Leading and communicating through crisis

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good afternoon everyone I'm gonna get started cuz it's 12:30 I hope you're all well
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and if you're watching live I hope you manage to have a restful weekend so
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welcome to week six of lockdown I obviously had to count that because time has lost all meaning my name is Katie
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Jacobs I work with HR leaders at the CI PD and I've been hosting our coronavirus
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webinar series this afternoon we're going to be discussing the importance of leadership and communication in times of
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crisis and joining me to discuss this fascinating and really timely topic I
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have a great panel of leaders we've got Peter cheese CEO of the CIPD Dominic
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Walters leadership communications consultant and former chairman of the Institute of internal communications sue
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Evans interim director of HR and organizational change in the public
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sector and David Frost's director of organizational development at global food produce business total produce
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thank you so much all of you for giving up your time to join us today now before
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we dive into the content as always I will just do some quick housekeeping this session is being recorded it will
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be available on demand by the webinar section of the CIPD website you can also access recording of our previous
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webinars there on topics such as well for being and furlough and you can sign up for the future sessions we're running
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two a week at the moment this Friday we're going to be looking at how HR teams can look after their own well-being
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times of immense stress and then next Monday we're taking a deep dive into supporting line managers I'll remind you
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about both of those at the end of the session secondly if you want to submit questions during the webinar can I ask
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you to please use the Q&A tab at the bottom of your screen please don't use a chat box we're not monitoring the chat
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box and can I also remind you that attendees are all muted so we've got about 300 of we on which is brilliant so
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any questions need to be submitted by Oh typing finally the legal advice I'd like to remind CIPD members that you can call
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our HR inform the helpline it's available 24/7 and you will get an individual response and I want to remind
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you that we are updating the resources on our right all the time you can head to the CIPD coronavirus hub for more so let's
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click off in times of crisis the importance of leadership and communication really
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comes to the fore and that has never been truer than right now with leaders needing to communicate clearly
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authentically and empathetically with teams working remotely and those working
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hard in the field and on the front line and often in the same organization the
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uncertainty surrounding the coded 19 pandemic not knowing when and how lockdown will end or what this will mean
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for organizations in the long term makes things even harder that's what our
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speakers are going to unpick today giving hints tips and personal examples of what's worked wealth them as leaders
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and what they've seen work well in organizations our running order is as follows first up Peter's going to set
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some context and give some advice for people professionals then Dominic is going to offer some practical tips and
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guidance on getting leadership communication right during times of crisis and uncertainty sue will then
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share her own experience they're coming into an HR director role pretty much on day one the pandemic and having to lead
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a function that she's never met before David will offer insight into how leaders in his global organization are
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communicating across markets and geographies and how HR is helping and and finally we'll take questions as a
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panel so please do submit them whenever you want during the session via the Q&A box so that's it for me to now commit
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that's it from me pan out sorry about that I'm going to hand over to Peter to kick off with setting some context thanks
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Peter Thank You Katie and welcome everybody to this webinar and incredibly incredibly
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important theme as Katie's outlined I mean leadership is probably been one of the most studied subjects in business
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for many decades I've studied a lot myself talked a lot about it and even leading into the crisis we were talking
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a lot about leadership in their circle Buca world some volatile uncertain complex and ambiguous and all the
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changes that are going on around us and of course the the covenanting crisis has accelerated all of that and rath taking
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Rae and put us all into a context of which none of us are entirely familiar
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so that old refrain that I played that soo much from leaders in the past where they've often said well of course I've seen it before and this is what happens
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you journey circumstances that demands something different promises leaders right from the beginning so leadership
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in a crisis is is what this is about how do I lead through very very uncertain times when I myself as a lead or a near
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misses leaders can be extremely uncertain of exactly how to respond and indeed it can be very stressed and
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challenge ourselves with the the unfolding of the crisis so this is
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without doubt probably the biggest test of leadership that any of us have faced
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and when I say leadership and I think throughout this webinar we're not just talking about the people at the very top we all have our roles in organizations
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as leaders particularly for our profession as HR people two points are important the first is that our
