And it’s also a time to begin the reflection process on the year that’s been… acknowledge the achievements, harvest the learnings, and make some intentional choices about what you want to manifest and how you want to be in 2023.

One of the topics that we’ve been exploring with our clients in our recent ‘Putting Human into Hybrid Leadership’ event is to do with Leadership Narrative – and in particular how to take back or re-establish your leadership narrative post pandemic.

Let’s explore this topic further to uncover some insights you may find useful.
Not wishing to go over old ground, the lived experience of the last few years has been a challenge for many of us. The arrival of the pandemic hot on the tail of flood, fire and pestilence – and then more flood.

And with the pandemic came daily briefings, government controls, and mandatory behaviour implementation and monitoring, not something we were accustomed to in a democratic society!   And whether we’re aware of it or not, this all contributed to higher levels of fear and anxiety across our families, communities and work environments.

From a work perspective, we saw a number of impacts:

• Isolation and lack of connection with colleagues
• Initial anxiety about job security moving to absolute job certainty due to locked borders
• Working from home for long periods
• Blurred lines between our personal and professional lives
• Wellbeing and mental health front and centre
• Back-to-back zoom calls and being ‘available’ for longer working hours

And there was some upside:

• Less travel to and from work
• A shift to ‘managing’ by deliverables and outcomes rather than by sight
• Ability to incorporate other activities into my work day – an occasional yoga class or hanging out the washing!

Now, hopefully coming out the other side, we have navigated our way through a variety of hybrid working models to land on a rhythm that works for our organisation.

But what was has the leadership experience been during this time?  To risk making some sweeping generalisations,

• We have been through a highly reactive rather than creative leadership period characterised by risk-based thinking and decision-making and shortened planning windows due to the level of uncertainty.
• Much of our leadership authority was taken away and outsourced to our governments and health agencies – many leaders felt they lost their ‘place’.
• Employee ‘wellbeing’ became our number one priority but it also became a tricky notion to nail down.

The end result – many leaders lost their narrative.

So how do you re-establish your leadership narrative following this extended period of displacement?  Here are three tips and, of course, get in touch if you want to know more:

Tip 1: Refocus on team wellbeing

This might appear controversial, particularly coming from us at Leading Well as our identity is centered on bringing together the dynamic of performance and wellbeing.

Wellbeing operates at three levels – personal, team and organisation.  Team wellbeing is contingent on every role being fully occupied.  This is a shift away from focusing on the person filling the role to looking at what the role needs from the person occupying it.  Be clear with each person in your team about what they need to do in order to fully occupy their role.  This will support their personal wellbeing as well as that of the team.  They will be clear on what they need to do to be successful – from a deliverable and cultural perspective.

Tip 2: Attend to Belonging

Our wellbeing at work is hugely influenced by how strongly we feel we belong. Unpack your post-pandemic team belonging rules and articulate what it means to belong.  This is a great exercise to do together with your team as well as surfacing any enacted belonging rules that have crept in over the last few years.

Tip 3:  Manage Performance

Another counter-intuitive tip!  Many of our performance expectations went out the window with Covid. Setting and continually aligning expectations, managing performance with feedback and coaching and, acknowledging the wins, the efforts and the attitude creates a safe environment for your people to go well.

David Fudge

Leading Well