Teams365 Blog - POTENTIALS REALIZED

TEAMS365 #2282 – Effective Virtual Conversations Tip 138: Iterate

3/30/2020

This weeks Effective Virtual Conversations Tip is all about iteration. As we move into the virtual space, it’s likely that experimentation, and on-going action with adjustment, is the norm. Technology can “happen” and things that worked in the in-person world, may not work the same way in the virtual space.

What does iteration mean for you?

Here’s a definition from StoryBoardThat.com:

Iteration in a business is the concept of repeating a process, analyzing the outcomes each time, and modifying for ultimate efficiency in hopes to achieve a certain objective or outcome. Iterate.

As you consider your business goals for the second quarter, what are the things you can do to get things out more quickly, get feedback and iterate? This might be a new program you have been thinking about offering, a new product for your customers or clients, or a new system or process that could benefit from some feedback.

With many of the programs I run, there is an element of iteration. It often includes writing first here at the blog, then incorporating into a program I am running, and then looking at the metrics and feedback from both readers and group members. These two streams of feedback always help to strengthen programming.

Consider what iteration could look like in your work right now.

With best wishes,
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton
Potentials Realized | Coaching Team Leaders | Remote Pathways Podcast
Team and Leadership Development | Coaching | Everything DiSC
Phone (416)996-8326

Get your planning on with the PlanDoTrack Workbook and Planner or Coaching Business Builder
Looking to enhance your virtual conversations? Webinars? Pick up a copy of Effective Virtual Conversations at Amazon.
Contact us to discuss how we can support you and your teams and organization with remote work.
Check out upcoming programs on our calendar!

TEAMS365 #2275 – Effective Virtual Conversations Tip #137 – Communication

3/23/2020

Clear, and effective, communication is at the heart of any great virtual work. Whether we are communicating with our colleagues, our boss or stakeholders/customers, we want to be sure that we are clearly communicating what’s important.

In the remote and virtual space, communication takes many forms – from instant messages, to texts, to email. In these instances, we lose a lot of the tone that helps us pick up on cues about communication. Phone is also another important channel not to forget, as it does provide for the layer of TONE to be heard.

The best channel to incorporate for your work may be streaming – whether you come together on a Zoom call or a Skype call. This can provide the rich, visual cues that help us get a total picture of the person we are speaking with.

Effective virtual communication also involves another layer of effectiveness and that includes checking in that our message has been received as it was intended. What are you noticing about how your messages are being understood? Today’s Effective Virtual Conversations Tip is about COMMUNICATE, COMMUNICATE, COMMUNICATE to reflect that important messages will need to be reinforced in different ways. If there is something important which needs to be shared, how do we ensure that we speak it, reinforce it with a written message, and maybe reach out for a one-on-one conversation?

Another channel available to us is also using images to anchor in the ideas we want to communicate. What are the icons and images which will support the conversation? What can you do to support the reinforcement of the messages you want to share?

As you think about your conversations this week, what’s important to reinforce?

Enjoy your conversations!
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton
Potentials Realized | Coaching Team Leaders | Remote Pathways Podcast
Team and Leadership Development | Coaching | Everything DiSC
Phone (416)996-8326

Get your planning on with the PlanDoTrack Workbook and Planner or Coaching Business Builder
Looking to enhance your virtual conversations? Webinars? Pick up a copy of Effective Virtual Conversations at Amazon.
Contact us to discuss how we can support you and your teams and organization with remote work.
Check out upcoming programs on our calendar!

TEAMS365 #2269 – Remote Work White Paper Now Available to Help You Get Up To Speed Quickly

3/17/2020

As many of you know, remote work has been the context of my professional life for the last thirty years, even before the Internet. Throughout the last three decades I’ve seen, and supported, thousands of professionals and teams in making the shift to remote work. With this in mind, I created a new whitepaper called the Remote Working Whitepaper – When You Need To Get Up To Speed Quickly.

Little did I know a few weeks ago when I finished writing this, and actually scheduled the post, that we'd be in a moment like this, where people all over the world are having to work remote.

It’s a very practical guide to support you and other team members in getting moving effectively in the remote space. The Guide covers these sections:

Context and Benefits of Remote Work
Pitfalls to Remote Work
Remote, Virtual or Mobile?
Who’s working in the remote space? The Digital Dozen
What’s different in the remote space?
7 Remote Work Enablers
What’s needed for success in the remote space?
Making the Shift To Working Remote
Making Remote Work, Work for You
What Organizations Can Do to Support the Shift To Remote Work
Five Digital Tools for Remote Workers
Core Skills for Any Remote Worker
In the Spotlight: Communication In the Remote Space
Remote Work Myths

Teams and individual remote workers like solopreneurs will find the white paper of interest.

Pick up a copy here.

