Teams365 Blog - POTENTIALS REALIZED

TEAMS365 #2466 – Wrapping up Q3 and Stepping into Q4

9/30/2020

It’s the last day of Q3 and we’re just about to step into Q4. Who is ready to step forward? Before we go there, I’d like to invite you to take 10 minutes or more today to do a brief reflection on your experience. If you prefer to do the reflection by video, take a look at this Quarterly Review Video I recorded 18 months ago as we moved from Q1 to Q2 2019. The questions are evergreen and don’t expire.

Grab pen and paper and take a look at this…

Best wishes,
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton
Potentials Realized | Coaching Team Leaders
Coaching Skills Training | Leadership Development | Teamwork
Growing Team Leaders, One Conversation at a Time™ in the Remote Space
Contact us to discuss leadership, coaching or performance needs for your and your team
Phone: (416)996-8326

Join us September 17th for the one-day Stand Out Virtually! STtdio Day Masterclass - Learn more about creating exceptional virtual presentations, meetings and programs, and leave the day with your next one sketched out!

TEAMS365 #2459 - Collaborating Virtually

9/23/2020

Virtual Collaboration is a core topic for all types of remote professionals. Whether we have to build something within our team, or expand our network, it’s key to build capacity to collaborate across distance and time. I address this topic in Chapter 12 of Effective Virtual Conversations. In a very practical way, you will want to consider the following areas for exploration:

#1 – Why are we collaborating? Many writers assert that it’s important not to collaborate just to collaborate. In fact, it’s key that we are clear on why we are collaborating. Is it because our skills are better when we fuse them together? It is because we bring a different insight into a core topic? Be clear on why you are collaborating.

#2 – What’s your core stance and common ground around the topic? What is the common stance you hold around the topic? Perhaps you are both passionate about educating around a topic. Perhaps you want to create a new approach to looking at an issue. Being clear on where you both align, and where you are different, is important.

#3 – What’s different between your work? Consider where your work is not only the same, but complimentary. Partnerships can get weakened if both partners are too similar. Consider exploring not only what’s the same, but also what’s different.

#4 – Consider what your end result is. Results in the remote space need to be specific? Clear? Focused? What are your end results? What are you looking to achieve?

#5 – Provide feedback. Feedback is critical to any partnership and collaborative experience. Be clear on what’s working. What’s not. What changes are needed and how things can proceed.

How often are you meeting? What type of feedback are you both providing and receiving?

Collaboration will continue to be a “pain point” for many professionals. What’s going to help your partnerships flourish in the remote space?

Enjoy the conversation!
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton
Potentials Realized | Coaching Team Leaders
Coaching Skills Training | Leadership Development | Teamwork
Growing Team Leaders, One Conversation at a Time™ in the Remote Space
Contact us to discuss leadership, coaching or performance needs for your and your team
Phone: (416)996-8326

TEAMS365 #2442 – Weekly Review :Virtual meetings, Systems Check and Monthly Kick off

9/6/2020

Welcome to the week in review. This week we covered the following posts:

Saturday’s Weekly Journaling Prompt
Friday’s Flashback Friday
Thursday’s Team Building Question inviting you to do a systems check
Wednesday’s focus on 6 Areas To Consider With Your Virtual Meetings and 8 Questions To Always Ask. Read it here.
Tuesday’s Monthly Kick Off and Review
Monday’s Effective Virtual Conversations Tip

Enjoy!
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton
Potentials Realized | Coaching Team Leaders
Coaching Skills Training | Leadership Development | Teamwork
Growing Team Leaders, One Conversation at a Time™ in the Remote Space
Contact us to discuss leadership, coaching or performance needs for your and your team
Phone: (416)996-8326

TEAMS365 #2438 –6 Tips for Better Video Meetings – And 8 Questions To Ask Every Time

9/2/2020

Inefficient meetings have simply transposed themselves over to the virtual space in recent months. Before you step into what is often the busiest part of the year (post-Labor Day!), consider these 10 tips for better video meetings.

