Lean on team members during COVID-19 pandemic, says Price
Published:Saturday | April 4, 2020 | 12:06 AMJudana Murphy/Gleaner Writer
FLOW Country Manager Stephen Price has suggested that business leaders lean on the strength of team members as they seek to lead through the disruption of COVID-19.
COVID-19 has impacted various local industries and forced many companies to quickly establish or implement business-continuity plans.
“Encourage the input of all your team members at this time because you wouldn’t believe where the best of answers come from. It is in that shared ownership of the execution of the strategies that will make things a success,” Price said in a virtual Rotary Club of Kingston meeting on Thursday.
The telecoms boss urged companies to continuously review business-continuity plans for worst-case scenarios.
“This is the new normal. As long as we have globalisation and flights, there is going to be a pandemic potentially on our doorsteps, so we have to prepare for these kinds of scenarios.
“We live in a volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous time. and thriving in these times as a business leader requires vision. It requires sound judgement and adaptability,” he said.
He went on to explain that communication, collaboration, and compassion are critical to businesses surviving the pandemic.
MORALE BOOST
Price told Rotarians that keeping morale high is crucial to telecommuting, noting that at least 40 per cent of his staff are working from home.
This can be achieved by having daily or weekly check-ins and meetings with all levels of staff.
Price said that in a time like this, employees demand transparency about operations more than ever, and it is important for leaders to stay visible and accessible to staff.
He said that in some instances, teams have hosted virtual lunch breaks once or twice a week.
“Everybody has lunch at the same time, and they have it by video conference. You can use those opportunities to even help people with tips to work from home or any kind of training you want to do in that time,” he reasoned.
Other activities that have been used to mirror the usual post-work leisure time of employees are online game nights and ‘quaraoke’ – karaoke in quarantine.
Further, he said that it is the perfect opportunity for staff who have not engaged in educational pursuits since they have been employed to register for online courses.