Mardi Humphreys

Your Pool is Leaking

Let’s do a Great recap. The iterations the workforce has gone through since March 2020 are The Great:

Retirement
Resignation
Reshuffle
Recognition
Realization
Reprioritization
Relocation

We are now in the Great Renegotiation. In all these evolutions, the workforce evaluated the role that employment should play in their lives. Many took control of how they produce income by trading traditional full-time employment for gigs, part-time, or starting their own businesses. There were 11.2 million jobs available in America as of the last business day of July 2022. There are more jobs than there are people willing to do them. What is the disconnect?

Employers say: No one wants to work
Workforce says: No one wants to work under the conditions employers are offering

Two plus years into the pandemic, the workforce has more agency than ever to choose how they make money yet so many employers refuse to accept that the balance of power is shifting. Too many employers are trying to attract workers with the same benefits they offered pre-COVD like signing bonuses, titles, and promotions. This strategy may attract traditional employees, but there aren’t many of them left swimming in the talent pool. The majority of available workforce want the flexibility to work remotely, mental-health support, and a manager who cares about them as a person.

The Great Rethink

For employers, it’s time to decide if you are willing to do what it takes to stay in business. For example, if you have a crucial position that’s been vacant for at least 90 days, then it’s time to look at your employee value proposition. Have you adjusted it to meet the needs of the current talent pool? Look at your notes from the interviews of recent candidates.

What were the majority looking for?
Did they expect both career development opportunities and autonomy to complete projects?
Were they not hired because you don’t fund upskilling?
Did any decline offers because they were not willing to work 40 hours a week on site?

Evolve to Survive

If you decide to update your benefits packages, you can use the answers to the above questions as a guide to attract the talent you need. To retain the employees you have, meet with HR and evaluate your company’s culture as objectively as possible. For example, If you say you have an inclusive culture that embraces work-life balance, but penalize employees for calling out microaggressions or taking a parent to a medical appointment, then employees will quit. Not only will they leave, but other employees who observe these contradictions may resign too. If culture adjustment is a huge undertaking for you, consider hiring a consultant. Someone who is trained in managing perception, can make impartial observations, and can help you refine your approach based on the currently available talent pool.

A Better Leader

Rethinking does not mean you are weak. Rethink about it like this: we are in an age where we must learn a skill, use it, then unlearn it to learn the updated version, use it, unlearn it, rinse, and repeat. Consequently, we should not be afraid of appearing indecisive when we change long-held opinions because new data, like this is available. Rethinking means you are both a realist and an innovator.

How are you adjusting to The Great Renegotiation? Please share in the comments.

Cyber Scary

October is practically here and while that means full on Halloween celebrating for most people, in my world, it means Cybersecurity Awareness Month. You know to keep your Personally Identifiable Information (PII) like Social Security number and bank account information secret, but you have no control over those banks getting hacked by Threat Actors. Nor can your computer’s and phone’s firewalls stop every phishing email from reaching you. Last year, identity theft cost Americans $5.8 BILLION. Here are some Don’ts and Dos to protect your identity.

Don’t Believe Everything Your Phone Shows You

We’ve talked before about not clicking on links in texts or emails unless you are expecting the communication. Now cyber scammers are getting bolder. They call claiming to be a representative from your bank, spoofing the bank’s phone number so that it looks legitimate on your caller ID. They speak in an urgent tone claiming there is something wrong with your account and they need to fix it right now using your bank’s money transfer service. They instruct you to transfer money out of your account and into their holding account, but the only holding going on is the cybercriminal holding on to your money and vanishing.

Don’t Be Lazy

From January – June, 2022, 817 American companies were compromised by cybercriminals with 53.4 million victims affected. Check here for a list of the most stolen PII. Before giving any company your PII, check their website to see what their cyber defenses are. If that information isn’t on the site, ask customer service: How may attacks have they withstood? What is their protocol for notifying you that a breach happened? How often do they update and patch their cybersecurity systems?

Don’t Leave It On

When you’re not using Bluetooth-enabled devices, turn Bluetooth off. Leaving it on allows hackers to see devices that you previously connected with. They can pretend to be one of those devices to access another one and steal your PII. For example, if you have a wireless printer in your home office, turn it off when you aren’t printing. Here is a good resource for more information.