#1 – Consider your audio – How clear is it? Are you using a good microphone? Is there any background noise?

#2 – Consider your lighting – When lighting is behind you your face may be shaded. It’s important to get lighting right so that you can be seen. Visual cues are key in the virtual space. Being able to read someone’s face is essential for building (and maintaining) trust. The best lighting is often created when a window is just in front of you, with muted light (I use a sunshade in my office to keep the light a little more diffuse).

#3 – Consider what visual cues will be useful – What are the elements you want to include in your meeting? What could be provided in a visual way?

#4 – What is your call to action – i.e. what do you want people to do afterwards? Make it as clear and focused as possible.

#5 – Always include a dial in number in case people have challenges accessing the call via their computer or app.

#6 – Keep to time – Don’t wait or everyone to show up because you don’t know if they will. Likewise, make sure you wrap up on time as well!

In addition to these 6 tips, always be asking the 8 Essential Virtual Meeting Questions I share in my book, Effective Virtual Conversations. The questions are:

What’s the purpose?
What takeaways do we want?
Who needs to be on the call?
What preparation is needed for us to be most effective in the meeting?
What pace do we want in order to keep it engaging?
What will help keep the focus?
What’s absolutely essential? (versus what will be nice to cover or where can people go for more information around topics?)
What follow up might be required?

Let us know what your favorite meeting tips are by sharing them over at the Virtual and Remote Visionaries Hub. You can find it here.

Best,
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton
Potentials Realized | Coaching Team Leaders
Coaching Skills Training | Leadership Development | Teamwork
Growing Team Leaders, One Conversation at a Time™ in the Remote Space
Contact us to discuss leadership, coaching or performance needs for your and your team
Phone: (416)996-8326

TEAMS365 #2437 Welcome to September – August Month in Review, September Planning & Gearing Up For Back To Work & School

9/1/2020

Welcome back to September. I’m excited to step into another month of blog posts with you. This start of September may be a little different than past years AND for many it still signals the start of a new year and new routines.

As we start this month, what are you excited about? What are you looking forward to? What do you want to make sure you focus on?

We’re going to start the month with our typical monthly review and stock taking. If you haven’t participated in one of these before, I hope you will take 5-10 minutes today to work on it. What’s important to note and pay attention to?

Looking back to the month of August (and/or the summer):

What were your achievements?
What didn’t get completed but is going to be carried forward?
What learning did you undertake?
What strengths did you leverage?
What got in the way of your plans/achievements?
What helped to MAGNIFY or AMPLIFY things?
What helped you FOCUS?
What helped you SIMPLIFY or streamline?
What else is important to note about your past month? (metrics, lessons learned, other…)
What did you do to renew?
What habits did you lean into?

Looking ahead to the month ahead:

What are your major goals for September?
What do you want to focus on?
What needs to be completed by the end of the quarter/end of this month?
What is the one routine you want to make sure you develop or maintain?
What’s important to let go of?
What will help you streamline or systematize?
What will help you MAGNIFY or AMPLIFY?
What habits do you want to focus on?
What relationships do you want to pay attention to?
What actions/projects do you want to complete, not matter what?
What else is important to note?

Enjoy your reflections!
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton
Potentials Realized | Coaching Team Leaders
Coaching Skills Training | Leadership Development | Teamwork
Growing Team Leaders, One Conversation at a Time™ in the Remote Space
Contact us to discuss leadership, coaching or performance needs for your and your team
Phone: (416)996-8326

TEAMS365 #2418 – Team Building Tip 258

8/13/2020

This week’s Team Building Question may seem a bit provocative, and in the remote space, it’s critical that we ask it – What’s not being spoken about?

When trust levels are high the question “what’s not being spoken about” can open up the doorway for a great dialogue. When trust levels are low, this question might seem very provocative.

