Episode 169: Is Your Remote Team All it Can Be? Tips from Claudia St. John

Welcome to Skucast, the podcast for entrepreneurs in the promotional products industry. Skucast shines a light on our industry's best work, features maverick personalities, and discusses what's really involved in running a modern promotional products business. Skucast is the official podcast of Common Skew.

She just said, I want everybody back in the office. I have to have everybody back in the office. But there was this anxiety around it because some folks weren't holding their own. And I said, well, then that's where you need to have that communication. Why was that team member not well-oiled? Why was that team member not fulfilling that expectation? And does bringing her back into the office really satisfy that?

Most of us thought at first that this work-from-home experience would be temporary, but now we know it's going to be longer than we thought. Moreover, many of us are deciding that we will continue to work remotely, some permanently. Forrester Research wrote that for B2B sales, change has been a long time coming, and the hardships brought forth by COVID-19 have acted as accelerants. The downward trajectory of the onsite sales meeting, the convergence of inside and outside sales, all of these trends coupled with the impact of the pandemic mean there is no going back to what once was. Now that we know that this is here to stay, and moreover, as we look to 2021 as the year when we have to make some tough decisions about whether to be in the office or change our infrastructure to offer remote options, we're facing more challenges ahead. And all the while, we're still struggling with optimizing and supporting our remote teams, which is why I am so glad that Claudia St. John is a friend of ours and back with us today to talk about how to get our teams to work better together. I was going to wait to publish this episode until after the first of the year, but it was just so timely. And I know that so many of you are struggling with managing a remote team. We talk about what to do when the rhythm of work together is offbeat and underperforming, why you should change your leadership style from listening to understanding, the MacGyver approach to policy, and what the hell we do with PT on vacation now. All that HR stuff that we normally don't pay much attention to unless we have to. And now we have to. Hi friends, I'm Bobby LeHew, the Chief Content Officer at Common Skew. If you listen frequently, you know that this is the part where I'm going to talk about SkewCon. But what you don't know, my smart friends, is that we've got a few surprises for you that I'm not going to even tell you about just yet. If you're new to this QCast, the event I'm talking about is an event held on January 7th. It's a virtual conference that— scratch that. It's really not a virtual conference. That sounds so lame. I mean, it is, but it isn't. You know what it is? It's a kick in the ass. It's a motivator. It's a place to bring your team to get inspired toward real action. Here's the thing. I don't have to sell seats. This thing is blown up and the attendance already is unreal. What I care about is how you lead your team in 2021 and how we grow back stronger. Join us on January 7th where you'll hear the brightest minds speak directly to our industry and help us open our eyes to the opportunities ahead of us. We already know the problems, we already know the issues. What are the opportunities? That's what we're going to gather together to learn. Come and join us and hear and watch the brightest minds challenge us. When I say the brightest minds, I mean folks like Seth Godin, Anne Handley, Denise Tashrow, Fast Company's Elizabeth Segran, Ben Jerry's Chris Miller, all the way from Belgium, Simon Pollet of Merchery, Mitra Khayem. You know what? Just hit pause on this. Hop on over to skucon.com and register your team now. I'll be here waiting when you get back. This episode is brought to you by Commenscue, the work-from-anywhere platform that powers your connected workflow, enabling you to process more orders and dramatically grow your sales. To learn more or to begin your free trial now, visit commonskew.com. Now here's my conversation with the always articulate Claudia St. John. Claudia, I asked a few friends of mine who run businesses in this industry. They're ranging from a few million in sales to $50 million. They're struggling with. And hands down, the most popular topic was remote team management, culture, motivation, inspiration, which is why we're talking with you today. So I have some questions of my own, but mostly questions from the community. So I'm going to let them remain nameless for now as I didn't get their permission to make their name public, but their questions are so insightful. So now that we know remote work is here to stay, let's explore how to thrive in this environment. And let's start with communication. One friend of mine asked it this way, quote, "For collaborative projects, I'm always urging more use of Slack public channels. Fuck email, I hate it. Lay it all out there in the channel. Talking on the phone and IM chats, not groundbreaking. But shifting how you think about why you are using them, how do other people feel about this? How are they connecting in actual new ways that shift how they work?" End quote. So what are you seeing, Claudia? How do teams feel about these messaging tools? What are the upsides and downs? And how do we engage our teams in a better way through communication with virtual workforce?