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profession very much is or we've described is on the front line of the organizational response and we're here
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and you will hear it from two HR leaders on this webinar that we really are right
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there and needing of course to support leaders and managers right across the organization as well as driving our own
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teams to enable businesses to operate in very different circumstances but we've
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always had a role I would argue as a profession in supporting leaders leadership development understanding what's good and encouraging leaders to
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act in the right ways and now is the time therefore for us as a profession to support leaders everywhere as well as
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demonstrating your own leadership capability I think also that what is always in my mind mean at the very heart
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of good leadership is the understanding of people and these ideas in compassion and emotional intelligence and of course
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well-being which is at the very forefront of this crisis not just a physical well-being associated with the
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actual effects of the of the Kevin ninety bars but all the related mental
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health issues that are clearly emerging from all of this and thank goodness sake again we've been talking about many of
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these things leading into this crisis it is again accelerated a lot of the debate but what we have to do what is our
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treated care at all levels of leadership and management excuse me all levels of
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leadership in supporting our people properly I think it's that we will be judged during this time
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of how we make decisions as leaders perhaps more than we ever have there are so many differing things to weigh out
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all the way from the short-term issues and cost experiences and making sure we
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can navigate these very very tough short-term response to the crisis with
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the lockdowns and the very big shifts to different ways of working through the medium term where we begin and women now
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seeing across the science and signals and government they begin to return to some form of workplace working men of
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course in their longer term what this will mean ultimately for us as businesses us as leaders what we learn
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from the crisis we can take forwards and positive ways so that combination of those short-term medium-term and
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long-term thinking is very challenging and then we get to think of better systemically so that we are not just
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looking at purely financial outcomes but we're understanding other things like of course all the different options we have
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in terms of how our organizations react to the current circumstances what are some of the legal constraints but
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perhaps above all what are the ethical and moral things that we do which demonstrate we're making the right
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decisions in all these different circumstances that we're acting according to our principles that were
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acting according to our stated values which we've all spent a lot of time on in recent years articulating and
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interesting I've always been a bit of a student of values that integrity is the
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most commonly stated corporate value so now is the time when we really really have to step up and show that what we
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are doing is acting with integrity and that integrity means that we are
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understanding all the different interests needs of all of our stakeholders in beginning of course with
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the people that were responsible to our employees but also our customers and our suppliers the conveniences of which
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business is so clearly part of and so on and those this idea of if you will
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multi-stakeholder capitalism is also part of the debate now for leaders so you got all those different aspects with
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how we have to think about leadership in this context but as I said driven very much from this idea that we must act
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according to good principles to good to reinforcement of our values and
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recognizing that often were makin decisions which aren't always with lots of analysis for having to engage people
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in very very different ways so finally I would say that this is leading of course to yeah what should be and what we've
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also talked about in leadership sometime a more humble form of leadership they're recognizing that none of us as leaders
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whatever level were at couldn't all be our answers we have to be open in
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engaging others we have to engage people at all levels as to how we're responding to this what other decisions were making
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and how does that mat best serve the individual collective interest for all that those we are responsible to and
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those are very very challenging things to put together and then of course finally is to talk about communications
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which we're going to be talking about a bit more particular dominate and I don't know if you saw it but the Jeff Bezos of
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Amazon was commenting recently that he has spent more time with his organization and talking to speak well
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then he ever had in pretty much all the time that Amazon's existed I heard from a CEO just last week saying in the last
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eight weeks they'd spend more time with their head of HR them they have the previous eight years promises as a bunch
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about what's happened in the recent eight weeks as what has happened in the previous eight years and it is this stuff therefore about how we're engaged
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in connecting communicating showing empathy and compassion but also showing and being honest ourselves as leaders we
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can't know it all we are also vulnerable and we need to talk about our own openly as well as part of our communications
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and if we do those things then we create that culture that environment where people also can feel that they speak out