Do Enable Two-factor Authentication

When a website, for example, your bank or favorite social media platform, gives you the option to enable two-factor authentication, say yes. I know you are rarely in the mood, but the protection is worth the time it takes to set up. It will take way more time to try to get back the identity a cybercriminal stole than it will take you to wait for and input the code the company sends you.

Do Shred

If you still receive paper statements for your bank accounts, credit cards, student loans, or any documents with PII on them, then shred them on a regular basis. If you don’t own a shredder, or have a friend who will let you borrow theirs, go online and search for “community shredding events near you.”

Do Monitor Your Accounts

Ultimately, you are responsible for your own cybersecurity. If you do not currently check your bank accounts weekly, then start. If you see something weird, like a transaction you did not initiate, contact your bank and investigate. If you do not check your credit score twice a year, then start. If you have experienced an attack on your credit, consider freezing it. Freezing your credit is a bit of a task and has pros and cons. Read about them here.

What do you do to protect your PII from cybercriminals? Please share in the comments.

We Belong

A couple of weeks ago, I received a DM on LinkedIn from my friend, Tonya Casey, Director of Finance, Miami Valley Hospital, Dayton, Ohio. Here is the thought-provoker that she sent:

“Getting a seat at the table is not what’s important as much as WHAT happens at the table. So, when you are seeking a seat, and you are fortunate to be offered that seat, remember that WHAT is said and done is the most important thing, not the mere fact that you are physically present.” Sylvain Trepanier, DNP, RN, CENP, FAONL, FAAN, SVP, System Chief Nursing Officer at Providence

Since recent studies indicate that diverse and inclusive businesses outperform their competition by 35%, most leaders welcome the idea of diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) in the workplace. They even take measures to hire and form project teams of diverse employees and include a DEI session in their annual trainings. Great! Now what?

Belonging (DEIB)

Building on Dr. Syl’s quote above, what do you say and do once you are sitting at the table? Belonging is the next iteration of the DEI process. To me, this means building a community and that begins with the people who are at the table with you. Here are three ways to get started.

Communicate

If you are assigned to lead a diverse team, when you come together for a kickoff meeting, you may want to plan on not discussing the project. Instead, focus on how you will work together. A good place to start is adopting Brene Brown’s mindset. Her motto is, “I’m not here to be right, I’m here to get it right.” This attitude requires a commitment from everyone at the table to be courageous, forgiving, and vulnerable. To facilitate this, you can set ground rules for the learning moments that will inevitably happen during meetings. For example, agree on a signal, like raising an index finger, indicating a team member wants to offer gentle feedback or ask for clarification. The good news is communication builds trust. The bad news is trust takes time and attention to build.

Engage

Trust is something we assume we have from our coworkers. You know what assuming does. You don’t give someone your trust without first observing proof that they are worthy of it. Your team must offer trust to one another before they can do the actual project you’re tasked with. Building trust won’t happen in one meeting. Allow time for your team to have intentional getting-to-know-you conversations outside of the conference room. Suggest a coffee in the break room between 2-3 teammates. Encourage them to tell each other what brought them to your organization. Begin your next meeting with one teammate telling the group one thing about one coworker they had coffee with.

Nurture

Once minimum viable trust is in place, follow up is key. This is where it gets uncomfortable. As the leader, it would be wise to say out loud to everyone at the table that belonging is an investment and while it is not the responsibility of anyone at that table to educate anyone else about DEIB, are team members open to suggesting appropriate resources that can? For example, what books should we read to learn how to promote belonging?

This is obviously a bigger conversation than 500 words. Thank you Dr. Syl and Tonya for starting it.

What suggestions do you have for fostering belonging in the workplace? Please share in the comments.

Passed Examples

The Sunday after Labor Day is Grandparents Day in America. This resonates with me because as I was growing up all of my grandparents worked. From birth to age thirteen, I had four grandparents. One set of maternal and one set of fraternal. The two sets were very different from one another.

