earnings across a wide variety of sectors, including Health and Social Care, the Service industry, Finance, Sales, and Education. Whether an industry’s workforce is predominantly men or women, the pay gap exists.
    In fact, in the top ten fields occupied by a majority female workforce, not only do men consistently earn more, but eight of the average salaries for women workers are below the ‘Basic Rate’ of income tax. This proves that inequality hits the lowest earners the most and that women’s work is consistently devalued.
    Health and Social Care is the field with the highest number of female-dominated jobs that suffer from the Gender Pay Gap. 12 professions show a disparity, with women Dental Practitioners earning a whopping £26,451.00 (39.3%) less than their male counterparts at the higher end of the salary-spectrum, and Teaching Assistants earning   £3152 (19.8%) less, at the lower end.
    Education also proves to be a significantly under-valued field. While the vast majority of all education workers are women, the pay gap reaches almost £10,000 for Librarians and Senior Teachers. This is a demotivating lack of recognition for those who are expected to nurture and inspire society’s future.
    Addressing the Gender Pay Gap in Your Business
    Accepting that inequality is a society-wide issue and that the Gender Pay Gap affects all areas of work, is a significant first step in effecting positive change. The next step is reflecting on how all this relates to your company, and what you can do to strive for equality.
    Making a conscious shift towards equality can sometimes be discomforting, especially to those already benefiting from the status quo. It might require making changes to your work culture and infrastructure, and reconsidering recruitment strategies and age-old hierarchies. It’s worth remembering that your company, as well as your employees, will benefit from this shift in the long term.
    Fortunately, there are some proven strategies that can help you work towards addressing the Gender Pay Gap:
    Recruitment: Make a conscious effort to include multiple women in shortlists when you are recruiting new employees. Use structured interviews with predetermined questions, standardized criteria, and skills-based assessments to avoid unconscious bias. It can also help to make returners (people who have had a gap in employment due to caring or parental responsibilities) welcome to apply for positions, and establish a diverse selection panel, where possible.
    Transparency: Be open about the processes, policies, and decision-making criteria related to salaries, promotions, and pay rewards. Women are statistically less likely to negotiate for better rates, and transparency can help with this.
    Support: Provide more welcoming and encouraging working conditions, such as paid parental leave, opportunities for flexible working schedules, networking opportunities, mentoring, sponsorship, and leadership training for women and other minorities.
    Reflection and Response: Review your company’s policies and procedures through a diversity and equality audit. Consider employing a diversity manager or consultant to help you set new internal equality targets, as well as organizing training sessions in diversity and unconscious bias.
    Striving for equality in the workplace isn’t just a legal responsibility, it’s also the ethical – and logical – thing to do. Your workplace morale, productivity, and reputation will reap the long-term rewards of fair representation and diversity.
    Lorraine Kipling is a freelance writer and editor from Manchester, UK. She writes for Resume.io.

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    WFH Saves People 23.5 Days a Year Traveling

    Is remote working here to stay? While many people have predicted the rise of remote working over recent years, nobody expected it to rocket its way to the forefront as it has during 2020. It’s difficult to remember what life was like before the Coronavirus pandemic forced governments and businesses worldwide to implement drastic changes […] More

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    How to Become an Exemplary Leader of Introverts 

    I was preparing for a program on introverted leadership by interviewing research scientists at a Fortune 100 pharmaceutical company when a new word caught my ear.   “Did you say ‘loudership’?” I asked a seasoned manager. Yes, he had. He went on to tell me that loudership was a companywide code word for what it meant to be […] More