The answer to this question can shine the light on areas you need to explore as a team, or areas to keep in min.

Here are a few other questions to keep in mind this week:

What other areas haven’t you explored, or spoken about?
What is taboo in terms of looking at as a team?
What ideas are never surfaced?
What’s not safe about bringing up an alternative view?

Enjoy your conversation,
Jennifer

PS - Take a minute and be sure to join us over at the Virtual and Remote Visionaries Hub as well on Facebook. You can join us here.

Jennifer Britton
Potentials Realized | Coaching Team Leaders
Coaching Skills Training | Leadership Development | Teamwork
Growing Team Leaders, One Conversation at a Time™ in the Remote Space
Contact us to discuss leadership, coaching or performance needs for your and your team
Phone: (416)996-8326

TEAMS365 #2416 – Teams: You missing any of these core virtual meeting ingredients?

8/11/2020

A large part of my work for the five plus years has been in supporting organizations make the transition from in-person learning to online learning. This year has created a tidal wave for the need for engaging and interactive virtual meetings, learning and teamwork.

As I wrote in Effective Virtual Conversations

“Meetings can be an essential part of the communication needed for a high-performing team, and, unfortunately, they have gotten a bad rap due to poorly planned and poorly executed meetings. We know teams that excel usually have shared practices like meetings, which focus on building relationships and getting results.

With more than 35-50% of people’s time being spent in meetings each week, the question of “what could we do to make team meetings more effective?” is a strategic one.

As a team consider:

What are the top three reasons we should be holding meetings?
When is the best time to hold them?
What’s working with our meetings currently? What’s not?
What’s the one thing we could let go of doing in our meetings without having too much of an impact?
What is the one thing we wish we did more of?
What is the best way to communicate information in different topic areas?
What are the things we want to start doing as a team instead of meetings?

END OF EXCERPT - © Jennifer Britton, Effective Virtual Conversations, 2017, pp. 312

Catch up on other EVC Author Readings I hosted during April, May and June. You can find them here at the Effective Virtual Conversations blog site. You’ll be able to listen into Chapters 1 to 4 of the book as I read it in a daily 5-7 minute reading. Enjoy!

Best wishes,
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton
Potentials Realized | Coaching Team Leaders
Coaching Skills Training | Leadership Development | Teamwork
Growing Team Leaders, One Conversation at a Time™ in the Remote Space
Contact us to discuss leadership, coaching or performance needs for your and your team
Phone: (416)996-8326

TEAMS365 #2398 – FlashbackFriday: Digital Transformation

7/24/2020

I have been doing a lot of speaking this year around virtual conversations and digital transformation. Whether I have been speaking about creating MEMORABLE virtual conversations, or HOW to digitize parts of your business, your learning or teamwork, 2020 is apt to go down as the year where the pivot to digital transformation got accelerated. Here’s what I wrote only a short 7 months ago in December 2019 on Digital Transformation in Teams365 #2178.

Take a read and think about what is important for you to note:

As an author and consultant, I often work with organizations and teams around the topic of digital transformation. As someone who has usually worked as an early adopter with technology, sometimes out of geographic necessity, digital transformation is an extension of the work I’ve been doing for several decades now.

You can hear more about the various pathways that bring us into remote and digital work at the new podcast I am hosting with colleague Michelle Mullins. Together we are exploring the people, pathways and processes that make up the remote workspace.

Digital transformation has been one part of this equation. From large banks, to healthcare, to education, the way we are connecting, conversing and doing our work is essential.

Many rural areas now have access to medical advisors that would not have been possible years ago. I remember vividly being part of some epiphany moments and paradigm shifters in 1998 (yes, that’s 1998) with a community deep in the interior of South America. A funding grant from the Canadian International Development Agency helped to fund solar panels, a satellite connection and special laptops to link that community with educational materials. When I arrived at the community to meet with my team who had been based there doing related work in primary health and infrastructure rehab, I was struck (as was often the case) with the very limited resources available for students. One notebook each, a small pencil and bare bookshelves. This pilot project was a bit of a game changer for that community, opening up the doorways to education for those children.