I think it's such a great question. And one thing that I'll share is that my company has been in business for 10 years and we're all virtual. So this has always been an issue and a challenge for us. And what I will say is that we use a ton of different modalities and somehow or another, we've just created this space. We have, you know, the video chatting, we do instant messaging, we do email, we do phone calls, we do texting. And we've sort of created a rhythm on what works. If we send an email or we send an IM and we're not getting it, we assume maybe they're out. And so we move to text if it's really important. I think the most important thing is to really, as your team is developing— and again, this is probably easier for smaller teams than for larger teams— is do the check-in. What works for you? How would you like to be communicated with? And because we're all in different places, and especially now when you've We've got parents who are juggling their jobs and their children and their children's class schedules. It's all evolving. And so, what I really think is the most important, no matter what tool you use, one piece of science to remember about it is that we as a species get 55% of our meaning of our understanding of others through body language. We get 35% through tone of voice and verbal communication, and only 10% via the written word. So it's really within that context that the video chatting has become so effective as a means of really being able to understand meaning. If you're training somebody and you say, "Did you get it?" And they say, "Yeah," if you're not looking at their face, their face could have a grimace like, "No, totally they don't get it," but you wouldn't know that. So I think it's really setting up the different channels and constantly having a connect-in with them. You know, does this work? Is this helpful? Some emails and some texts are great. You know, hey, did you check this? Can you respond to that inquiry? That's fine in a text. But if you get a text that's, you know, this is a problem, then you need to shift it so that you can use as many of those communication tools, the video that helps see and hear and use all of those communication skills that as a species we rely on. I also think that, you know, we find that sometimes we shift between, you know, our Zoho Chat and Skype and FaceTime because they require different things. Sometimes Teams works and sometimes Zoom works better if we need to share a screen. So I think it's a never-ending progress or process, and I don't have any specific answers to it other than just to remind you know, everybody that if you rely on the written word, that's why we have emojis. Emojis exist as quite literally it is because we need to interpret mood and emotion and just text alone doesn't do it as every single one of us knows when we've got outraged by an email or a text that made no sense.

Correct. I also, I know too that productivity has really taken a hit in terms of the new communication. So for example, our our team has a really good rhythm of working together. We've had a team that's worked off, like yours, virtual for a while. Part of us have been virtual for a while. But looking at the businesses that are in the community that are listening to this podcast, we have manufacturers and we have salespeople and distributors, we have production people, traffic people, and we have folks in different roles. And so as an example, just with our team, we have programmers who need to do deep work and can't be disturbed. We have managers whose job it is to maintain and lead a team and be in constant communication. And with distributors, you have production managers whose job it is all day long to check on statuses. So they're familiar with the constant notifications of statuses and updates. But there are folks like in my role, I'm a content person, so deep work is a priority for me. And I have to do deep work and I can't be interrupted during certain aspects of that. And then we have folks in our community who do creative work. And the same thing. So I think there's a new challenge too, in that we're getting used to how do we use these tools in a way that communicate well, number one, but then number two, also how do we weave in the rhythm of productive work?

Absolutely. And the one group that you didn't mention in there are sales and communications folks who tend to be profound extroverts and are wilting, you know, when they're locked at their desk by themselves and they don't see or connect with people on an emotional level. And again, I think the thing that's changed the most in this pandemic has been the role of leaders, of managers, because before it was, you know, what is the production, you know, widgets in, product out. And now it's so much more around communication, check-in. And so that rhythm is going to be very different based on that function area. And so as a result of that, you may have a very different communication tool, rhythm, structure, technology for the different facets of your business based on, as you said, do they need deep think time or do they need interpersonal connection time? How are you cross-communicating? And I've told many, many business leaders in this industry, your job used to be checking on status orders or checking on product or checking on delivery. Now it should be, checking in regularly with your team, communicating with your team, not paying attention as much to your P&L. Of course, you have to, but it's much more incumbent upon leaders and managers and supervisors to shift their priorities from their old delivery and the way they were doing it to communicating. How do you communicate effectively? And what does every individual need? And it's going to differ not only by function area, but also by person and life situation and where they are physically located in this. And so, again, I don't have any specific solutions other than this is your priority to figure out for your company. This is what you have to focus on. They know it, but I would say you look at your normal to-do list or you look at your normal set of priorities And you need to change it so that check-in communication, those things are now at the top. Because from that, everything else will flow differently.

