Having worked with numerous teams across various sectors, one common challenge that employees seem to face is finding work-life balance.
Author: naren@hybreed.co
Let us keep the pandemic aside for a moment and go back to pre-Covid times. A McKinsey article published last year had this to say:
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In one of my earlier assignments as a business head, we had a very passionate and driven employee Tanya (name changed).
As she moved into her new role as a Marketing Manager, we were very confident that she would be able to drive the marketing team hard and help the organisation get a competitive edge. However, three months into her new role, the marketing function was struggling with unprecedented internal issues. Her strength suddenly started looking like a weak point, where she got trapped into a “me vs team” situation, which got worse with time as she kept on pushing her views and ideas on the team in a very “my way or highway” approach.
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Program
Unilever Bangladesh | Influence Workshops
Objective
A series of three workshops at Dhaka, Chittagong & Dhaka targeted at the entry level cadre of Unilever Bangladesh. The workshops were designed for executives who handled around 7 field level DSO’s. The intervention was intended as an opportunity for energizing this group and arriving at a common understanding around what would make them exercise Influence better & scale up to be Leaders.
Solution
Leadership in the context of these employees was about exercising Influence on the teams they worked with and with external stakeholders. The whole workshop was hence constructed as a 2-day intervention woven around the Cohen Bradford Influencing Model.
Through the use of experiential activities – melded with open discussion amongst the participants, the workshop brought out the key learning as mentioned above, in a facilitative manner.
The methodology of addressing a serious topic with deep insights in a playful manner worked extremely well in the context of these employees.
Impact:
Here is what Taslima Hasnat Jaigirder, the HR Business Partner of the team had to say about the whole intervention:
“I have never received such overwhelmingly positive feedback from each and every participant before for any other program! Even the typical critics came proactively to thank me for organizing such training. But the real credit goes to FocusU of course. Unlike typical training filled with slides, theories and handouts, FocusU brings in a different way of learning while enjoying participation. Their use of simple activities to relate with key learning points makes learning more effective. No wonder participants found it instantly convenient to identify key learning points and action plan at the end of the session. Moreover, the level of energy, positivity and enthusiasm the trainers exerted within the participants was brilliant. I believe FocusU India has more such learning interventions to offer which Unilever Bangladesh Ltd will be keen to explore. We look forward to building a lasting relationship with one of the most dynamic training solution providers. All the best to FocusU for their future endeavour.”
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For most organisations, the pandemic brought to surface unexpected talent, creativity, and resilience. Many mid-level employees stepped up and took charge of the situation. They handled the unexpected challenges with unprecedented creativity and a strong bias for action. These entrepreneurial team members have really changed the game for everyone, everywhere. Regardless of the size of the organisation, these team members showed initiative and devised innovative solutions, employing cross-functional resources to optimise the productivity for all.
Continue reading “Your Team Stepped Up During The Pandemic. Now, It’s Your Turn.”
What are silos? Originally tall vertical structures used to store large quantities of grain and later gaining worldwide notoriety for housing missiles capable of nuclear destruction, silos have continued in our midst for quite some time. In recent times, they stand tall within organizations, virtually even taller than the missile variety, posing as much danger to the organization’s functioning as any weapon of destruction. Though mostly virtual, and sometimes even imagined, organizations and specifically teams continue to struggle with them without success. Silo mentality, as it is more often called nowadays, refers to the phenomenon in which different teams work as if they are prisoners within one of those giant silos, not able to communicate effectively with each other.
Continue reading “How To Break Silos Within An Organisation?”
