Leaders have outsized influence on whether employees feel connected across silos and hybrid teams, but many assume connection happens on its own. Research shows organizational connection is only as strong as its leaders, yet they face crushing workloads that make fostering it harder.
Chapters
Let's talk about leaders, because we know that leaders have an inordinate impact on people down through the organization. And that whole idea of leadership influence was the fourth challenge that came up in the research.
Yeah, and I mean, it may have been the fourth, but in one sense, and I think this came out with our conversation yesterday morning, number one is leadership influence and leadership ability within just the whole sphere of connection within an organization. They can influence it at a much stronger level than anybody else in the organization. So that makes them key to actually driving how it happens, and it's key to the conversation around, 'Oh, we're too busy, we're too busy.' You know, they helped influence that. They influence the connections across the silos. They influence how the hybrid is working. So, you know, there's, there's really— the connection is only as strong as your weakest leader, which is, you know, that sounds kind of negative, but it's only as strong as your strongest leader. So you need to really think about it, and there's such an accountability piece on leaders to really value connection in an organization rather than thinking it's something that just happens, you know, Usher, listen, they're all together in a room, so, you know, they're obviously connecting. But you can't assume the connection is happening just because of certain things that you've done. You have to really get in into the weeds of it, you know, and then on the flip side, leaders are busy. They're in the same trap that everybody else is in. So they're too busy, they're stretched, the focus is on delivery, which is the way a business works. So these pressures mount all the time on leaders, and it is hard, and you have to have— and that's where the empathy comes in again. There has to be empathy for leaders as well who are trying to do everything. And it is getting harder. It's getting harder. And I think there's more asked of leaders now than ever before.