We're going to talk about more of that in a minute. But on the subject of working better together and collaboration, here's the question from another friend. And I must say, as I poll the community and what their biggest challenges are at this time and what they foresee in the next couple of months, this question was at the top of everyone's list in some form or another. And I'll quote, We are still working through the challenges of supporting the virtual workforce. As a boutique team, we rely on each other to succeed. When one of the cogs is not running smoothly and getting gunky, every other cog feels it. We're having to work harder with more effort to reach similar results. And by the way, as a parenthetical here, Claudia, what's happening in our industry, and you might be fully aware, there are a lot of hitting complex projects going around. There are kits being created. There are campaigns being developed. It's a unique time, but I've noticed the projects have gotten more complex. So that's an interesting insight into what has changed in our business. Now, back to the question. When we take the time to oil and maintain the cog system, it works smoothly. And as the rider, I can pedal faster, smoother, and challenge bigger climbs. But what if I'm carrying others? That's the gist of it. What about getting a team to work better together, Claudia?

And again, you know, I think it's, you know, if we're really on top of it and we really are working hard to make sure those cogs are well-oiled. And again, this gets to what we were just talking about. It's really looking at what each function area needs and making sure that they have what they need. And really, as managers, we forget about this, but our core responsibility as leaders, as managers, as managers more than leaders, is to set the expectation. What do you need to accomplish? Do you have what you need to accomplish what that expectation is? And then providing that regular feedback, check-in, this satisfied the expectation, this fell short. And I've I've actually been working with a lot of promotional product companies recently, and I just had a conversation actually last week with one who said— and they're in charge of client services and sales— and she just said, "I want everybody back in the office. I have to have everybody back in the office." But there was this anxiety around it because some folks weren't holding their own. And I said, "Well, then that's where you need to have that communication." Why was she— why was that team member not well-oiled? Why was that team member not fulfilling expectation. And does bringing her back into the office really satisfy that? Is that really the end goal, or is it—

that's what I was going to ask you. Is that a knee-jerk reaction because that's the only thing we know and that's a way to control that behavior? Or is there a way—

because frankly, many of us are not going back to the office ever again, right? Right. And in this case, this is— and this, I think this is just such a great example. In this case, she just wanted everybody there so that she could sense where everybody was and what was going on. It's really just that sensing. And that ability to do the open communication. And I said, well, you know, yes, and you may also create new stress by bringing them in. They may be less productive under the current situation. So again, I think it puts way more work on managers. But what it requires is, are you setting the expectations? How do you know they're not performing to your liking? What is it that they're missing? And how do you build in those expectations, those tools, those communication strategies to manage? It makes managing harder. There is no question because you're not picking up by osmosis. But again, some folks are going to really thrive on this. More introverted people with more detail-oriented work, they're going to be much better at this. Those who feel like because they have no deadlines, because they have no deliverables, they lose momentum and then they fall behind, well, then those are the ones that are going to require more check-in, more team collaboration. And it's not a one-size-fits-all for your team, even within the same team. So I think a lot of it is also, and this is something that I think is hard for leaders, hard for managers, is to say, I don't have the answer. What do you need? What can we do for you? And really doing rather than telling, way more listening, way more understanding. I've given you everything that I know that we need to get done. It's not quite getting done. Why? And having that conversation not as a means of saying, hey, you're not living up to my expectations, but really why not in a non-threatening, non-confrontational way, but as a way of sensing, as a way of understanding in order to Maybe have more meetings, maybe have fewer meetings, maybe we need a different technology, maybe we need a different work schedule, maybe we need to extend our hours a little bit later in order to accommodate those who are spending the morning making sure their kids are getting their lessons done. And maybe, hey, can we check in at 7 o'clock a couple of times a week just to check in? It's being as creative as you possibly can and listening as much as you can to your team. There's really no magic bullet.