Stoic vs. Emotional
Never went to church vs. Went to church every time the doors were open
Mail carrier and former U.S. Army Air Corp captain married to a children’s librarian turned bank employee vs. Factory worker and former marine married to a waitress turned factory worker
One set paid for my freshman year of college vs. One set invited me to do my laundry at their house every week
Lawrence Welk vs. Hee-Haw

Grandparents have seen more of society’s evolution, experienced more heartache, strived more to make ends meet, and learned more lessons on setting priorities. Here are things I learned about work from my grandparents.

Sometimes Your Job is Just a Job

When I was a child, my maternal grandfather worked at a car manufacturing plant. He did not talk a lot about his job. He did not love his job. He did not expect it to be his calling. He worked so his family had food, clothing, shelter, and fun. He found his greatest fulfillment in God. His love of the Bible, his church, and its people was his calling. It is where he invested his T.E.A.M. From him I learned that work can simply be a means to an end.

People Come First

When I was a child, my maternal grandmother was employed at the same car manufacturing plant as my maternal grandfather. My fraternal grandmother worked at a bank. On occasion, both babysat me when my school was on a break and my parents were at work. I remember watching television at my maternal grandparents’ house while my grandmother cooked and did laundry because for her a day off from the factory meant a day working at home. I also remember going to the local bank with my fraternal grandmother with a tote bag full of snacks, books, and seek-and-find word puzzles to keep me busy in the break room while she did her job. (This was waaaaaay before Bring Your Child to Work Day.) Both women found ways to help my parents watch over me. From them I learned helping people takes priority over work.

The Correct Way to Cut a Pie

When I was a child, my fraternal grandfather was a mail carrier. Before I was born, he was a POW during WWII for 11 months. During that time, food was scarce for him. When my parents and I spent Thanksgivings with my fraternal grandparents, my grandmother always made two pumpkin pies for the five of us. My grandfather got one all to himself. After dinner, he settled in front of the television with his pie to watch football and say, “There’s only one way to cut a pie. In half. One for the first half and one for the second half.” From him I learned to reward myself for putting in the work.

What did you learn about work from your grandparents? Please share in the comments.

It’s Just a Pause

I have a confession to make. I’m Team Oxford Comma. People can get passionate about correct comma usage. I did not realize there is such controversy over a crooked little mark. It’s just a pause, people! Sometimes a sentence has multiple commas because the author wants to slow down, make a list, or clarify. These three things are also useful in the workplace.

Slow Down

Plan A does not always work. When your team is trying to complete a project and hits an obstacle, pausing can help cool their frustrations. For example, I ask my clients to tell me what hurts. Their answers give me clues to solving their problems. Sometimes just thinking about the pain and how wide-spread it is sends them into a panic spiral. They talk faster, the pitch of their voices gets higher, their eyes get wider, their flight-fight-or-freeze mechanisms activate. That’s when I know it’s time to respond with slow, low, gentle-toned reassurances full of commas. By the same token, encouraging your team to take a pause helps everyone reset. Then you can calmly regroup and figure out together how to deal with the obstacle.

Make a List

Every task on your to-do list is the top priority and needs done yesterday, but you’ll get more work done if you stop what you’re doing. This is very counter-intuitive, but it’s like a flywheel. You can’t see the progression of the wheel turning while you’re pushing it. Much like you can’t feel the earth constantly turning while you’re standing on it. When you complete the push that makes the flywheel take off, you suddenly have lots of time. To get to the final push, sometimes you have to use a comma. Take a minute to box breath, then look at your task list. Determine which tasks are important and which are urgent. Take one action that gets one urgent task closer to completion, then pause. Look at your important tasks list. What is one action you can take in the next 15 minutes to get one item on it closer to completion? Then continue on with your urgent task list. At the end of the workday, reflect (another comma, btw). Celebrate how far you got on both the urgent and the important tasks, especially if you did not mark everything off both lists. Do not dwell on what is still left to do. Make a quick note of the next steps you’ll take on both lists tomorrow.

Clarify

Mental noise surrounds you 24/7/365. There is an overwhelming amount of information available to you. How do you make sense of any of it? Use a comma.

Pause – Stop. Breathe. Drink a glass of water
Reflect – Your wheels are turning, but you’re upside down. How did that happen?
Focus – What is the Why?
Refine – What is the most important next step or course correction?
Iterate – Take the next step
Repeat

How do you make the best use of pauses at work? Please share in the comments.