Many past organizational clients have been reaching out to me in the last few days looking for support around their shift to remote work.
Different supports we offer for remote work includes:

Virtual Team Sessions
Virtual Planning sessions
Virtual Strategic Planning Sessions for organizations
Virtual facilitation skills training - gain skills in leading virtual conversations
Leading virtual sessions for their organizations and teams to help with the transition to working remote.

If I, or my company, can be of service to you at this time, please reach out and contact me - phone # is below or please reach out by email. Don't feel like you need to go it alone.

Best wishes,
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton
Potentials Realized | Coaching Team Leaders | Remote Pathways Podcast
Team and Leadership Development | Coaching | Everything DiSC
Phone (416)996-8326

Get your planning on with the PlanDoTrack Workbook and Planner or Coaching Business Builder
Looking to enhance your virtual conversations? Webinars? Pick up a copy of Effective Virtual Conversations at Amazon.
Contact us to discuss how we can support you and your teams and organization with remote work.
Check out upcoming programs on our calendar!

TEAMS365 #2268 – Effective Virtual Conversations 136 – Boundaries: When is Off, Really Off?

3/16/2020

One of the remote working myths is that “We are always on”. When we are part of a global team you might think that you need to be on all the time in order to reply. While this can be a short-term strategy, over time it will lead to burnout and other productivity lowering events.

Today’s question gets you as a team thinking about, and in dialogue around the question for the remote working space “When is off, really off?”.

As I have asked in other Teams365 posts, are there core hours of work when people are expected to be on?

What happens when people need to turn off?

What is expected in terms of response time?

If someone is off, how do they signal this?

What communication channels do you have to ensure that people know when people are off, and when they are on?

What do team members understand about workflow and prioritization so they can plan more effectively or workflow and time?

Issues which seem small in the face-to-face context can get magnified easily in the remote space. What’s important to note?

Best,
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton
Potentials Realized | Coaching Team Leaders | Remote Pathways Podcast
Team and Leadership Development | Coaching | Everything DiSC
Phone (416)996-8326

Get your planning on with the PlanDoTrack Workbook and Planner or Coaching Business Builder
Looking to enhance your virtual conversations? Webinars? Pick up a copy of Effective Virtual Conversations at Amazon.
Contact us to discuss how we can support you and your teams and organization with remote work.
Check out upcoming programs on our calendar!

TEAMS365 #2262 – Virtual Collaboration – Collaboration in the Remote Space

3/10/2020

In my book, Effective Virtual Conversations, I share seven skills needed to make collaboration work well. These are particularly important in the remote and virtual space where collaborations need to be more intentional and are often characterized by touch points which are much more infrequent.

The seven areas we want to be building skills and capacity around are:

Trust
Candor
Connection
Flexibility/Adaptability
Self-Awareness
Working Across Differences
Relationship Development

(Page 385 – Effective Virtual Conversations, Britton, 2017)

What do all of these skills look like in your virtual work?

If you were to give each one of them a rating, what would they look like?

Having introduced these categories to hundreds in speaking engagements over the last few years, I often will poll the audiences I speak with about which ones are most important. By far, the one which most frequently gets raised is TRUST.

What does building trust look like in your virtual relationships?

It may include:

Being present – and not looking like you are multi-tasking
Being reliable – following through with promises made to send something out
Participating in chat and/or annotation and/or verbally
Showing up on camera (even if that’s uncomfortable)
Asking questions out of curiosity

Consider recent calls you were on. What does building trust look like in your context?

For more on other topics check out:

Differences When Working Remote
Listen into Five Ways to Strengthen Team Relationships here

Remember that things are magnified in the remote space.
If you are collaborating remotely, consider how some of the 7 Enablers of Great Remote Work fit in, including:

Communication
Clarity
Consistency

What’s going to support better conversations and results in the remote space?

Wishing you the best
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton
Potentials Realized | Coaching Team Leaders | Remote Pathways Podcast
Team and Leadership Development | Coaching | Everything DiSC
Phone (416)996-8326

Get your planning on with the PlanDoTrack Workbook and Planner or Coaching Business Builder
Looking to enhance your virtual conversations? Webinars? Pick up a copy of Effective Virtual Conversations at Amazon.
Contact us to discuss how we can support you and your teams and organization with remote work.
Check out upcoming programs on our calendar!

TEAMS365 #2261 – EVC 135: Rotate: Who is Getting Shortchanged?

3/9/2020

This week brings us to Effective Virtual Conversations Tip #135. In remote meetings it’s easy to get stuck in a rut. One of the ruts we may find ourselves in is always meeting at the same time. If we are all in similar time zones that’s ok, but if we are in the space of remote work, it’s possible that one or a handful of the team is ALWAYS meeting at a time which is not convenient.