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and I've experienced all those things myself there's a leader at the CIPD and how I'm communicating very differently
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much more frequently I won't always get it right and that's true for all of us but oh my goodness I think it is really
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shifted our thinking and understanding a world is important in leadership and I believe those are things that we need to
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take it forwards beyond the crisis so that we are getting positive outcomes from this terrible time as well so ket
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on that note let me hand hand it back to you and you can pick up the thread from there thank you so much for that Peter
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really really great context and as somebody who has equity I say you're getting it right the time so I'm gonna hand over to
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Dominic Walters now I'll let you wanna make introduce himself and he's gonna take us through some practical tips and
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guidance for communicating pre-crisis Thank You Katie thank you very much and
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good afternoon I'm Dominic Walters I work with organizations and leaders to
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help them think through how they communicate and connects with their people so often involved in coaching training developing strategies so what
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I'd love to share with you for the next 5-10 minutes is some of the key things I've experienced we've experienced
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working with different organizations with leadership teams some of their challenges look at three areas firstly
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some of the key things that leaders have to do differently secondly to go through
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some practical tips that I've seen leaders and work with leaders of them experienced myself and then lastly just
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some thoughts about how what's happened will affect the way that leaders communicate beyond if we ever get back
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to some sort of normality there's something over the next slide please we've already had I think from Peter a
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number of the things I'm going to mention now that number the things but the things we four big communication
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crises or challenges side of the crisis is giving leaders as Peter said leaders are very much under the spotlight at the
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moment they will be judged on how they behave now and just as Peter was saying we're already seeing that leading is a
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very conscious the fact that the values they've been espousing for years are really really going to be tested there to see whether people actually
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performing according to what they said they're going to do and communication is obviously key to all of that so some of
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the challenges were seeing leaders facing are firstly how do I respond to the stuff that's changing at a pace
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we've probably never seen before but knowing that our actions again have long-term implications not only in terms
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of the health of my business but how we interact with our teams the relationship we have with our teams I guess if you
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look at the big stage seeing Boris coming back today some of the challenges he's facing again looking at the papers over the weekend how do I make some
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decisions because people are asking for some very complex answers very quickly but knowing that he's going to be jumped
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by history the government's gonna be judged by history as the patient's of those are on a slightly smaller scale that's the dilemma of being faced by
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many leaders I think secondly leaders there they've got to be visible they've got to be out with their teams
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and teams were behaving and performing in different ways how do they do that without overwhelming people and this is
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a challenge that not everyone's getting right at the moment it's a hard one to get right how do you make sure you show
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your team's and you're caring you're available without overwhelming than with your presence and I know speaking of
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some team members they were saying I can't believe how irritating it is have my boss appearing in the corner of my living room so frequently thirdly how do
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you establish this sense of community which is important to what you don't but obviously haven't got because you're not
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necessarily a physical place or what everyone is but also helping people to be more self-reliant how do you give them the confidence and information to
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perform make often at home but also create sense of community between them and some of their colleagues who may not
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be working at home may be doing their job in a way that's they've done before and lastly how do you build these bonds
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when you haven't got that interaction of people meeting each other in the corridors or meeting together to have a
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bite to eat or having coffee together so if we go to the next slide please I've hungry like to present everything
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seven tips based on experience first one you won't be surprised to see is keeping
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up a pace a regular pulse of communication regularity is very important people like the certain job it
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in the early days of the lockdown I was talking to a team member of the client and she said to me one of the great
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things about knowing I've got a regular check-in every day is I never feel that I'm too far away from shore which I
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thought it was a lovely mental picture an allergy if you like the shows how people feel about having regular
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sessions where they can go and talk with their line manager their bosses we also know as a temptation when things are
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busy for leaders to communicate only if they have something that they need to say that must work very well in normal
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times it certainly has to work at the moment and it's important for leaders to understand just having a check-in if
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they've got nothing to say to get people chance to raise issues or comment or ask questions is going to be important
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secondly this may seem obvious but leaders need to be very open to new
