So much has been written on the new normal, hybrid working, the great or quiet resignation. And it is complicating what matters.
Without doubt, we are in uncharted waters, but there are some constants.
The constant is that people want to continue to work on things that really matter. If they are working on what really matters for your business, their location is less important (so please consider retracting those return to office mandates) but for many, a sense of broader community contribution is likely to be desired. People want to be making a difference. Further, different teams will have different views on what matters, and this will require people to come together.
As somebody who facilitates workshops on digital (the future of a business) and leadership (how to lead an organisation), with approximately fifty client workshops completed over the past four years, my clients and I have found four key stages to be explored to establish what matters.
LOVE and FRUSTRATIONS about the organisation and their work. Seek to answer these.
- What do they love about this organisation?
- What do they love doing?
- What would they love to be doing here?
- What is holding them back?
FOUNDATIONS and SCALE are what enable the business.
- What foundations do we keep?
- What else do we need to do? - How do we scale these?
INITIATIVES and ACTIVITIES, being what we need to do to progress the business.
- What are the key initiatives to progress the organisation? - What have we identified activities that need to be stopped? - What have we agreed to do differently?
TRAITS
How will we be? These are the TRAITS of the team. They are established by asking what the desired traits are, clustering these into themes and having the group agree on what they are with a supporting strapline. Sometimes I am asked, ‘can we lead with the traits at the beginning of the workshop?’ My answer is always ‘probably not’ - people seem to establish more meaningful traits after they have agreed on what must be done. You can read more about traits in last week's BLOG here.
Now the BIG question is, why would you consider a facilitator to undertake this activity? The same reason you would consider a doctor or specialist to undertake any important activity, for their expertise, a proven process and outcome.
Feel free to contact me to discuss this further.