One of the biggest but less-remarked-upon challenges presented by lockdown has been the impact on professional relationships.
As remote working stretches on for many, how do we maintain presence and profile with colleagues and clients, have conversations that spark new ideas or help us out of a rut and continue to develop our networks by meeting new people?
How will the lack of conversation around the water cooler, combined with lunches and coffee breaks taken on our own at home, affect our profile, presence and reputation?
Social capital is the oil that smooths the cogs of our commercial and professional life
During a recent webinar for the Association of Consulting Actuaries, two-thirds of respondents to a poll reported that they would be working from home for the foreseeable future, despite UK government attempts to encourage people back to the workplace.
Only 7% were back in the office full-time. This poll was conducted just before the most recent restrictions introduced by the British government and, at the time of writing, the indication is that we will be seeing remote working prevail for some time to come.
When lockdown first came in, many people would have seen the prospect of working from home as blissful, as long as their home environment was conducive to work.
For more introverted or analytical individuals, the thought of working without interruption, constantly being called into meetings and having to put on their ‘work face’ really appealed.
The novelty soon wore off, however. Zoom or Teams fatigue introduced a different drag on our working day and people began to miss the regular interaction with colleagues. It’s very easy to underestimate the energy we draw from those mini exchanges around the office and how small distractions can give us the space we need to be more creative and break through mental blocks.
Not only do we need other people to help to stimulate and energise us, those regular interactions also play a key role in progressing our careers or helping us to get our job done efficiently and effectively. Being in sight and in mind is important if we want opportunities to come our way.
In his book, Empowering Yourself: The Organizational Game Revealed (AuthorHouse 2010), consultant Harvey Coleman argues that career progress was dependent upon three key elements:
In my experience, the majority of people expect performance to be the main criterion when it comes to securing promotion. That is a reasonable expectation – in a fair world.
Coleman, however, estimated that performance accounted for only 10% of the factors influencing promotion decisions. Image accounted for 30%, while exposure is worth a whopping 60%.
You might be good at your job (performance), but unless you develop a network, the chances are that only your immediate line manager and your peers will be aware of that. If you are already operating at a senior level, those managers and peers will be influential. But in the main, those groups don’t usually make the decision on promotion.
If people are either unclear about where your key qualities lie (image), or not enough influential people know about those qualities (exposure), then your performance will be academic.
So, you need broad and strong professional relationships – your social capital – to help you deliver a powerful personal brand and make sure that your name comes up in the right way and in the right conversations.
As this applies to your career, so it does to your role.
If you are trying to influence key stakeholders, your networks and reputation will go a long way to how your ideas are received and acted upon. Social capital is the oil that smooths the cogs of our commercial and professional life.
When we work in isolation, our profile can diminish. Even if we take the lead in many online meetings, we miss out on those tiny interactions that can leave a big impression. And we run the risk of seeing our social capital shrink.
Now is the time to be much more proactive and considered in the way we approach building and nurturing professional relationships.
Start by thinking about who you are talking to.
Working remotely, particularly when you are busy, makes it much more likely that the vast majority of your conversations are transactional.
In other words, they are centred on agenda-driven conversations you need to have, often based on the project you are working on at that time.
Relational conversations, the ones you would have in passing day to day or schedule in as lunch and coffee meetings, get shunted to the side. In fact, in my work I identify seven stages in professional relationship development.
This reflects that networks are not linear; we enjoy a different depth of relationship with different people.
It’s not enough to just meet someone, exchange cards and consider them in your network. That relationship then has to be nurtured to strengthen the bond between you.
In addition, you are less likely to develop new relationships during lockdown. And it’s harder to do so, with no physical events to help you or the prospect of bumping into people who then introduce you to their colleagues.
Take the bull by the horns and, if you know that you have gaps in your network, seek to fill one or two each week.
Follow up with people who have been on the same conference call as you and arrange a short one-to-one chat to get to know them.
Engage with people on LinkedIn and other social networking sites and ask people in your network to introduce you to people who can help you to work more effectively.
Throughout the pandemic, it has become clear to me that the way you treat people throughout lockdown will influence how they see you in the long run. The empathy you demonstrate now will have a huge impact on your reputation going forward.
At the Association of Corporate Treasurers’ recent International Treasury Week, Joseph Braunhofer, head of treasury at Smith & Nephew, said: “Flexibility and understanding, and making sure you take those things into consideration for everyone’s situation are important.”
I would argue that they are essential.
I was pulled up on more than one occasion in the first few weeks of lockdown because of a failure to show that understanding. I engaged with people as I normally would, not thinking what might be happening in their wider lives.
People were worried about being furloughed or losing their jobs; concerned for their health or that of family members; hit by the uncertainty in their lives or just impacted by the global crisis.
My agenda was far from the front of their minds and my focus on the transactional was not well received.
We have settled down a bit since then, but many of these insecurities remain. Whether dealing with team members, colleagues, clients or others, putting empathy at the front and centre of how you interact will be appreciated and valued.
Our social capital does not need to diminish through lockdown. But it will if we don’t take conscious steps to nurture key relationships, find ways to maintain our profile and reach out to new people.
Andy Lopata is a specialist in professional relationships and networking, and author of Connected Leadership
This article was taken from the December 2020/January 2021 issue of The Treasurer magazine.