Tag Archives: mental-health

Here’s what’s wrong with the debate on remote work

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Ever since the pandemic, the debate on remote work been both fascinating and frustrating to follow. 
 
Before the pandemic, remote work was practically unheard of. Some organizations allowed it do different degrees, but on the most part it was rare. Then when the pandemic hit everything changed overnight. People weren’t allowed into the office and all of a sudden work that had been considered impossible to do remotely turned out not only to be possible, but actually worked quite well. People realized, that working from home offered a lot of flexibility and now, post-pandemic, most employees don’t want to stop doing it – at least part of the time.
 
Employers, on the other hand, feel differently, which really isn’t very surprising. Research has shown that managers found remote work during the pandemic to be much harder than other employees did. They couldn’t fall back on old management routines but had to come up with new ways of managing their teams when team members were no longer right there in front of them.
 
Now, post-pandemic, organizations have been trying to call their employees back to the office with varying success and some have even abolished the possibility of working remotely altogether. Employers argue that face time is crucial for innovation and development as well as for new recruits, which is true, but getting people to want to come into the office is still challenging. Some organizations set rules for when you have to be in the office, but no matter what they decide, people still aren’t happy. 
 
The on-going debate has been very black and white. Is remote work good or bad? Should people be allowed to do it or not? Yes or no? There are arguments for both sides that are valid, but the debate doesn’t really seem to be going anywhere. That is because it’s missing the point.
 
First of all, one problem is thinking about remote work in terms of how we used to think about work when everyone came into the office. Yes, it is true that innovation suffers if people don’t engage enough with each other. But this isn’t actually a problem of remote work, but rather an issue of leadership. If people work remotely, we need to make sure we create opportunities for collaboration and innovation. This is fully possible. We need to make sure we have routines for including new recruits in the community so that they feel welcomed and become part of the team. It doesn’t happen automatically just because we’re in the same building, but it certainly doesn’t happen if we don’t consciously make it happen when working remotely.  We need new routines for leadership and organization. Just like during the pandemic, we – both managers and employees – need to do things differently to make it work. 
 
The other thing that frustrates me is how organizations go about deciding what their policy for remote work should be. It seems that no matter what they decide, people are unhappy. What strikes me is that most organizations fail to see that remote working practices and policies are a question of organizational culture and any changes made with regards to ways of working should be treated as any organizational change. 
 
In order to get people on board with change you have to involve them in that change. On the one hand, you have to allow them to create their own understanding of why the change is necessary and, on the other, you have to let them be a part of the solution. If they actually feel the need to change and have been involved in developing new solutions and routines, they will naturally also be committed to them. 
 
The same goes for remote working practices. Those of you who grapple with this, have you talked to your employees about it? Have you asked them what their needs are? Have you involved them in thinking about what it is you want to achieve as an organization or as a team and what they best way to go about it is? It’s not just a question of how many days to work on and off site. It’s a question of what needs to be done how to best create solutions to achieve that. 
 
Some say people simply don’t want to come into the office anymore, but this really isn’t true. It’s just that they don’t want come in if they don’t feel like there is any point. People have seen what a positive impact working remotely can have on their lives and their wellbeing. 
 
Experiences change us and we can’t go back to the way it was before the pandemic. We can only move forward. Remote and hybrid work are here to stay in one form or another, and that is not a bad thing. They are an excellent way to provide employees with more flexibility and to create sustainable lifestyles and solutions for work. Office work isn’t a thing of the past either. 
 
We can figure this out, but we need to think about work a bit differently than we’re used to.

Nonsense work – let’s stop doing it! 

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I read an article the other day about nonsense work. This is the type of work that is completely unimportant and meaningless; work that no one notices or cares about. According to the article it can be things like selling products that no one wants or writing reports that no one needs. And it is very problematic because, as you can imagine, it is demoralizing, anxiety inducing, and chips away at your motivation and energy. 

Understandable. 

People generally want to live meaningful lives. No, you don’t have to love your job. A lot of people go to work just to get a pay check so that they can follow a passion outside of work. That’s fine. But if what you do is completely meaningless, it’s bound to have an impact on your sense of worth. 

It got me thinking. Nonsense work doesn’t necessarily only have to be about work that is completely meaningless. Also, for those of us with jobs that we find deeply meaningful, there can be elements of nonsense. But if there is a very big dose of it and if the degree of nonsense is disproportionately high, this nonsense work and the frustration it triggers really starts to get to you. 

One thing that I’ve learned on my own opting out and in journey, is that there tends to be a lot of nonsense work in the academic world. In Finland, we have very strict laws concerning universities and what they do. This means that there need to be operating procedures and routines that uphold the law. Unfortunately, as a result, a lot of academic organizations create routines that are astonishingly bureaucratic. 

This includes things like logging on to a program to click a button once a month confirming that you have indeed worked that month (preempted by an email from admin reminding everyone to do this plus reminder emails to remind those who forgot despite the initial reminder email). Then line managers go in and click to approve the initial click, approving hours that have been added by HR but are arbitrary because they do not reflect all the extra hours or weekend work that being an academic entails. And I’m sure there are reminder emails written for line managers too but that I don’t really know anything about because I’m not a line manager myself. 