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channels and I think crucially being prepared to get things wrong and adapt I suspect everybody on this call has got
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his or her own favorite story of something's gone wrong on a reference call or where technology has
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let us down and things haven't worked out as we as we hoped it happened to me on Friday for example and I think one of
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the things that we found is that leaders need to prepare to just go with it if things aren't working with their presentations of working out what
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they're not doing the responses at the time that they expected from their colleagues they need to give them a bit of grace we found that that's becoming
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more important my wife is a primary school teacher and this last week she's been struggling and has her colleagues
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have been with Google classroom which you may have come across and if the way
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they're working now is incredibly different from what it wasn't week ago does they've tried things out they work with parents they've had conversations
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they found new ways of working I think leaders need to be much more open to that linked with that leaders need to
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think about changing their behavior new circumstances mean definitely new sets of rules I've mentioned the fact that
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leader some leaders have been tempted to have regular conversations with their team members as they would if they're in
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the same office and that doesn't work if you're constantly emailing someone will constitute trying to get people onto a
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video link but more importantly there's practical things about changing the tone
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of the way you communicate realizing that when you're standing in front of a group of people in a physical room the
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way you need to behave is different from when you're talking on a medium like we are at the moment you haven't got that
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distance between people is it's much more egalitarian and therefore you need to be much more informal in the way that
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you communicate and again another leader I spoke to said to me I was talking to one of my team members recently he was
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bouncing his young son on his knee and it's hard to be corporate in those sort of circumstances so you need to be able
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to flex and adapt but also just slightly lightheartedly we've noticed that
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leaders need to be learning some broadcast techniques and I say this with hesitation as everything I'm about to
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say I'm sure I'm not actually following but for example we found that leaders have been criticized because the way
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they come across on video is their face takes up the whole of a screen and we've had feedback from people saying it's
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like a scene from 1984 having our boss's face projected as such a large way we've
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also heard that and the BBC have been given guidance about this that leaders need to run conversations
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over media like like we're doing as if they're hosting the show so constantly giving a running narrative about what's
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happening bringing people in if they're being quiet making sure they stick to time so changing their behavior most as
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well fourthly I suspect we've all found that the last couple of weeks we've been
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focused very much on the operational keeping the business going or or changing things if it's not going to be
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actually in business for the next few months following I know has taken up huge amounts of time for many people and
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so in those circumstances we find it's very tempting for leaders to forget the bigger picture but it's now probably as
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important if not more important than ever and as a practical thing reminding leaders took perhaps just every two
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weeks take some time out and give their teams the big pitch of the context where the organization is heading remind all
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about what's special about the organisation roomette remind me a bit about the purpose to the organization
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which may have been slightly obscured by just keeping things ticking over and it's a great great opportunity every now
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and again take stock and share some reasons to believe give people some good news about the organization even if it's
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only about how the organization is adapting to some of the terrible things may be happening within it fifth this
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seems fairly self-evident for any leader conversation is key but even more so I
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think in the crisis that many people have been facing is that having those regular conversations to make the
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connection just to find out how people are getting any on building in regular chat times with teams and trying also to
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include people who work in different types and circumstances is very important I think also one of the
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crucial things about conversation is the opportunity and I think we heard this from Katie earlier for leaders to show
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their vulnerability for leaders to express their frustrations perhaps with
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some of the selectra stances they're facing share some of the problems they've been they've been experiencing some of the things they may have got
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wrong all these things build memorabilia sakes express vulnerability and help to
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build trust between leaders and their teams which means of people are much more encouraged now to share their own
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frustrations and comments but will also build different give dividends when we come back to some sort of new
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normality as people remember how they felt how they were made of that feel by the leaders that were running the teams
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when they go into the government six is opportunity to share stories and I think
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stories are a number of levels I've already mentioned about the importance of organizations the Sheraton best
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practice but also sharing success but allowing people also to share stories about what they found what they must