Today’s prompt gets you thinking about ROTATING things – whether it’s time, meeting location, or focus so that it’s more equitable.

Consider who might be getting shortchanged with your meetings or learning.

Enjoy!
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton
Potentials Realized | Coaching Team Leaders | Remote Pathways Podcast
Team and Leadership Development | Coaching | Everything DiSC
Phone (416)996-8326

Contact us to discuss how we can support you and your teams and organization with remote work.
Looking to enhance your virtual conversations? Webinars? Pick up a copy of Effective Virtual Conversations at Amazon.
Check out upcoming programs on our calendar!

TEAMS365 #2254 - EVC Tip 134: 8 Essential Virtual Meeting Tips

3/2/2020

Last week’s post got you to think about meetings and what’s going to help you keep them on track, especially if they are virtual. Part of the challenge to virtual calls is not only keeping them focused but making sure we also bring everyone’s voice into the room. There are a variety of techniques we can be leveraging to make sure that meetings are interactive and are not just a talking head.

In your next meeting, consider using the following elements:

Visuals – What visuals are going to capture people’s attention? What will prompt or provoke some new thinking?
Media – Have you created some music or video that will stimulate or prompt a different energy?
Breakouts – If you are looking to bring people’s voices into the room, can you incorporate breakouts into the main room? Maybe different groups explore ideas around the varied topics you are exploring? Perhaps sub-groups meet in breakouts according to the topic they are interested in.
Annotation – Annotation is often an underutilized way to bring peoples voices into the room.
Chat – Get people to input and communicate via chat.

Also, like today’s post recommends, be sure to incorporate the 8 Essential Virtual Meeting Tips I share in Effective Virtual Conversations. This may include questions I term as the 8 Essential Virtual Meeting Questions:

What’s the purpose of the meeting?
What takeaways do we want?
Who needs to be on the call?
What preparation is needed for us to be most effective?
What pace to we want to keep it engaging?
What will help keep the focus?
What is absolutely essential to cover?
What follow up might be required?

(Source: Chapter 9, Effective Virtual Conversations, Jennifer Britton, Copyright 2017)

What are you going to do to make the most of your next meeting?

Best,
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton
Potentials Realized | Coaching Team Leaders | Remote Pathways Podcast
Team and Leadership Development | Coaching | Everything DiSC
Phone (416)996-8326

Contact us to discuss how we can support you and your teams and organization with remote work.
Get your planning on with the PlanDoTrack Workbook and Planner or Coaching Business Builder
Looking to enhance your virtual conversations? Webinars? Pick up a copy of Effective Virtual Conversations at Amazon.
Check out upcoming programs on our calendar!

TEAMS365 #2252 - Happy Leap Year Day! Several of the Teams365 Series You Will Want to Check Out

2/29/2020

This year we get an extra day. Every four years a leap year occurs. February 29th was actually the birthday of one of my grandmothers. She was born in 1904. As a little girl, I thought it would be so neat to be born on leap year. What do you want to dedicate the extra time to today?

Given it’s a special day, I thought it would be interesting to look back at some of my favorite series over the last four years since we last had a leap year day.

If you haven’t had a chance to take a look at these past posts, do take a look at the following:

20 Activities for Virtual and Remote Teams, such as #11 on Conflict Management – read it here.
Remote Work Myths – Read one of the more recent ones here – Remote Does Not Equal Disconnected
Weekly Journaling Prompts each Saturday – View the 80 plus in the series here.
Monday’s Effective Virtual Conversations tips - check them out here.

These tips map to my 2017 book – Effective Virtual Conversations. If you are needing to shift your workspace to the remote or virtual domain, this might be a great book to pick up. It covers some of the foundations of holding more effective virtual meetings, learning and team sessions.

Given that’s it’s the last day of February I thought it would be interesting to highlight some of our focus areas this month. What was to focus more on Collaboration and Relationships at the top of the month, became much more focused on one of our specialty areas – remote working – given the significant impact health events have had this month.

You’ll want to check out some of the posts including:
Teams365 2227 – Ingredients for Making Remote Relationships Work
Teams365 Tip 274 - Calibrate
Teams365 2241 –Differences when working remote: part 1
Teams365 2242 – More Differences when working remote
Teams365 2235 – Remote Work Myth – Remote Does Not Equal Disconnected
Teams365 2243: February 20 – Remote Work Enabler #2 – Boundaries
Teams365 2240 - Effective Virtual Conversations Tip – Matrix Tip – What’s the priority?

Enjoy your exploration and have a great Leap Year Day!
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton
Potentials Realized | Coaching Team Leaders | Remote Pathways Podcast
Team and Leadership Development | Coaching | Everything DiSC
Phone (416)996-8326

Get your planning on with the PlanDoTrack Workbook and Planner or Coaching Business Builder
Looking to enhance your virtual conversations? Webinars? Pick up a copy of Effective Virtual Conversations at Amazon.
Check out upcoming programs on our calendar!