Did I lose you? 

Don’t worry, understanding the minutiae of how I report my working hours isn’t the point here. It’s just one example of the nonsense work I do. 

Now, I do know that there are different ways of both interpreting and upholding the law. Things don’t have to be quite that bureaucratic in order to follow the rules. There are simpler ways (and this also includes reporting working hours). However, after about a decade and a half in the academic world, I also know that there isn’t much hope for me to change this in my own place of work. That in itself would be quite a formidable exercise in bureaucracy. 

But there is hope for you!

When faced with a task that takes time and energy, but that feels completely superfluous, question it. Does it really have to be this way? Is it really adding any value at all? Or is it just a complete waste of time?

If you answered no, no and yes, change it!  Let’s focus on more real work and less nonsense! 

Your people will thank you. Your organization will thank you.

Why are there so many bad bosses?

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Well, I can think of a few reasons. First of all, being a boss is hard. Leading a team or an organization takes skill. 

You may have heard the statement that people don’t leave companies, they leave bad bosses. Well that isn’t always true, but what is true is that a bad boss is one of the main reasons, if not the main reason, that people leave. And as we know, ever since the pandemic, people have been opting out in droves, and work-related mental health issues are at an all-time high. According to The Mental Health at Work Report 2022, three in four employees are experiencing mental health issues at work. 

But first, I want to say that there are a lot of really great bosses out there. For some it comes more naturally, and others have to work harder for it, but they are out there. The problem is just that there are a lot of bad bosses too, and bad bosses, without meaning to or even being aware of it, can really cause a lot of harm. 

So how do people become bosses in the first place? Often it is from being really good at what they do. A person without leadership responsibilities might be excelling at their job and then get awarded for that with a promotion to lead the team. So, a salesperson, for example, who is a wizard at sales is made head of the sales team because they are so darned good at selling. But being a wizard at sales is no guarantee that you are going to be any good at leading a team, or that you even like doing it. Do you see what I mean?

And there is a lot of prestige associated with leadership roles and having people report to you. So, people often accept the raise and the status without maybe thinking about what it really entails. 

Now I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking, but people do get leadership training to support them in their role. Yes, this is true, some do some don’t. And leadership training certainly helps. I encourage everyone who is in a leading position to get leadership training. 

But there is also something about our working cultures that doesn’t exactly foster the kind of skills and routines that you need to connect with your people.  In fact, studies have shown that there is a growing sense of disconnection in our workplaces and people are feeling lonelier than ever.

Organizational cultures tend to encourage us to push forward, be competitive and not show emotions. Business is business, right? It isn’t personal.

Wrong.

Business is personal. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: it’s highly personal because we (employees) make up the business and we are all people. But because of this norm, we are encouraged to keep our personal lives separate and not show emotions at work, or at least only show the ‘right’ emotions. But, the thing is that what happens in our personal lives deeply affects how we act and perform at work. And vice versa, naturally. Also, when people aren’t allowed to bring their real, whole selves to work, it makes it really hard for them to realize their full potential. 

This is because we are whole human beings and as much as we are encouraged or would like to leave parts of our selves at the door, that’s actually not how it works. 

I just finished a book, HumanForce: The Power of Emotions in the Changing Workplace, and the author, Natalie Boudou, hits the nail on its head again and again. She talks about how we need stronger, more intelligent workplaces and how a strategy of greater emotional intelligence and openness is the key to successful leadership. It turns out that compassion and emotion, traditionally thought of as soft, fluffy bunny issues and words not generally used in conjunction with work, are in fact strategic issues that provide the key to healthy, creative, productive and competitive work places. 

Leaders simply need to be emotionally intelligent. If this doesn’t come naturally to you, and for most people it probably doesn’t, you need to work on it. It’s an acquired skill. And if you are a boss or a leader, you need to want to be around your people and connect with them. If you do, you will have a better sense of what they are going through and a better understanding of their needs, which will help you adapt your leadership style to different people in different situations. If you don’t, you’re not really being a leader. 

P.S. Read the book! You can find it here.

On working in places where practices go against your values, and deciding that you can’t

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People opt out for a number of reasons. Yes, the dream and pull of a new lifestyle that is more sustainable and where you can live and work on your own terms plays in. But truth be told, it is the push of a job that you no longer can or want to do, for whatever reason, that actually makes you take the step. 

In my research I have found that more often than not it is values, or the clash of values, that becomes the tipping point. It can be values regarding anything really, but I’ve found that it often has to do with the ethical treatment of others, both humans and non-humans. 

People come to a point when they realize that they just can’t stand for whatever it is their employer is doing. 

That was the case last time I left a job. Especially with the research I do and everything I stand for regarding sustainable work, ethical and respectful treatment of others, and wellbeing, I just couldn’t continue working for an organization that didn’t seem to care about any of that. 

