As one year ends and another is about to begin, it is human nature to reflect back before we look ahead. The
year just ended was unlike anything any of us have ever experienced and valuable lessons come out of disrupted, challenging times. During the year, I wrote more than 75 different blogs based on real-world practical experiences emanating from delivering more than 1,200 hours of business acumen and leadership training to some of the best companies and leaders around the world. I took a few hours to look back and think about the key leadership lessons from this historic year and process what they mean to us as business leaders moving forward.
Work is an Action, Not a Location
One of the most popular blogs I shared back in July was called, “Stop Insulting Your Employees by Welcoming them Back to Work.” I can share now that one of our dear clients, the President & CEO of a top 5 Pharmaceutical company, shared it with all his leaders imploring them not to discount the efforts employees made figuring out the new normal of working remotely. By the end of 2021, most successful leaders realized that “work” is not a location, it is an action that has measurable outputs. An earlier blog that was also very popular back in April called, “3 Leadership Implications of not Working in an Office Every Day” shared perspectives that helped drive changed skills that when used were very effective:
- Communication Skills – The ability of leaders to take the time to thoughtfully communicate the details of strategies, actions, tasks, and ways of getting things done. Many leaders are going to have to get much better at this skill.
- Being Authentic – Now more than ever, employees need their leaders to be open, transparent, and humble. Many leaders are going to have to get much better at this skill.
- Focus on Results – At the end of the day, it’s results that drive success. Using Business Acumenskills, leaders will need to focus on driving revenues, profits, cash flow, and shareholder value. Leaders are going to have to work harder to focus on these types of results as opposed to the easy way out of measuring attendance in an office every day.
Leaders Have More Time to Effectively Coach
Another major development I experienced this year was that because managers of people, teams, and processes had more time (because they didn’t have to commute to an office), they prioritized that time to learn how to coach more effectively. At Advantexe, four out of our ten largest training engagements this year involved scalable coaching where processes and approaches became more standardized, and leaders had the time to coach. In more than 25 years of delivering leadership development training, I have never seen a more consistent effort to teach one type of approach with such great results.
Psychological Safety in the Work Environment is Much More Important than we Thought
The most popular blog of the year was shared in June, “The Psychological Safety, Diversity, and Inclusion of Virtual Simulations.” I will also share this is the blog I am most proud of. What we discovered is that remote work and remote learning offer incredible benefits that our biased perspectives could have never imagined. Two incredible insights came from a study we did on the impact of virtual learning and psychological safety:
- There is almost no physical or emotional bullying in a virtual environment
- Women feel much safer in a virtual environment
The replacement of in-person with virtual where people felt more comfortable and could see better, participate better, and hear better was an astonishing discovery and one that I am hopeful will continue to transcend the digital environment and eventually the in-person environment if that ever comes back.
Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion becomes More Attainable
The other part of the blog I wrote in June about psychological safety also dealt with Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion. The bottom line is that the new normal of digital work can be a great equalizer. Before the disruption people would use their physical location – big corner office, layers of security, waiting rooms, and gatekeepers – as a source of power and prestige. There is and remains something so warm and inclusive by being invited into someone’s home office to have a meeting and then suddenly the pet dog or cat jumps into the picture. People feel more human and equitable this way.
The Digital Transformation of Developing Leadership Skills Really Works
The final reflection for me is the most significant. 24 months ago, I didn’t know if Advantexe would survive. Because at that point 90% of our work was done in person. With an eye toward the future, we had evolved all of our learning assets and business simulations to be digital by the end of 2019 in anticipation of a slow evolution. Well, as we all know, the evolution was a disruption, unlike anything we’ve ever experienced. Nothing was proven in April of 2021, but we had a vision, and today that vision has turned into a reality. We delivered almost 3 times as much training and the scores and impact are the highest it’s ever been. Learners are engaged, involved, and focused. They can better manage their work-learning-life balance, and the skills they need such as Business Acumen, Business Leadership, and Strategic Business Selling are at their fingertips 24 hours a day 7 days a week.
In summary, what a year! And the most exciting part is that it seems we are all just starting a new and amazing journey. Happy New Year!
