How to Rethink Your Posture as a Manager

The emotional impact of lockdown will certainly change professional interactions. Rather than feeling helpless, this is an opportunity for executives to bounce back by capitalizing on the lessons their teams were able to draw from this period.

With the end of lockdown, there are now two categories of managers: those who imagine that, with the “return to normal,” they will find their teams “just as before” and will be able to lead them “just as before” — they probably belong to the category of executives who perceive their employees as a workforce — and those who will have understood that “the post-lockdown” will never again be like “the before” and that a change of posture will be indispensable.

It is a genuine trauma that has shaken the world of work: this is not about imposed remote work, the process changes that had to be improvised, or forced digitalization; it is about the lived experience of employees who, with this pandemic, have been indelibly marked.

A fear that does not disappear

There is, first, fear. The fear of death in particular, because some had to mourn a loved one or feared for themselves after being infected. The fear of being infected for those who were not; the fear of losing a “vulnerable” relative. The fear of the neighbor who, even without symptoms, became overnight a potential time bomb, unaware of the deadly danger they represent. The fear of touching objects that are themselves vectors of contamination. The fear of taking public transport, of going back into shops. The fear of losing one's job, and so on.

All these fears have shaken many convictions, but since fear is experienced very individually, the intensity of the trauma obviously varies from one person to another. The only certainty is that, like any trauma, fear marks the memory, both individual and collective. Having been more or less marked, employees will no longer be the same as before.

This is not a return from holidays

There are also those who will have experienced lockdown badly, those who will emerge exhausted from this period because they had, for weeks, to juggle between work and childcare, or those in the process of separation because they realized they could no longer stand their spouse or partner. There are even those who will have quite simply suffered from... boredom.

Since lockdown did not only make people unhappy, there are also employees who will have appreciated spending more time with family, those who understood that they can perfectly well do their work remotely without daily enduring exhausting commutes, those who discovered they were much more productive with fewer meetings and poorly designed processes. There are also employees who appreciated the new autonomy that was granted to them by force of circumstances.

In this very particular context, the post-lockdown will not resemble merely a return from holidays. Everyone will, in one way or another, have been affected emotionally. Failing to take this into account in the way one manages would be a mistake.

A new need: to feel safe

Faced with this observation, what options do executives have to manage things as well as possible? The obvious one is to show empathy. Taking an interest in your employees also means taking an interest in their emotions, during but also after lockdown. When they return to their company's premises, employees will have a new need: to feel safe.

Knowing that employees will have experienced lockdown more or less well, it can be useful to create a space for expression to allow those who wish to share their feelings and their experience; then, to identify the improvements implemented by those whose agility made it possible to adapt work to lockdown conditions; finally, to thank those who were particularly invested and to recognize the talents that revealed themselves. It will also be the occasion to see the impact that the trust granted during this period will have had on each person and on performance in general.

For this, you can invite all the members of your team to answer the following questions. They concern equally the interactions within the team, the organization of work or processes, and relations with the hierarchy, clients or suppliers:

1 — What struck you or challenged you during this period?

2 — What will never be the same as before?

3 — What did you like the least?

4 — What did you appreciate?

5 — What did you learn or discover?

6 — What worked well professionally?

7 — What worked badly professionally?

8 — What changes would you recommend for the future?

Since exemplarity is queen, the manager must be the first to answer these questions, notably by showing that they, too, may have encountered difficulties.

You can then launch a strengths-leadership workshop, a structured approach that helps each team member become aware of their strengths and make the most of them. In addition to improving collective performance, it will have the effect of increasing everyone's self-confidence, as well as their resilience.

To bounce back better and capitalize on the lessons drawn from this experience, you can then propose that your team define together the rules of the game for the future, which will lead everyone to express their expectations. Clarifying the rules is also creating a more reassuring environment. A good way to achieve this is to co-construct an “engaged-team charter” which, as its name indicates, fosters team engagement.

The old rules and codes have been shattered

Indeed, this pandemic and its consequences, having shattered many codes, established rules, processes and old-fashioned managerial practices, have opened the door to other possibilities. By capitalizing on what happened, this is the opportunity to start afresh on new co-constructed foundations, and to rethink our relationship with the word “collaborate.” But for this, you must listen to your teams, not fear questioning everything and, above all, dare to review your posture as a manager. By placing the human being back at the center, this crisis has opened the door to a much more gratifying future for everyone.