I’m not going to get into the details right now because there are just too many for a blog post, but I had been mistreated myself and I saw how much suffering there was around me and I realized that if I accept this and just go on as if nothing had happened, it would be hypocritical. I can’t accept crap for myself that I tell others has no place in the organizational sphere. Or any sphere, really. 

So I left. And I’m no alone. A clash of values and a sense of disillusionment are reasons why many people leave. And the fact of the matter of is, values are important and they are just getting more so with every new generation that enters the work force. 

Research has shown that one thing that sets gen z workers apart from previous generations is that values play a much bigger role for them in relation to work and money. They generally want more than to just make money and also have higher expectations on their employers. They have sites where they compare notes and don’t want just any job, but one that is aligned with their values. 

Sometimes older generations will roll their eyes at this but I think they are right to expect more from their employers. I think one reason why so many work places are sites for so much suffering is that we haven’t expected enough. 

So don’t underestimate the importance of values.

Besides, research has also shown that ethical treatment of others – both those inside and outside the organization – is good for business. It’s good for the bottom line. But as I tell my students, using this as an argument to get organizations to act more ethically is really quite problematic. Because what if it turns out that it really isn’t a game changer? What if the bottom line is good enough without treating others well, is it still okay then not too?

A time of crisis is a moment of reckoning

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I think we can all agree that we live in a time of crisis. The crises we face are many, they are serious, and they are all interconnected. 

The environmental crisis – climate change – is perhaps the biggest of all because without a planet there is no us. It’s also arguably the first crisis that literally affects everyone, every country and every person on this globe, and as such it is a crisis that we have to solve together. This can be frustrating and difficult because everyone doesn’t seem to think that this crisis is serious, serious enough to give up comfort, economic growth or profit for, or that it affects them. But that is an illusion. 

It affects all of us regardless of where we live in the world, whether it’s about lands becoming unlivable, wars that are fought over diminishing resources, mass migration to countries that aren’t seeing the worst of it yet, or just bees dying which inevitably will mean that we won’t have food.

We’re also seeing a crisis of democracy. I think we’re all acutely aware of that, whether or not we think it’s a good thing or a bad thing. Because the world is exactly that polarized at the moment that there are people who really think it’s a good thing. 

The US is on everybody’s minds, lips and social media feeds at the moment, and the things that are going on there are hard to even grasp. This is also a crisis that affects all of us; it’s not just a domestic issue, nor is it a phenomenon that is unique to the US.

This rise of populism and easy answers to difficult questions is a phenomenon we’re seeing in many different countries around the world. Populist political parties are gaining traction mainly because a lot people are just sick and tired of the status quo. 

What’s going on in the US and in many other places around the world is in other words a symptom of something. We need to take it seriously, not ridicule and antagonize those who think differently, and do our best to understand why some people are just so sick and tired that they don’t even believe in democracy anymore. Because even though democracy isn’t perfect, it’s the best system we have and we need to protect it. It’s vulnerable and can be destroyed if we don’t stand up for it. 

Another crisis we’re seeing is a crisis of the work place. There’s a lot of suffering in the organizational and corporate world. People get sick, people die. People are also leaving their jobs and careers in numbers never before witnessed. There are a lot of people who just don’t want to do it anymore. They feel like the cost to their health, to their families, and to their lives is just too high.

So what do we do? Well, as I said, a crisis is a time of reckoning. It’s a time of change and reinvention, and a time when anything is possible. The balls are up in the air and we need to decided where and how we want them to land. It’s time to change the way we think about work. It’s time to change the way we think about a lot of things.

Change is hard though, especially when it craves a new way of thinking. That’s why it often takes a crisis for change to really happen. But I believe we can do it, if not for any other reason than that we have no choice. 

The pandemic showed us that we really can rethink things completely and change at a drop of a hat when we have to. And we are already seeing some interesting initiatives that redefine how we think about work. 

The four-day work week or six-hour work day is one example. When we have been doing something in a certain way for as long as we can remember we start seeing it as a truth. But truth be told, the five-day, 40-hour work week is actually a relatively recent phenomenon.

The four-day work week questions what we think we know about efficiency, productivity and dedication. Research has shown that we really aren’t very efficient or productive if we work very long days. It’s not the best use of our time. On the contrary, a shorter week or a shorter work day allows us to be more efficient because we don’t get as tired and we have an easier time combining work with other areas of life. This has been tested in a number of different countries and test results have been very positive. So positive that some organization haven’t looked back since. 

We live in a world where we idealize constant growth and efficiency. Still, resources are finite, both our personal and our planetary ones. We can’t always be efficient; if we don’t pace ourselves we burn out. If we do pace ourselves, it opens up possibilities for creativity, creative thinking and new solutions. Not to mention mental and physical wellbeing.

I know, in a world where organizations struggle to stay competitive, it’s hard to be the one leading the change.

But it’s time, it has to be done.  And we can do it!

P.S. If your organization is doing something different that challenges current thinking – anything, big or small – let me know, I’d love to hear about it!