And I read once that there are really only 3 priorities of a CEO. Number 1 is to cast the vision and purpose for the company. Number 2 is to make sure there was always money in the bank. And number 3 was making sure your team had the tools and resources to get the job done. There's more than that, but those are 3 essentials. And when I say tools and resources, we're meaning more than just technology, right? Meaning, you know, interpersonal tools, personal communication, all of these different tools that are mostly invisible that we use to get our work done.

Yeah, and you know, one thing I recommend everybody check out is the Gallup organization has this thing called the Q12 Beta Analysis, and basically it's the 12 things that highly engaged employees say that they have at work. And the number 1 thing that engaged employees say they have is, "I know what's expected of me at work." And number 2 is, "I have the tools and resources necessary to do my job well." And number 3 is, within the last 7 days I've received positive feedback on my ability to satisfy those expectations. And that's really, you know, that's really it. If you focus on that, then you'll know where your hiccups are, where your foundational cracks are, and then you can look at, is it a technology? Is it a hard skill? Is it a soft skill? Is it mentorship? What is it? And again, I think a lot of this also gets to positive feedback. I feel more engaged I am told you're doing a great job. You do so well at this. Thank you. You do an amazing job. I'd love to work on this. We still have some challenges over here, but really focusing that feedback on positive, affirming behavior and outcomes. And we just don't spend enough time on that. And it's critical to people's level of engagement and satisfaction at work.

Absolutely. Safety is still a big factor. And some distributors are now experiencing clients who want to have in-person meetings. Suppliers are struggling with whether to ground their teams again or whether to release their teams or they've sent out partial teams. How are you seeing companies navigate this treacherous season and how do we regulate or manage the transition to being in public again? I realize there's two questions there. How are we handling it now? How should we handle it now? And how do we regulate or manage the transition that we're facing?

It's so interesting how this is really really a problem for companies of all sizes and whether they're distributors or suppliers wanting to have that connection, wanting to be in person, but wanting to stay safe. The best bet I can recommend is that follow CDC guidelines, follow your local health priorities. And if you are in a place that where most of us are right now, the rates are climbing, we thought we, you know, we had a reprieve over the summer and now it's looking bad again. Set the safety standard for your employees so that if a distributor or if a client wants an onsite, be the one to take the leadership and say, at this point, we don't feel that it's appropriate for our health or for your health to meet in person, but how can we do it differently? We can meet distance, you know, we can socially distance, we can maybe do something different, but communicating your philosophy around this. And we have clients who the leaders don't buy into this and want it over with. And employees—

I was going to ask you about that, right?

Oh yeah, absolutely. And they're frustrated. They just want everybody back. They want this over. Of course, we all do. But then you have clients and you have employees who are really cautious and take this very seriously, maybe even over-seriously, which is a matter of perspective. So I think really it is the first and foremost recommendation is follow the guidance of the CDC, of your local health authority, of your state, of your locale, and conform to those standards. You know, we still do not see really anybody recommending air travel. We don't see anybody recommending in-site, you know, on-site conferences. It's just not— we're not there yet. We see a little glimmer of light ahead, but I also think that as leaders, we should be giving cover to our employees to say, this is not the time for you to be meeting in person. Let's figure out another way of doing that. We need to own that for our businesses.

Absolutely. Regardless of your political persuasion, regardless of your perspective on this, I'm trying to address this delicately, Claudia, but there are folks who are find this whole experience to be ridiculous, and yet they're leading a team of people with different perspectives and different opinions. You covered it a little bit there, but it seems like as we move back into the transition phase, it's going to get tougher. I mean, right now it's almost— you can, you can see that it's difficult right now and that the cases are so high, but going into this next phase of transition seems to be— might be the place where we run into the most challenges in terms of being leaders and getting our company back either in person or blending teams or deciding, making virtual versus in-person decisions.