While not every project like this is a success, they radically change the paradigm of how we work, what’s available and then what’s possible.

This is also what’s happening in the era of digital transformation.

While we may not be comfortable in letting go of “how we’ve always done things” it’s important that we also look at the questions of:

What can we do now?
What’s now possible?
What new connections are there?

VUCA, digital transformation, and AI (all 3 separate things) are showing up in some workplaces at the same time. It can be overwhelming for some and spark creativity for others.

Providing a space for people to connect and share their insights in a way where they can be heard.

As a team, over time, be sure to build in time to explore additional questions around:

What changes do we need?
What can be evolved? Repurposed?
What new things do we need to create?
What do we need to stop doing?
What conversations are important for you to have as a team? What space and time do you need to earmark so these conversations are taking place?

Interested in having a conversation about this? Need a facilitator or speaker to come in and discuss? Please reach out to me by email at info@potentialsrealized.com and let’s set up a time to talk.

Best wishes,
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton
Potentials Realized | Coaching Team Leaders
Coaching Skills Training | Leadership Development | Teamwork
Growing Team Leaders, One Conversation at a Time™ in the Remote Space
Contact us to discuss leadership, coaching or performance needs for your and your team
Phone: (416)996-8326

TEAMS365 #2390 – Team Building Tip 254

7/16/2020

Welcome back to another weekly Thursday question to bring into your team. This week’s question is “What could be collapsed?”

When you think about this question it might take you to thinking about:

What processes could be collapsed so they are more streamlined?
What components could be simplified?
What communication could be made easier?
What elements could be broken down?
When you think of collapsed, what is important to note?

Best,
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton
Potentials Realized | Coaching Team Leaders
Coaching Skills Training | Leadership Development | Teamwork
Growing Team Leaders, One Conversation at a Time™ in the Remote Space
Contact us to discuss leadership, coaching or performance needs for your and your team
Phone: (416)996-8326

TEAMS365 #2384 – Flashback Friday: Teamwork Skills in Complexity – Curiosity

7/10/2020

Welcome back to another Friday where we are focusing on Teamwork Skills in Complexity. This week’s post is all about the skill of Curiosity. To explore it, let’s look back at Teams365 #1596.

Here’s what I wrote:

This month we are exploring what’s required to thrive in today’s ongoing world of complexity. Last week we explored listening, and today we are exploring the skill of curiosity and open-mindedness. Tomorrow, we will be turning our attention to the skill of experimentation.

Curiosity is a critical skill set for today’s ongoing change and complexity, given that many times “we do not know” or have all of the information needed to make decisions or see what is next. This could be because things are changing so fast or it could be because things are unclear on the road ahead. Being able to lead from a place of curiosity or “not knowing” can be liberating when the shift has been made.

One thing that can help us on our voyage of curiosity as a leader is questions. We can use questions to check assumptions, learn from others, and harness the wisdom that exists. Some questions that enable all team members to step into a place of curiosity are:

What’s possible?
What’s one thing we haven’t tried?
What else?
What else can you leverage?
What’s the worst thing that can happen?
What’s another option?
What could you do differently?

In order to cultivate curiosity within our team we can:

Encourage risk taking and mistakes
Support team members in pilots and experimentation
Enable learning across the silos which exist within the business
Expose the team to new areas regularly
Support a growth mindset

What can you do as a team to cultivate curiosity?

Enjoy the conversation!
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton
Potentials Realized | Coaching Team Leaders
Coaching Skills Training | Leadership Development | Teamwork
Growing Team Leaders, One Conversation at a Time™ in the Remote Space
Contact us to discuss leadership, coaching or performance needs for your and your team
Phone: (416)996-8326

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