As the year comes to an end, we can certainly attest that it has brought many major, unprecedented, and even hard challenges.
To navigate in this environment, we have had to propose projects, review strategies, realign the troops, challenge yesterday’s certainties, and… start again.
We have implemented new tools, new systems, new processes, let go of ways of doing things, all this while asking our teams to follow us through the fog.
Our organizations have gone through a number of challenging transformations.
Whether through training, strategic planning, coaching, competency assessments or engagement surveys, our mandates allow us to get to the heart of organizations and exchange with the leaders, managers and teams that support them. The year 2020 has been rich in this respect.
The acceleration of the last few months has brought to light a common thread: the feeling that we are not always heard or listened to.
No one wished for this situation, but here it is. We were in reaction mode. Some organizations quickly realized this, while others are just now seeing it for what it is.
As consultants, we sometimes hear that if we consult, we risk having to live with unrealistic demands. We conduct hundreds of different types of organizational surveys every year. We are always pleasantly surprised to see how naturally solutions emerge when there is room for exchange. To make this possible, we need to build an environment that promotes sharing objectively. We must know how to listen, not to answer or argue, but to really understand. The feeling of usefulness is one of the pillars of mobilization, and we really need to get it right.
What if 2021 was an opportunity to take stock of our teams, to prioritize this mutual listening, to hear what we like and what we could improve, both in terms of performance and skills development and to act on our teams’ well-being?
This year, we have put in place a number of tools to meet these needs. Clients have asked us to facilitate listening sessions or group coaching sessions in order to break isolation, create a sense of belonging and develop strategies adapted to today’s reality; others used our “How are you?” survey, which allows us to quickly take the pulse of the team to know where to act. Others trained their managers virtually, in large numbers, with our Ensemble path, while others offered conferences on stress management, virtual management and skills development in turbulent times.
As the proverb says, “He who speaks sows; he who listens reaps”. So, what can you do right now to to act on all these good ideas?