Absolutely. And, you know, I, I'm someone who I've had people in my own life, in my own circle who have died of COVID and it changes your perspective. And I do hope that most people don't have that experience. I think If we can find a way to say, look, whether you believe it's a hoax or whether you believe it's as serious as it is, the things that we can do are really not that big of a deal. We mask, we socially distance, we try to use technology for this period of time just to get through us, just to get through this moment. And I understand that even that seems irritating and has become politically charged, but when you really think about it, it's not that big of a burden. It's way less of a burden than when you have to shut down your entire company because you've had a major exposure. And I know companies that have, you know, 10 employees, they've had to literally quarantine everybody for well over a month because they had their first case, their second case, and then their third case, and then the quarantine rules require 14 days and the testing, and it's just much easier to keep those at home who can work at home and really work through the communication, bring the folks in that need to come in for production, and really focus on keeping that workplace safe. And Bobbi, you know, we see these rates increasing, and it's because of two things. One of them is it's cold, the windows are closed, we're inside, and so we now have these— we're in these spaces. And on top of it, we're over it. Like, we're just done. We just, you know, I want to go and eat sushi and have a drink and go shopping and it's all happening and the holidays, it's all happening at the same time. But I just, it doesn't, in the end, it doesn't require that much of an accommodation just for this period going forward to keep our employees safe and to protect our most vulnerable employees and clients and to be creative as possible. And thank goodness the technology exists where we can do that. You know, I think the one thing that's really amazing is we now know we can do this from home. We just have to perfect it. We have to work on, you know, making it better, but, and it isn't ideal, but we're doing it and we can do it a little bit longer, hopefully until, you know, we get vaccines and we get this thing under control.

Right. On that note, are you seeing some companies start to make the transition and regulate or manage this in a way that is allowing employees flexibility? What do you foresee for the future as we transition into the next new normal?

I have been saying this since the beginning, and I didn't know that when I first came out with this, it would be like my mantra, but it's rubber bands and bubble gum, you know. Everything, every approach is a rubber bands and bubble gum approach. And that's not only to what phase are we in this pandemic, to what happens with your individual employees, how are you dealing with the most vulnerable of employees? And it also comes into play with people's different political views. I don't want to wear a mask. Okay, well, that's our rule in this workplace. So how do we get you to work work in a way that you are safe. And maybe it's you mask and then go to your office and shut the door, and that's all that we see of you. That if that's your choice, then that's how we do it. It's rubber bands and bubble gum. And so—

What do you mean rubber bands and bubble gum? Forgive me, I'm slow.

No, no, you are the least slow of people, but it's the old MacGyver toolkit.

I got you.

We're winging it. There is, you know, I get these calls all the time. Claudia, we need a policy for this. And you look at it and you think, I don't know how to create a policy for that. It's for this moment in time and in 3 weeks, it's going to be different, or it's just for this employee and not for another. And as an HR person, we want to mitigate and manage risk. That's really what we do in addition to inspiring employees and all of that good, happy stuff. But there is no real policy that we can put in place that can account for everybody's life situation. You have people who don't have, who don't have children at home. You have people who have children and sick parents at home. You have people in production who cannot work from home. All of these require their own approach. It's a rubber bands and bubble gum. We're developing a strategy for this moment in time to get through this moment in time so that we can stay productive, keep earning money, keep our jobs, and stay safe. And there's no one-size-fits-all on it.

Speaking of, what do you recommend we do now for vacation and PTO? It seems now that many of us are homebound. What is vacation? And let's, and let's be honest, in this economic climate, employees are fearful of taking off work. They don't want to be seen as inconsequential. Owners and managers, some are struggling, others are actually experiencing incredible growth. But this whole atmosphere just muddies the vacation PTO landscape. And yet, just because we're home does not mean we don't need a break. And time for ourselves? What are some of the best practices you are seeing now, or perhaps alternatives if there is such a thing?