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worked cracks they may have come across their experiences to share some of the
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personal experiences as well these helped to build a sense of community and again they're one of the things that can
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get very easily lost when leaders are very much focused on getting things sorted in the operational task side of
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things as well and my seventh tip would be to make feedback a priority and I
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think that's on two levels we're already finding I work with an engagement
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company we're already finding that people are focusing organizations are
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focusing less on engagement to now but much more on well-being so using the channels that they may have set up the
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surveying channels they may have to do a more regular shorter more focused surveys on how people are getting on
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what they're making what's happening how they're feeling about stuff making people much more aware about their own
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personal well-being and how they can access support and help to to help I
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think that sort of shift has been something quite significant so having regular short surveys conversations ways
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in which people can raise issues and think about their personal well-being has been important then more broadly
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leaders finding getting feedback on how they're doing even more crucial and it
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is in normal times whatever they are being able to ask what's working for them what's not making running repairs
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to the way they're doing things happening the humility the being humble enough I guess to ask for support and
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help from their people as well so just to bring this all together but has the last slide please then I'm coming to
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land what does all this mean about the future leadership communication I think it's going to be less less hierarchy
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once you've seen inside someone's house several times once you've seen him or her play with their children often to be
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you can never go back to the old rigidity that we had before I think secondly there's going to be people are
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going to be much Betty informal conversation because things have been informal now that's going to happen in the future
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thirdly technology it's worked organizations if they had danced before
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about agile working and be able to use technology will have fewer excuses to put it plainly and finally I think
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because we've been away from real face-to-face communication for so long organizations are going to cherish it
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and one of the battles I've been having for a number of years is to encourage people to see face to face is the most valuable communication channel Aries I
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think people did evaluate and try and skeet squeeze more valuated that fit in the future that's it I hope I'm going
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over my time by too much particularly
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pleased to hear about the kind of depth of formality as somebody who is the most informal communicator ever so that's
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kind of music to my ears I'm gonna pass over to soon as who's going to give some
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insight into leading HR teams based on her own recent and time they experience
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but you see thank you and thank you to Dominic I'd like to think that I do
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those seven things but I'm going to go and ask my team and check that out is that fantastic list and and absolutely
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real in this moment in the interest of storytelling I'm just going to tell you a little bit of a story about my landing
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in West Sussex County Council I'm for three last three years I spent time to
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be short-term interim projects and I was invited to go to West Sussex to fill in
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a gap as they wait for a new permanent appointment and of course I landed and
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then Kovac 19 landed immediately after me so there's an immediate challenge
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there I'm a very sociable person and I like to think that there's a human in
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like human resource interaction and endeavor and of course I'm denied that
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because I can't see the people that I work with and actually haven't met quite a few of them so it's a big thing this
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whole communication and leading through a crisis which really are you doing at a
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remove and where normally we would have face-to-face conversations you get
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all the verbal cues that are around you you clearly don't don't get that you have to work harder this communication
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stuff and I think Dominic's absolutely spot-on with this is a very human and
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empathetic environment we're trying to understand what every individual is
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going through within your team at this stage because everybody circumstances are different I think we've been
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bombarded in the last few weeks with people trying to tell us how to get more from our remote teams how to manage our
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remote teams better how to increase productivity unless interested in that I think but in
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trying to make sure that I look after my team the response from local government
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the response from the public sector through this crisis has been absolutely phenomenal I am so proud of the way that
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my team have stepped up and stepped in to new and different roles we asked
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something new of acting every day whether that's to step out and stop
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doing what they're doing and go and lead a community hub whether it's to set up a new set of processes we've set up a
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redeployment hub we're working with volunteers we're working with partners we're solving problems so this is a
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whole new set of ways of applying those existing skills within HR and my