Emerging Expectations

A year ago Google gave their employees access to a pay calculator that let them estimate how permanently working remotely would impact their salaries. For most workers it meant a reduction. Since then Facebook, Twitter, and Microsoft revealed similar policies. What is an employer’s justification for cutting pay if their employees work from home? Should you lower your expectations for compensation if it means you can work 100% remotely?

Employers Parry

Tech companies that have national and International workforces like Google, Facebook, and Microsoft revise an employee’s salary when the employee changes the location of their residence. For example, If the employee moves to a lower cost of living area, then their pay is reduced. Conversely, a few companies (e.g., Spotify, Reddit) raised the compensation of remote employees during the pandemic to match the salaries of their workforces that are based in New York and San Francisco. Google’s explanation for decreasing remote employee’s wages is that their compensation packages are always based on location since they pay employees top of the range for the market the employee lives in. Facebook said they had to adjust an employee’s salary to their location for accounting purposes and tax requirements. VMware and Gitlab also commented. Read more here. Companies cutting pay for working from home may be using it as a device to get employees back in the office. Maybe they think it signals a return to business as pre-pandemic usual. Maybe they feel if your manager doesn’t see you working, then you must not be. Maybe they believe physical presence boosts collaboration and innovation. These expectations need to be re-examined. We are living in a business as unusual, homing from work, videoconferencing our heads off era. Work-life integration advances both work and life.

Employees Counter-parry

Studies of productivity during the pandemic revealed that remote workers not only accomplished the same tasks as they did in the office, they also worked longer hours to do so. Employees feel like they should be paid for the work they do, not where they do it, but the majority of their managers disagree. Seventy-three percent of managers affirm that productivity was great. Their problem is, managing their remote workforce caused 69% of the managers to burnout. The study also indicates that 51% of company leaders believe employees want to return to an office and that incentives like free food and happy hours will lure them back. If employees are willing to give up promotions and wage increases to work from home, snacks are not enough of an incentive to return to an office. However, on-site childcare would be a good start.

Touché

This fencing match isn’t really about money. It’s about power. Employers have traditionally held all the power in the relationship. The pandemic gave employees a sense of agency and a means to prove they can handle it. A significant percentage of the workforce discovered that it does not make sense for them to stay in one place 9:00am-5:00pm Monday – Friday to do their jobs well. And so far nothing management has done to lure them back has changed their minds.

Would you accept a pay cut to work from home? Please share why or why not in the comments.

What Did You Expect?

Once upon a time, I worked for a manager who gave me a priority list every Monday. Then every Friday I gave him a status report which shaped his list for the following Monday. He gave me in writing what he expected over the next week, month, and quarter. I knew what he wanted and he knew what I was doing. Our expectations were aligned and we worked happily ever after. Sound like a fairy tale?

In subsequent employment, my procedure is to figure out what my manager wants and give it to them. Sometimes I’m a hit. Sometimes I’m a miscommunication. Here are a few things I’ve learned about aligning expectations with managers, teammates, and clients.

Managers

Communication is hard. Conflicts happen. These are opportunities. Even if the only upside is that your emotional intelligence gets a workout. You can only control you. You can’t control other people’s opinions of you and sometimes that stings. One of the best ways to take the stinger out is to get curious. For example, ask, “What events led to this conclusion?” “What boundary was crossed?” “Please define the non-negotiables.” The answers to these questions can reveal what your next steps should be. Maybe a different department is a better fit for you. Maybe a different company is a better fit for you. At the very least, conflict gives you better questions to ask. This data is useful because you rarely have the full scope of variables that led to the conflict.

Teammates

Everyone brings their preferences for working together to the team. You approach a project thinking you know how this is going to go, and so does everyone else. Organizations hire people for different positions, put them on a team, and expect them to get projects done. If they don’t assign and communicate roles, expectations, and how tasks should pass from one coworker to another, then how will anything get done? Throw in the fact that Plan A rarely works, and you have a mess of wrong intentions, confused roles, and misaligned expectations on your hands. To remedy this, have a kick-off meeting for each new project and ask each team member to answer these questions out loud. “What is our goal?” “What is your role in achieving it?” By the end of the meeting every member should know both their role as well as all their teammate’s roles in achieving the goal.

