Robert Terry brings us the second half of his piece on managing remotely. If you missed the first article, catch up here. This section addresses social media and cultural sensitivity.
The rise of ‘social media – many of which can be implemented or mimicked over internets or extranets to make them available only to a closed group – can have real benefits, although care is needed both in their use and the interpretation of their use. An online forum can make many threads of discussion open to all team members, so that everyone can have a voice and an opportunity to speak (and be heard) even in the absence of the physical water-cooler, canteen or shared kitchen.
Building social capital is an important element of team development and team leadership, and the opportunities for ‘conversation’ that these media can provide can be highly valuable. Remember, however, that offline conversation is fleeting and passing: its benefits may be lost if technology is implemented in such a way that team members sense that ‘anything they may say will be recorded and may used against them at a later date’. Digital communication needs agreed protocols and boundaries for use and mis-use, but over-policing – which can happen simply because it’s possible – can be counter-productive. There is little benefit to be gained from providing a means for communication and then disincentivising its use. A team online forum or blog could be a powerful channel for creative suggestions on process change, team working patterns or many other aspects of working life – and an effective way of allowing team members to ‘have a voice’ – but this won’t happen unless they are entirely comfortable to speak out in this way.
The second point – cultural sensitivity – is just as important. There’s an old adage – "out of sight is out of mind" – that bears remembering. At a literal level, for example, the impact of staff arrivals and departures on working patterns and inter-personal relationships may not be visible to the remote leader, but that does not diminish its impact on the remote team. Other, perhaps more subtle issues may arise that can take time to become visible to the remote leader that would, in other circumstances, be perceived, monitored and acted on before they became larger ‘problems’. An unnecessarily unfairly distributed workload – or a performance gap that could readily remedied – is obvious when one person is visibly working harder and longer than others, but may take longer to spot from a distance.
This is one reason why it is important for remote leaders to maximise opportunities for face-to-face time both with their remote teams and the individuals within them, but this will not always be possible. Listening skills – like communication skills – also need to be modified and enhanced in a remote management model. Leaders need to learn to listen for different types of clue: tones of voice in audio communications, times of day (or delays in responding) that emails are sent, or lack of contribution to discussion boards.
They also need to not leap to conclusions about what these might mean when they occur, but to make calm, sensitive and tactful enquiries. Over-controlling micro-managing approaches can be damaging in a co-located context: applied remotely, they can easily start to feel like remote surveillance, undermining trust and the team’s relationship to the leader. A remote team has an in-built advantage when it comes to hiding things from their absent leader: your own behaviour in building trust and encouraging open communication is critical in preventing this. You should think pro-actively in addressing other aspects of team leadership that are affected by a lack of physical presence and direct observation: 360 degree feedback instruments, for example, can give a more rounded view of individuals that can help with performance appraisals where your assessment might otherwise be based purely on what is visible to you.
But there’s another element of cultural sensitivity in managing remotely, especially across geographical boundaries. Recognising social protocols and respecting cultural differences (remembering religious holidays, national days, being mindful of local political sensitivities) are all part of the impact that we make on others. Better to put your best foot forward than both feet in (to use an idiom that’s unlikely to translate beyond English speaking countries). Even the technological tools that – well used – can help may just as easily hinder. In some countries, for example, email etiquette will be highly formalised, with their content resembling something that to modern British seems antiquated, over-formal and carrying a whiff of bowing and scraping. But to the team in that country, a typically informal modern Western email could equally be offensively offhand and either wildly personal or impersonal.
Perhaps one remote manager we spoke to on one of our development programmes some years ago summed up the challenge most concisely:
"I can’t quantify what I’m about to say but I actually think in this environment you have to be a more comprehensively better leader than you had to be ten years ago. I suppose what I mean is the ability to tolerate a shortcoming in a leader is reduced in this environment."
Robert Terry is founder and managing director of ASK