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goodness are they skilled and are they talented so being able to recognize that in this
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context is great it's a great opportunity for us to say to our teams do you know what you really are very
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good at what you do but you're now using those skills in a slightly different way we've never been more connected
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I think we're digitally hyperactive and about you I I find the I start I
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struggle now to switch off my phone is in my hand all the time I kind of feel like I'm tied to this because we're in a
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crisis and we need to be there and we need to be able to answer questions but that has a knock-on effect on people's
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resilience and mental health so we spent a lot of time and I spent a lot of time encouraging the organization to think
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about how it looks after mental and physical well-being through this and trying to encourage people not
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to be afraid to switch off not be afraid to log off and not be logged in the
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whole time and actually thinking about recharging batteries so a lot of reminders there in HR I think have a get
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again a very really important role in looking after the organization and reminding people that these are human
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beings in this and we're not we can't run at full tilts forward at the time this is a long haul emergency it's not
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going away anytime soon so at this pace we have to maintain and we have to
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sustain and in terms of that sustenance it's about I think allowing for
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understanding of people's individual circumstances so for two parents try to
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work from home and home school and struggle childcare that's a real tall
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order so giving them advice for that being more productive isn't going to go anywhere it's more important for them
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you understand and can emphasize the situation when they might have a four year old running around while they're
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trying to write a policy or they're trying to to do some work and I think people feel less productive because they
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feel that there are too many distractions and let's be really really clear but actually people are not
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working from home they're working at home and that's different
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stay there are times that people choose to work from home chances are your children are in school there's peace and
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quiet and you use that time to get on this is not the case now we've got people whose home lives and working
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lives have completely conflated and so communicating in that environment is
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about understanding where they are understanding what their challenges are and giving them permission to find that
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tough as we find it tough and I think that there's something about HR leading
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the way and role modeling that kind of empathetic approach which says let's
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look after this organization at the end of the day I want to come out of this with the staff in West Sussex saying
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actually we worked well in looking after them we did it right we didn't get it
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right all the time but we really had our hearts in the right place in terms of managing people through this particular
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crisis and I think that for us that has meant working very closely with the
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communications team so the regular big messages go out the regular exchanges
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the chief exec and I rather a webinar last week at Live Chat dealing with
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people's questions and concern so there is a channel for people to say I'm worried about that or haven't we thought
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about this recognising that that feedback loop is so important yes well
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done you got that right how can we do that and also I think HR is in a really important position here in terms of
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storing up the organizational learning we are learning so much at the moment
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about how the organisation can be different going forward but that means that we can really take into the future
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those things that are right those things that work those things that will drive a
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better place to work give us a much better feel for how well people can
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contribute them where their strengths are and recognizing that adaptability and that's my favorite word at the
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moment adaptability and if you want adaptability you need even look much
30:46
further than than your HR teams and I think I've been very fortunate I've
30:51
comes into West Sussex straight into the strategic leadership team which means that HR have that voice at the senior
30:58
table we're in at the beginning of the decision-making and we're able to influence the people agenda really
31:04
positively and allow us to think about how that can impact on our staff what do
31:10
people need to know how can we best communicate with people how can we best get these messages across and one of the
31:18
things that I think has stood out for me is that willingness of people to really
31:24
make a change in their behavior it comes back to one of the Dominic's points actually I've had to change the way I
31:31
do things I've had to change the way I think and so have a start and they
31:37
really really have and I think again it's that working out just how we will
31:42
capitalize on that flexibility going forward I think that for us
31:47
the the public sector have had a Herculean task really in terms of
31:52
supporting the other natures particularly local government have supported the NHS in keeping people out of hospitals
31:58
now that's brought with it a whole raft of other issues and we're learning how we can respond very quickly how we can
32:06
solve problems very quickly but that organizational learning if we're not
32:11
careful we might lose that as we go back to the new normal and also now we're
32:17
starting to have a very detailed conversations around what post lockdown world might look like and what the world
32:24
of work might look like going forward so starting to communicate with people about how we might come out of this what
32:31
things we want to take forward what we want to leave behind what our objectives are where our values will sit and my
32:40
goodness we've challenged we've really challenged ourselves one of the other things that I think's been fantastically
32:46