Yeah, you know, PTO has become an incredible issue because a lot of our policies that we have in our employee handbooks, they may require a use it or lose it, but nobody's going anywhere, nobody can do anything. And this again is another one of those rubber bands and bubble gum. You can develop a PTO policy for this year where you can roll over and bank, you can use in different increments, you can have people take half of their vacation time and stay at home. You know, I know one client who, you know, they have allowed employees to take a half-day PTO but a whole day off just to stay home and have mental health. Unfortunately, we have some clients who are having to suspend accrual of PTO because they can't afford when everybody does, you know, find a time when they're able to take their time off, they won't be able to sustain their businesses. So, you know, again, rubber bands and bubble gum, but I think as leaders, we have to give time for employees to take that time off. Everybody needs it. And emotional intelligence, I wrote a blog and had a video on my own emotional collapse. You know, I've been going along fine, everything's fine, everything's good, everything's great. And then I go to the grocery store and there's no more paper towel or toilet paper. And all of a sudden I'm done, I cannot handle it anymore. And a complete emotional collapse, which didn't serve me or anybody around me very well, but we're all going through it. And so I need time off. I'm not going anywhere. I haven't left my house. I haven't left my zip code since March, but we need that time off to do a puzzle, to walk the dog. And I would, it starts at the top. If you're not taking time off, if you're not taking a break, if you're not taking a mental health day, no one will feel comfortable doing so. And I think we have to lead by example on all of these things, on what we're doing with our own vacation and our own PTO. But when it comes to this PTO, the one thing I would also encourage folks to do is to consider allowing folks to bank it in case they do get sick or have to quarantine. As of right now, the Families First Coronavirus Response Act, the emergency paid leave and paid sick leave, that's going to expire at the end of December. And then we don't have any supplement for it. So encouraging employees to bank some of that time for a rainy day in case they do need to quarantine or they, God forbid, do get sick, or creating maybe a sick bank that employees can donate their time so that they can help others who maybe not have that time. Looking at your landscape and another exercise, run your PTO report. See who's not taken their time. See who's really got a lot of accruals. How much can you afford? Can you allow employees to take that time off between now and the end of the year? So really being mindful of having people take that time off, even if they're not going anywhere, and banking it, rolling it over, spending it out appropriately. Maybe give it to them in a cash form if that's not what you normally do. It's on your books, it's a liability. Consider paying them out as part of their bonus if you've never done that before.

Rubber bands and bubblegums. It's so good. You know, I had to go through it myself. I was the CEO of a company for 15 years and we had situations. I had to go through a crisis myself, a personal crisis myself, to understand the impact of that on my team. And I realized that at any point, 30% of my team can be going through a dramatic crisis. I mean, like a big crisis, life crisis, whether it's divorce or sickness or death of a loved one. And what I learned was that people who are going through a crisis, we had to adjust our hard-lined rulebook and allow them even more time off because the crisis, they needed time off for the crisis if that was a hospital stay or whatever it might be. But then I had to say, you know what, don't use your vacation for that. You're going to need that later when you're trying to recover. And that was, I remember at the time thinking, this is breaking, I mean, I screwed up a lot, but that's one thing that I'm glad that I did at times in certain seasons was break the rulebook a little bit for someone who you knew would be back and was so vital to the team, but you also knew they really needed that time.

Absolutely. And the only thing, the only rule that you should not break is to be mindful that you set a precedent and you do not want to be arbitrary in who you give that special accommodation to. You don't want it just to be the people that you're close with. You don't want it just to be the people that you're particularly you're not really fond of and the ones that, you know, kind of make you itch and you don't want to give them that accommodation. You want to be, you want to make sure that you're not discriminatory or biased in breaking that rule book. But beyond that, break away because we need that. And never before have we all faced so much disruption in our lives. And we don't know what's happening with parents, with spouses. With children, with our own folks, with our own mental health. So, Bobby, I think we have to walk that walk and be brought down a few pegs and face that humility ourselves to really have the empathy to understand, man, you know, you only have one walk through this life. We need to make sure we make it as easy for our employees and ourselves as possible.

Absolutely. Inspiring our teams and maintaining morale. Another question I have from the community, a friend of mine asked it this way, quote, Yes, no one is coming back to the office full-time any, anytime soon. So maintaining company culture remotely can be challenging. We've been doing semi-monthly sales meetings, monthly company meetings per usual, and then we added a weekly or semi-monthly happy hour. They would do an online game or something as a team. Quote again, good laughs and trying to work hard at making connections. I know another distributor friend of mine, their team shares a weekly meditation before their meeting. The question is, how do we inspire our teams and maintain morale during this time?