Clients

If you do the above with your coworkers, then satisfying the client is much easier, but it’s only part of the equation. You need to close the loop by consistently aligning your team’s expectations with your customer’s. On the team side, you can check with direct reports after giving instructions. For example, ask, “Do you have any questions?” On the client side, you can reiterate the instructions you receive. For example, “This is what I heard you say that you need from us…” You can also survey clients after a project. For example, ask, “What did you like best about the way we communicated?” “For future reference, what improvements in communication would you like us to implement?”

One wrong assumption and adverse reaction leads to another. Habitual unchecked communication fuels suspicion and negative reactions. Once this pattern is normalized, it’s hard to break. You cannot build effective working relationships without effective communication.

What is your process for aligning expectations at work? Please share in the comments.

Minor Offenses

Last week in part one of this series, we talked about how obstacles to communication can lead to misaligned expectations. This week, let’s explore how that combination can lead to criticism, envy, or grudges and what you can do to prevent them.

Criticism

Taking criticism is like being randomly pelted by Wiffle balls all day. If you let criticism get to you instead of letting it go, then you risk derailing your career instead of protecting your brand. For example, Alexander Hamilton could not tolerate having his reputation questioned. Marty McFly could not stand being called chicken. One way to ease the pain of criticism is to identify your triggers. How did you feel when you were criticized? Embarrassed? Angry? Surprised? Consider the source of the feedback. Is it from someone you respect? Or did it come from someone who gains from tearing you down? When you figure out what triggers the emotion, you can disrupt it. This is one of the handful of times I do not suggest communication as a solution. Try letting it go first. If addressing the criticism is absolutely necessary to continue working with this person, then proceed with caution. 0% emotion, 0% sarcasm, 100% statement of the facts. E.g., “I’m aware that it has always been handled this way, but let’s both present our options to our manager and let them decide.”

Envy

You don’t advertise your struggles, right? Your resume is full of your hits, not your misses. When jealous of someone else’s success, ask yourself, What did they do to achieve it? What do they have to do to keep it? Is that even what I want? For example, if a coworker received a promotion that you wanted, then make a plan to get it during the next round. Figure out how they got the promotion. Did they receive high-risk projects? Did they make their successes visible to your manager? Did they communicate their expectation of moving up to those who promote? The answers will help you define your goals. Then list what actions you have to take to achieve them. Break those down into steps. Assign each step a deadline. Determine if it is worth your T.E.A.M.

Grudges

The negative energy holding a grudge produces manifests itself in your mind (depression), body (high blood pressure), and spirit (self-esteem). A grudge begins with feeling like you were treated unfairly. Then you repeatedly relive the incident substituting what you wish you’d said or done. Carrying those thoughts around is like trying to put out a fire by throwing gasoline on it. Reset your expectations to the reality of this moment. Do something to force yourself to stay in the present and out of the past: Meditate, take a walk, pray, journal.

Your coworkers will offend you and you will offend them. Most teammates don’t realize they offended you. Some don’t care. You give someone power over you when you retain negative emotions toward them. Decide to be the only one who dictates how you feel. It is extremely difficult to make wise choices at work if you’re resentful.

How do you deflect criticism, envy and grudges at work? Please share in the comments.

Hit and Miscommunication

It’s a tale as old as time. No, not Beauty and the Beast; I’m referring to miscommunication in the workplace. Because we get so much practice at it, most of us think we are great communicators. Yet this recent study found 81% of employees reported that miscommunication happens very frequently, frequently, or occasionally. Let’s think about the quality of our workplace communication and not just when it is spoken or written. A cocked eyebrow after a coworker shares an opinion, looking at your phone during meetings, even taking longer than 24 hours to reply to an email, are all forms of communication. Here are five ways you can upgrade the quality of your communication at work.

You Have Issues

Realize you bring your personal challenges to work with you. This effects both how you receive and transmit communication. For example, if you are a nurse and had a bad commute to the hospital, then you bring that stress both to your patients and coworkers. If you are a self-aware nurse, then you take a minute at the beginning of your shift to breathe, let go of the tension, and refocus.

