It's time for compassion
Since Covid 19’s designation as a world pandemic in March 2020, the working world has changed and it is taking some rethinking. We are seeing professional services returning to ‘hybrid working’: a combination of the remote working we have endured for many months and a partial return to our offices, part-time, in bubbles, in teams. Video-calling, the mainstay of the last 14 months will remain, but we tentatively start to reconnect, face-toface.
Our employees need support, encouragement and the opportunity to grow post-Covid. I’m seeing that even the most high-potential, high-performing, talented, driven professionals are suffering… fluctuating confidence levels, re-entry anxiety, a lack of connection with colleagues, burn out, lack of motivation and individual focus, and not to mention, poor mental health.
Or a combination of all of these
Feelings of isolation, home schooling responsibilities, financial insecurity, and the erosion of the boundaries between work and home life, combined with the grief of losing family and friends, have brought untold burden. And unsurprisingly, this has had an impact on the employees.
Many professional services firms are not just rethinking how hybrid working is going to pan out, they are rethinking how to manage and lead their people more compassionately and empathetically.
Lead with compassion
Management are deciding how to support, encourage and motivate their people, reestablish focus and proactivity and help them move forward positively in their careers and lives, post-Covid. This is a time for compassion.
There has never been a greater need for individual executive and team coaching in the professions. Why? We need to re-connect with ourselves and our colleagues despite changing working environments and the bringing of our corporate cultures into our home offices. We need to move forward, set goals, be proactive and grow again.
And the great thing about executive coaching? Not only does it help people grow, progress, achieve…it means people stay…committed and embedded within their organisations and their ethos. They don’t leave! They are more invested. They feel more valued. They perform better. They sensor-check their own behaviour. They communicate better with their colleagues. There are less ‘HR’ conversations and they tend to need less management. Not to mention, firms can save thousands on recruitment fees and can plan succession with confidence.
I have spent my whole career watching people leave organisations, both as an employment lawyer and recruiter. My experience has taught me that there are a handful of reasons why people leave.
External factors sometimes are a factor but in the main, it is that the individual does not feel valued and heard on
a deeper, personal level, in terms of their growth and aspirations. In a nutshell, they have not progressed in the way they truly wanted to. People who grow…stay.
Professional services firms who are already making executive coaching a part of their current rethinking are embracing the need to support their people in a new way.