so comfortable with that look at the idea of trust in an organisation yeah in
32:52
the past I have worked in organisations trying to move forward around agile and flexible working the root of that is in
33:00
trust and I have had conversations in the past with municipal have you appointed people that you can't trust to
33:05
work at home well up now we've had two and now we will going forward so there's
33:11
a big change here I think in terms of how we think about work how we think about what's meaningful and one thing
33:19
that I think is coming back in spades is the fact that people have felt really
33:24
engaged and involved in solving those issues within their communities and that
33:31
real sense of connection that we nhr have now in solving problems in the real
33:37
world so we are not in the background we're at the forefront we're right at the beginning of this and actually
33:43
that's a brilliant and places to be I'm not losing that and not not really recognizing what that
33:49
should do for our confidence as a profession and for the way in which we think about our contribution to
33:56
organizations going forward so when we write our people strategies when we're
34:02
working on our policies let's keep this learning in view let's recognize just
34:07
what this crisis has meant for us and where that's taken us a as a profession
34:14
and B as individuals because I think in those those two parallels there's an
34:19
awful lot there for us to take forward and to be able to use I think finally
34:26
from me working in an organization where you know that there's a broad range of
34:36
things that have to be delivered becoming part of that being part of the
34:42
overall machine that produces big solutions for communities and addresses
34:48
very major issues in our local areas it means that we need to step up into that
34:55
space and I am say so proud of the way that my team have done that and I think
35:00
there's a whole raft of of new respect there across every team within our
35:06
organization and again HR have a role to make sure that we don't lose that and
35:12
we're able to capitalize on it going forward so let's think about that in terms of what it means for all profiles
35:18
let's think about that for what it means for managing performance for making sure
35:23
people understand and get good feedback around what they've contributed and how
35:28
they can recognize those new skills and take them forward and use them more wisely so it's been a really interesting
35:36
ride for me the last few weeks to pick up in an organization we have at the
35:41
same time we have inducted two directors into the organization who've never met
35:46
one of them is never set foot inside the building and of course is leading and and running a major service at the heart
35:52
of this crisis and we've had to work very hard with them to kind of help them
35:58
overcome those challenges whilst maintaining social distancing not not
36:03
wanting them to go and and and get involved we get stuck in at the frontline it's very hard for leaders to
36:09
take that step and to lead from a virtual position and finally I think
36:16
there's something in there about really seeing things differently and doing things differently I'm not being
36:22
surprised by the learning that you get from this and not being surprised by
36:29
thinking actually that doesn't work maybe I'll try something different and being able to open up about who you
36:34
are within that process so I've tried to write to my team on a regular basis I
36:41
like to try to check in not check up open up the lines of communication drop
36:48
into those kinds of meetings and actually have those regular meetings with my team we're probably more
36:53
connected than we have been and that's good and let's keep that going forward but it will never ever ever replace that
37:00
lovely feeling of being walked into an office and see people and engage with people on a human level because that's
37:06
what we're all about really and that's it for me thank you so much sue that was
37:11
brilliant here and I think we'll come into the discussion later about how to capture some of the learnings and what a
37:18
interesting and I guess almost game-changing moment this has been for the profession I'm going to hand over to
37:24
David now to talk about leadership communication within a global business over to you David
37:31
thank you very much deputy and thank you the opportunity to be joining you today so just to give you a bit of context
37:38
around total produce we are a global fresh produce company we have almost
37:44
40,000 people working at over 270 sites from South America North America and
37:51
across Europe with a joint venture business also in India so we are in the
37:56
business of growing product sourcing product and then supply a meeting to retailers wholesale and through food
38:03
service so when you think about fresh produce from our point of view it is any vegetable product fruit product or salad
38:09
product the last few weeks you can imagine just personally what that's been
38:15
like for us because we've had we described it as three or four Christmas in Disney in one go we ball it would see
38:22
heaps of demand by 50% at Christmas time and we would be planning a few months
38:28
ahead for that that all happened incredibly quickly and we had several weaknesses that sort of level of demand
38:35
although that is now beginning to reduce some more normal levels so that has but enormous challenges into the
38:41
organization so one hand we've had a big dinky demand by then of course when we miss applying restaurants and catering
38:48
that sector that has dropped off to almost zero so we've had to cope with humility of those changes as well in the
38:54
market so what's the challenge to manage very quickly now we already work in a
39:00
very remote decentralized way within the business so we we have regional structures we have regional CEOs looking
39:07
after businesses in different parts of the world the group CEO himself really he lives in Spain I'm based in the UK
39:13
the FDA is based in Ireland so it gives you a bit of an idea of we're already working in in that sort of way although
39:20
did was we have lots of calls and video conferences just before the lockdown
39:26
took place I've had a conversation with Elsie her about having a really good day at session finding any said David you
39:33
know we just could do with the day just going and walking on the beach and getting ourselves really thinking about this quite deeply wouldn't that be great
39:38
to do that and then because that that will stop so many we have how to do a beach session virtually but
39:46
it was the idea between together so here now we're thinking about how do we
39:52
manage communication process incredibly diverse organization which is decentralized but we need to make sure
39:58
that we send out the right messages from the group so very much at the beginning
40:04
of the mock down we started working in quite a different way much more this has been way around staying in touch with
40:10
business so every week now I have a call with our CEO with another member of the
40:15
executive team but during the week we make sure we stay in really close contact with all of our senior
40:21
executives and senior management so during that week we're making regular calls and just finding out how people are I'm not stopping the business and
40:28
then we debrief the CEO there's also doing the same thing I should say on a Monday morning and then
40:34
we decide what communication is important for that week so it's just really making sure we're keeping very
40:39
close contact with what's happening around the organisation at the beginning of the lockdown period very well of
40:45
course that was being phased across different parts of the world at different times but really early into the lockdown in Europe at the CEO sent
40:52
out quite a detailed communication to the whole group which was cascaded to all employees the way we've structured
40:59