Again, you know, so, so hard, and now a priority. This is your priority. This is your most important job. And that employee or that owner that I talked to last week who just wanted everybody back, she felt like she wasn't doing a good job with this exact piece. And I think intention is the first and most important piece. If people see that you're just trying to come together, you're just trying to make that connection, you're cognizant of it, you're needing it, you're wanting it for them, that goes a long way. I also think having employees focus what they need. I have a member of my team who wants to be left alone, and when we have our Zoom things, she hates them. She doesn't want to participate, but she doesn't want to say no because she doesn't want to feel like she's the curmudgeon, but it's demotivating for her to do the things that we need to do or want to do in order to connect. And so I've said to her, well, you know, do you want to do any of them? Do you want to hop on, you know, without your sharing your screen? What can we do to satisfy you? And so what we do is those of us who want, we get together and we do like a game, you know, we do our bingos. We also have our morning bitch sessions where we sit down and it's like, oh my gosh, I'm so done with this, or I just baked bread. And we send her an email and say, here are the things that made us laugh about you. We were thinking about you, we were grateful for you. And so we were communicating to her our thoughts and making her feel not excluded, but included, but in a way that made her okay. So we said, if you don't want to be a part of this, we totally understand, but you are going to be a part and we'll share with you what we're doing. We say. And, you know, it's celebrating her and just making her not feel bad. But this, you know, how do we inspire our teams during this time? You know, this is your job, and it's going to look differently. Again, using all of the different modalities. I also think surprising employees, you know, sending them a Grubhub, you know, having lunch delivered to them, sending them a puzzle. Sending them something, a piece of swag, you know, giving everybody a special, you know, a special COVID sweatshirt, you know, we survived the first, you know, 283 days of March, you know, which is when we all went out and be just Google, listen to your friends. This is the thing about this industry also, you guys are creative, you're coming up with amazing and inspiring and fun things for your clients. Clients, don't be a cobbler's son and not give your kids, you know, their shoes. Do it for your own team. And you know, everybody likes to be surprised. Everybody likes to be thought of. And this is your number one job. If you do this right, then all the other pieces will follow.

On that topic, the last question here is business owners have become part counselors now. I mean, emotional intelligence has always been the most important trait for a leader, in my And it's almost as if we need more training from folks like Brené Brown right now than business gurus. I mean, how— for example, just a small example, what questions should we be asking our teams right now? What conversations? How are you doing seems to fall short, and that's such a large, big question that can be unpacked, but it's important to ask. So what advice do you have for us as we are making this transition to be be honestly part-time therapists.

I have a couple of thoughts on this. The first is emotional intelligence. The science of emotional intelligence has a few parts. The first is to recognize when you're in an emotional state and to recognize it and pay attention to your body because our bodies are collecting stimuli through our brain stems constantly. Instantly. And if it's something that's shocking or upsetting, it immediately goes to our amygdala, which floods— it's our fight or flight center. It's our primitive brain and it floods our body with really disruptive hormones, cortisol, histamines, epinephrine. And those, those hormones stay in our body for 8 hours. So we're in this heightened state where we are all about We're all about fleeing, denying, hiding, being aggressive when really this, the situation may not, may not require it. So the one thing I would encourage folks to do is to help each other come to terms with their own reaction to stress. Pay attention to stress. Where do they feel stress? And if they're feeling it, oftentimes they'll feel it and they don't know why. So I love the idea of having team meditations, check-ins in their body. Where are you feeling this stress and why? The question of why you're feeling stress, that will help you take that stimuli and say, oh, I'm feeling stress because I have to have a critical conversation with a client who wants us to come on site and I don't feel comfortable with it. And once you think about it, then you can take it away from your primitive brain and start processing it, start self-regulating. So a lot of emotional intelligence is around listening to your body, paying attention to your body, and then regulating your stress. Sometimes it's going for a walk, sometimes it's meditating, sometimes it's spending time with your family, sometimes it's, you know, being alone, sometimes it's being with friends. Everybody's is going to differ. But the point being, and I know this is a long-winded point and I'm sorry about this, but checking in with your team and saying, tell me about your stress. What is stressing you right now? Is it something you can control? And if so, how can we help you? How can we, what can I do to help you if it's something that you can control? If it's something that you can't control, what do you need or what can we give you to help you? Maybe it's some yoga exercises, maybe it's a call with a counselor, maybe it's a walk, maybe we can get together and, and just talk things through. I've had this with every member of my team because their kids are failing in school and they're terrified because they, you know, they had their house on the market and the market has collapsed and now they're stuck with a mortgage that they, that they didn't want. And, you know, the issues vary, but I think it's not just how are you, It's also saying, "Hey, I'm reaching out to you because I've just had a really bad day and I am at my wit's end and I just wanted to talk to somebody." I, and this also gets to Brené Brown, I show my own vulnerability first. And Brené Brown is a vulnerability junkie. And you know, Bobby, when you said, "I made a mistake. I made a mistake 15 years ago and I learned something and now it's changed how I, as a leader, as a manager, act, the simple act of saying, "I messed up," or "I lost it," or "I sat down and cried," or "I yelled at my kid for no reason the other day and I feel sick about it." Sharing your own emotional journey, sharing that you don't have all the answers, you just know what it feels like. And that conversation in itself does so much to help the other person. And then whatever those things are, whatever their needs are, you'll learn. And it probably will be because you listened. It probably will be just the act of listening will help your employees.