Perception Is Reality

The brain takes bits of information and creates a story around them. You come to believe this narrative is the truth. When the story turns negative about a conversation with a teammate, stop and think. Was his tone defensive? Was his body language aggressive? Was he looking you in the eye during your heated debate? For example, weary can present as annoyed. When you recall the difficult conversation and your thoughts drift negative, try processing your memories through the filter of assuming that everyone is doing their best. It helps your brain construct a better narrative.

I Do Not Think It Means What You Think It Means

It’s tedious in the short run, but going back to your coworker and asking for clarity will save time in the long run. It will help you figure out how to more effectively communicate with them in the future. It will let them know you see them. It may prevent future conflict. Using a format like, when you told me that, this is what I heard. I interpreted it to mean the other. Did you mean what I think you meant?

Control The Environment

Create an environment conducive to listening, speaking, and writing. If you work in an office with an open layout, then communication is inherently difficult. For example, the music piped throughout the office, a neighboring coworker’s videoconference, and the random fun facts your teammate keeps interrupting your work with are all obstacles to active listening and effective email writing. When a conversation is important to get correct, find a quiet space to talk. When an email is important to get correct, listen to white noise through your noise-cancelling earbuds.

Seek Feedback

The sooner you receive data on your job performance after a project, the better. If your manager does not hold a weekly 1:1 with you, then request those recurring meetings. Ask not only how your manager thinks you did, but also how their manager thinks you did. Positive feedback tells you that you’re on the right track. Negative feedback allows you to course correct for the next project.

How do you manage expectations at work? Please share in the comments.

Fiscal Finesse

If you work for a business, then you are either trying to bring revenue to it or cut its expenses. If you work for a non-profit, then you participate in fund-raising efforts. If you work for a government agency, then you try to spend as little of its budget as possible.

It’s a Job

Managing money isn’t the first skill we associate with motherhood, but motherhood is a job, and every job is about money. Mom has to learn how to pay for the things her baby needs (e.g., diapers, formula). She has to learn how to pay for the things her child needs (e.g., school supplies, clothes). She has to learn how to teach her teenager how to pay for the things they need (e.g., too many to list). These skills transfer to the workplace where Mom uses them to budget for her team.

Disclaimer

ICYMI, I’m not suggesting that every woman needs to have a child in order to be a good leader. I’m saying that motherhood is, by default, leadership training. In the final installment of this series, let’s look at how moms learn about handling money both for the short-term and the long-term.

Short-term Savings at Home

Everyone needs to learn how to live within their means. At home moms have extra decisions to make regarding the household budget. For example, when buying clothing for her rapidly growing toddler, must the clothes be brand new? If her child is going to outgrow their clothes in a few months, then why not thrift shop?

Short-term Savings at Work

Leaders have to learn how to stretch a dollar. At work leaders have extra decisions to make regarding the office budget. For example, when purchasing furniture for the break room, must the tables and chairs be brand new? If clients aren’t going to see them, then would refurbished or gently used tables and chairs work?

Long-term Savings at Home

Moms have to prepare their children for the future. This is not always fun. At home this may look like teaching a child delayed gratification. For example, Mom stays strong and denies her child permission to buy the $60 video game now because that money would have to come from the savings account set aside to buy her child a car in two years.

Long-term Savings at Work

Leaders have to prepare their team for the future. This is not always fun. At work this may look like teaching the team delayed gratification. For example, a leader stays strong and denies her team permission to leave work early on the Friday before a holiday weekend because there is a backlog of sales calls to follow up on. Those follow-ups could fill next week’s pipeline.

It Isn’t Really About the Money

Money isn’t really about money. It’s about what you can do when you have money and what you can’t do when you don’t. A mom learns to consider her child’s feelings when making money decisions at home. When Mom is a leader at work, she’s practiced at considering her staff’s feelings. In terms of money, motherhood teaches women to influence through vision casting not force. It trains women to learn their team members’ emotional reactions to stimuli and use them to push the team to do good work. It reminds them that the only failure is to stop trying.

How do you think motherhood prepares a woman to handle a budget at work? Please share in the comments.