How to Build Solid Post-Pandemic Teams

A June 2020 study by Facebook in partnership with Bain & Company shows that in Southeast Asia, ‘at home’ is here to stay. A third of the respondents felt more productive and less stressed thanks to remote working, and 37% reported having started or using more remote presence apps. Businesses need to adapt to these new ways of living and working instead of just waiting for things to “return to normal.” Successful organisations post-pandemic will be ones who have embraced the implications of these new habits, and have re-imagined what solid team dynamics look like in the age of video conferencing and a dispersed workforce. As a leader, what areas can you reevaluate to make sure that your team is as resilient and effective as ever in these evolving circumstances?

While the future of work is evolving, outlined below are ideas on behaviours and principles that will provide the foundation for building a resilient team that thrives through the ups and downs. The pandemic has presented us with a unique opportunity to hit refresh, go back to the drawing board, and evaluate what really matters. It is these factors that will guide your team to success regardless of any curveballs you’re thrown. 

1. Prioritise Integrity

Given that most teams are now at least partially, if not completely remote, establishing a high-integrity culture is especially important. No longer can you easily “read the room” or notice shifts in your team’s body language the way you used to. In this time of video conferencing, problematic behaviour can go unnoticed if you’re not careful. 

Call out bad behaviour in senior management. If someone is being disrespectful, dismissive of diverse perspectives, or taking credit for a colleague’s work for instance, make sure that you’re nipping this behaviour in the bud. Especially when the person in question is a high performing individual, management tends to overlook these breaches of integrity. However, as a leader, you should hold your team to a gold standard of behaviour that’s entirely separate from their performance and results. 

Don’t turn a blind eye to unethical behaviour, because you won’t be able to see the impact it is having on the rest of your team as palpably due to the remote setup. Small incidents can add up to disastrous effects down the line. For instance, someone who takes credit for an industry report their subordinates put together may not be “harming” anyone per se, but eventually if this individual ends up getting promoted and is then in a position to exploit more people’s work, it becomes a much larger issue. 

With teams growing leaner, you need to be very selective and hold on to people who demonstrate high levels of integrity. Establish a gold standard of behaviour that is distinct from someone’s ability to deliver results. In my opinion, it’s better to have someone with excellent integrity and above average performance than a top performer with low integrity.

2. Minimise Layers

With lean teams also comes the need to reduce layers and hierarchies in the organisation. Often in startups and larger corporations, leaders believe that the only way to retain top talent is to carve a path to management for them. However, as a result, the organisation becomes peppered with arbitrary layers, making it easier for managers to lose touch with ground realities that junior members of the team are working with. 

The current remote setup challenges this need for arbitrary layers. With the space for more voices to join the conversation virtually, there’s increased transparency. You’re able to hear from people on the ground, who often have more nuanced perspectives; as they’re executing on the daily, they’re speaking with customers and negotiating with the changing needs of the business. In many cases, managers won’t have the same detailed insights. 

In an organisation that’s overly layered, accountability is weakened. When a manager starts shifting blame or taking credit for their team’s work, the people who are actually executing can feel demotivated to perform at their best. The pandemic has highlighted the importance of managers who can take the reins and steer their team towards excellence under challenging circumstances. These are the managers you want to retain. 

Minimise arbitrary layers in the organisation. Make it clear that career progression doesn’t have to be a function of how many people you have under your chain of command. Instead, highlight that by staying close to the ground, high performers actually are closer to the pulse of the business, which ends up opening up many opportunities for learning and expanding their careers. Promotions could look like an expanded scope of work, or diving deeper into a particular area, along with increased compensation.

3. Strike a Balance Between the What and the How

If Covid-19 has taught us anything, it’s that things can change overnight and the 5-year plans you invested a great deal of time crafting will have to go out the window. For a long time, organisations have been trying to strike a balance between the How and the What when evaluating performance. Perhaps it’s time to revisit that debate. 

I posit that it’s even more crucial than ever to focus on the What, as it is the more productive way forward. With team sizes smaller and resources scarce, businesses need real results, not just elaborate decks and presentations on strategy. If you’ve succeeded in creating a high integrity culture, then you’ll have effectively tackled the How, opening you up to focus on the What more rigorously.  

Drive a sense of accountability and an entrepreneurial mindset in your teams. Centre your discussions around KPIs and goals, and make them the benchmarks against which you evaluate your team’s performance. Instead of dedicating hours to strategy documents that tend to exaggerate the complexity of the problem or the industry, shift the focus to delivering results. 

For example, if you’re in the process of your 2021 annual planning, zone in on the actionable What – improving customer preference for your business by 15% for instance. Outline the key metrics you’ll monitor, and set your targets. Covid-19 has shown that the need to document strategies isn’t key, as the world is increasingly dynamic. With a high-integrity team, focusing on the What will take you where you need to go, without the need to spend inordinate amounts of time unpacking areas such as strategic pillars. 

In short, don’t let your How be an excuse for your What. 

4. Rethink Performance Evaluation

In many organisations, performance evaluations are a time-consuming process, where employees are often rated on a scale and a lot of effort goes into defining how a good performance differs from an exceptional one. In my opinion, the process isn’t productive and creates a culture of unhealthy competition. Often, managers need to meet a rating curve criteria, so a lot of high performers are given lower ratings. Those who are not performing highly are usually just let go. 

I’m of the mind that things should be done differently. Why not do away with ratings and flatten this rating curve? To bring out the best in their teams, managers should take on an altogether different approach. If someone is performing well, offer them a promotion in some form. If an individual’s performance is missing the mark, give them feedback instead of just a rating, acting as a coach to help them achieve their potential. Obviously, you hired this individual because they stood out among others in their abilities. Take responsibility as a manager to suggest how they could improve, offering opportunities for upskilling or mentorship where possible. 

In sports, managers who train a team of average players end up building more successful teams than managers who put together teams of hand-picked star players. Investing in your lower performers is a much more challenging approach than just washing your hands off them. Yet remember that post pandemic, it’s harder than ever to hire top talent. Taking a hands-on approach in developing the people on your team is what separates an average manager from an excellent one. 

5. Get Rid of “Cool” but Inflated Titles

A quick scan of LinkedIn will show you that everyone seems to be the Head of something. I believe that titles should be functional and clear. I suggest getting rid of vague and performative titles altogether. All they do is cause insecurity, especially among junior members of the team. If a policy around using fake or inflated titles on external platforms doesn’t exist, put one in place to reduce the likelihood of people misrepresenting what they do. 

Avoid titles that sound “cool” but only cause ambiguity and dissatisfaction in the team. With a lot more people being hired and on-boarded remotely, functional titles are especially important in establishing clarity and transparency.

In summary, here’s a handy checklist of warning signs that should act as red flags. If you find a member of your team demonstrating any of these behaviours, take immediate action to course-correct to ensure the health of the organisation. 

1. Taking credit for someone else's work within your team or a cross-functional team 

2. Managers looking to create artificial layers of more people managers under them under the mask of 'career growth'

3. People spending more time on elaborating on a strategy to do something than actual results

4. Inflated LinkedIn Titles 

5. Managers shirking responsibility of improving someone by using a 'performance curve' to manage people 

6. Any form of arrogance, name dropping and territorialism  

7. Managers using the term 'I' more than 'We' 

8. Leaders indulging in quid-pro-quo instead of objectively evaluating each project 

9. Nontransparent managers who engage in multiple parallel communications or lobbying, or lack of transparency in sharing the company's and leadership's vision 

10. People who seem to value their individual progress over that of the company’s