The uniqueness about this particular season has been that it is the closest many of us have come to, to a long-term illness, the emotional experience of a long-term illness. So it's almost as if even in a very mild way, we have all been in a perpetual fight or flight status. Absolutely. Whether the flight is a retreat to our home, and this is what our flight results in, it has been this sustained long-term emotional reaction. So there's so much going in the undercurrent here.

Yes. And I have been asked, you know, I've given 77 presentations since March, and a lot of them relate to things like how do we work remotely and how do we engage engage teams, the one presentation that I am not asked to give and I ask to give is, how do you handle your emotions during this time? What are you doing about the emotional health of your team? It is the most important conversation that we're not having and that I want folks to start thinking about. And I have a Reiki prayer. I do Reiki. And this is literally how I start my day every day. And it is The prayer is: Just for today, I will not be angry. Just for today, I will not be afraid. Just for today, I will be grateful for all of my blessings. Just for today, I will work honestly. And just for today, I will be kind to every living thing, including myself. And the Reiki prayer doesn't say including myself, but I add it because I forget to be kind to myself. I am very good at being critical of all of my failings. Things. There's something about this prayer because I would love to be able to metamorphosize my way into being this way every day. I can't. But I know that if I remind myself today not to be angry and not to worry and to be kind and to count my blessings, I can do that for today. And it's the accumulation of I can do that for today when you really begin to live in a different state. It's very soft and it's very emotional and it's very squishy-feely, but this is probably the most important conversation and probably the most important journey of finding emotional health and wellbeing and gratitude to get through this. Because when you're really grateful, you can't be angry. You can't operate, you can't exist in dual states of anger and gratitude. Attitude. It just doesn't work.

So it's also being very present to this moment in time perpetually, and that's a freeing and beautiful thing.

And the Reiki prayer, one of them is, and today I will work honestly. I will dedicate myself to doing the good work that I know I need to do, even if some of it's hard. I'm going to focus on it. So it doesn't, you know, shirk your professional responsibilities it builds itself into that concept of I'm going to try and not be angry and not be hostile and be gracious to others. I don't get nearly as much road rage as I used to since I started doing this. I'm from New York, so I can certainly get frustrated when I get cut off, but I don't seem to do that anymore, which is a good thing.

Claudia, thank you so much for joining us again. I knew you were the right person to talk to about this subject, and you certainly helped us unpack a lot of, a lot of topics here in a very short amount of time, and we appreciate you so much.

I am so grateful for the invitation, and I just, I wish everybody listening to this good health, good mental health, a happy holiday, a safe holiday, and hoping that everybody We'll soon be able to gather in person at the next SCUE Camp and that we'll be able to be together. That's my hope.

That's right. Thanks, Claudia.

Thanks a lot.

Thanks so much for tuning into this episode of SCUEcast. Be sure to keep up with our latest content by subscribing to SCUEcast on iTunes or to our blog at community.comonscue.com. Until next time, friends. Thanks so much for listening.