TEAMS365 # 2249 – Meeting Questions: Keeping Them Efficient Even If You Aren’t Face-to-Face

2/26/2020

Communication flow is key to work today – whether we are in person, or virtual/remote. Today’s post shares with you 8 Essential Meeting Questions to be asking every time you are preparing for, and leading meetings. The recent impact of COVID-19 has disrupted operations for many global businesses. One key area that’s been disrupted is that of meetings.

Let’s take a look at the 8 Essential Virtual Meeting Questions I share in my 2017 book, Effective Virtual Conversations.

What’s the purpose of the meeting?
What takeaways do we want?
Who needs to be on the call?
What preparation is needed for us to be most effective?
What pace to we want to keep it engaging?
What will help keep the focus?
What is absolutely essential to cover?
What follow up might be required?

(Source: Chapter 9, Effective Virtual Conversations, Jennifer Britton, Copyright 2017)

As you consider your next meeting, what’s important? What’s going to help it be the best meeting possible?

Pick up a copy of Effective Virtual Conversations at Amazon (Kindle and Hard-copy versions available).

Two other things which will help you maximize this virtual conversation in the remote meeting space are:

Having an agenda. Being sure that the agenda is what people want and that you stick to it! Unlike a face-to-face meeting where people may have lots of time to come and go, stick to the agenda.
Be clear with responsibilities and accountabilities. One of the nice things with virtual meetings is that you may be able to record them (check local legislation around what is feasible and/or part of company policy) and have them transcribed quickly as a record of next steps. This can save hours of meeting notes!

What’s going to help you with your remote meetings?

Looking for more support on thriving when you need to move things remote? Let’s talk about training or consulting support for your organization, or have your folks join us on one of the Wednesday One-Day Virtual Facilitation Essentials programs. These one-day Virtual Train-the-Trainers are geared to get professionals up to speed in leading virtual conversations of all kinds – meetings, team building events, retreats and coaching sessions. Learn more about the Virtual Facilitation Essentials program here.

Best,
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton
Potentials Realized | Coaching Team Leaders | Remote Pathways Podcast
Team and Leadership Development | Coaching | Everything DiSC
Phone (416)996-8326

Get your planning on with the PlanDoTrack Workbook and Planner or Coaching Business Builder
Looking to enhance your virtual conversations? Webinars? Pick up a copy of Effective Virtual Conversations at Amazon.
Check out upcoming programs on our calendar!

TEAMS365 #2247 – Effective Virtual Conversations Tip #133

2/24/2020

This week’s Effective Virtual Conversations tip reminds you to “Catch people doing things right”. A challenge in remote work is that we don’t always see people in their natural work setting. Feedback, in general, may be missing when we work remote and sometimes it can feel like we are operating in a vacuum.

In order to help team members excel, feedback is needed. Both positive feedback and constructive feedback when things aren’t going well.

So how do we provide feedback when we don’t see others in action?

Build in review reflection touchpoints. This might include mid-project or end of project reviews. These can involve sharing works in progress (or completion) where there’s a specific focus on sharing and receiving feedback.

Build in co-working opportunities where it is live and virtual. This can provide a sense of everyone’s different working style. What might a co-working opportunity look like? It could be undertaking a 4-hour block of work together with the group coming together at the top of every hour. I facilitate these as part of the different remote coaching services I offer to group members who join me for an annual basis. With benefits of both ongoing accountability and getting things done quicker, it can be really interesting to have people share a snapshot of their work, real-time. It’s not only inspirational for us but can be a validating factor for those sharing the work. It also opens the door for informal feedback like – “Have you thought about….” OR “Have you considered looking at…..”. While we may operate in isolation, it can be important to benefit from peer wisdom and sharing.

Job shadow virtually, where feasible. Can more junior team members shadow another team member? Be an active observer so they can learn from others?

What else might you do to encourage job shadowing?

Finally, are you building in a culture with your remote team of having people share accomplishments and successes at team meetings? There might be a Star of the Week, or the Month. While this may not motivate everyone, it can build a great practice of building in a pause, so people note what they have done.

Enjoy your focus on thinking about feedback in the remote space and catching people doing it right.

Have a great week!
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton
Potentials Realized | Coaching Team Leaders | Remote Pathways Podcast
Team and Leadership Development | Coaching | Everything DiSC
Phone (416)996-8326

Get your planning on with the PlanDoTrack Workbook and Planner or Coaching Business Builder
Looking to enhance your virtual conversations? Webinars? Pick up a copy of Effective Virtual Conversations at Amazon.
Check out upcoming programs on our calendar!