that was very much a top-level message though the top-level message was we are in a critical industry we're very busy
41:04
pleased don't worry about the organization for the longer term albeit we're going to have to make a lot of
41:10
changes very very quickly to cope with the demand or to cope with a reduction in different parts of the organisation
41:15
so one top-level message with just a sub point it was just to explain to people
41:21
but we knew what was going on within the business and we were getting some really important context rather what was
41:26
happening different parts of the world other I guess it's the vice I will share on this it's very important thinking
41:32
that type of communication that the CEO recognizes specific things that are
41:38
happening in the business to demonstrate that the CEO is in touch so for example when the CEO is thanking people for
41:43
working safely he then cited example as what he knew was going on within the business to demonstrate of that so it's
41:49
making it very tangible people that the CEO does understand what's actually happened again so one of the questions I
41:54
think for any CEO or senior leaders what are you alright is Howard how you
42:00
really making sure you know what's happening in your organization tip it's very diverse and very spread around
42:06
that's very that's very important and then with quite almost supporting
42:11
information as well to really make sure that when we're talking about the business being safe for the longer term
42:17
well what does that mean and how can we really demonstrate that so we were
42:22
talking about the fact you know we are in it where people do need to eat we are providing healthy food so it's a sector
42:29
that is important for the longer term it might change shape or it might be under pressure it is going to be
42:34
important for the longer term so really trying to reduce some of the fear people might might feel that at this time but a
42:43
group level we found a really useful approach by bringing together HR
42:49
representatives from each of our key businesses across the borough and having videoconference events with them to
42:56
really find out what's happening within the organization so we're sharing practices around how are they communicating openly within their
43:02
businesses how will they handle safe working so what does that look like for them in that particular part of the
43:08
business what about remote working how is remember working happening and what are they learning well we will learning that
43:14
in different parts of the group so from doing that we then pull together information packs that we share across
43:20
the group so people can look at what's happening in different areas and learn from those good practices and the
43:25
experiences that are happening across the group I thought that one of the most lovely examples with a CEO one of our
43:32
businesses in North America were they in activism for 300 people he's based at home at the moment as the
43:39
CEO but he's making around 150 calls a week to cross-section of people right
43:47
across abysus from for differences still working in a warehouse delivery drivers who still delivery to our customers
43:53
sales teams are all working from home and when I just got into little detail
43:58
around so how are you handling those calls what are you discussing it about just asking questions really that's the purpose how are you
44:04
doing how are you feeling at the moment what concern is have you got he said you
44:09
know a delivery driver and going out to deliver into a really can
44:15
be quite worried because they are feeling more exposed and stuff is working from home so listening to that
44:20
and they're giving reassurance actually feeding back lends that individual my knowledge of what they're hearing so
44:26
that the line managers can be again getting another insight from the stereo but I just I love the example the CEO
44:31
really really keeping in touch with the whole organization and being very open then of course it would then give him
44:37
the opportunity to talk about the wider business so just imagine if driving a forklift in this video called you and
44:43
you're getting a little update in terms of what's happening with the business itself as well very very simple but very
44:49
very powerful I think we're also seeing examples where daily team briefings are
44:55
happening very well across the organization so we've got examples of a dozen or 15 people coming onto a couple
45:01
of 8:30 with a video call doing this to get the day going and running the team
45:06
brief just in the same way they would do in the office of you have to be they have to be dressed they have to be ready and then they won't have that regular
45:13
daily check-in and that's a pattern that we're seeing across the group that's been very effective I think and then on
45:19
the more informal side of it we've got lovely examples where some teams are having evening cocktail gatherings and
45:24
having a glass of wine or a cocktail with each other and just chatting about family and the informal things as well and so nobody examples of that happening
45:31
which others record very human very down-to-earth and again very practical
45:36
so I think the other point that I think Dominic particularly was picking up on
45:42
this is at the moment you know this is we've learned very important that we keep everything in terms of
45:49
communication degree level road down to work we've being very open we're not
45:54
we're not using oil platitudes you know you wouldn't want to have leadership speeches you know that try and help
46:00
change their views or opinions of the world but let's just recognize that we are going through a challenging time
46:06
it's all about asking the questions and this is think what people have to say and then demonstrating that we we are
46:12
taking steps where we can to help people be safe within the business so I think
46:17
that's particularly critical I think going forward as a business we
46:22
demonstrate all those sorts of behaviors at ground we could do with the term a meeting and will fly for a whole day
46:29
just to have a two hour meeting we'll take a train journey and have the whole day out just for two hour meeting and
46:34
the number of colleagues are the same to me yes that's not really that smart is it you know why are you spending all
46:40
that time and all that money doing that what we're doing now to working really well so yes we do need a face-to-face
46:45
interaction is we're gonna have a strategy day or we want a day where we could really get into into some detail then and face-to-face contact is still
46:53
important but this is working on oh by the way it's making a huge difference to our operating costs as well and also
47:00
fits in with our sustainability strategy of running a business that is healthier for the planet as well so I think one of
47:08
the big changes we're going to see is definitely an automatic question people were asked when they put a reg meeting
47:13
is can we do this virtually before we decide we're going to book a book a flight definitely going to change we've
47:19
also noticed that the quality of conversations during video conferences can be incredibly high and one of the
47:27
reasons is that people have to give each other in space so they can speak you can't interrupt quite so well on a video
47:33
conference you have to listen and then the questions seem to be flowing very well so people are now starting right at
47:38
those coaching skills that they when they weren't on that coaching course a few years ago or a few months ago
47:45
actually are really really useful so I think better listening better
47:50
communication is something that we're seeing coming out of it and maybe another point to make here is that in
47:56
terms of longer term changes already where we're running leadership development programs where we would have what people together to a physical
48:02
location and flown people to an in special development events to come and
48:07
meet in London perhaps and we do Brazil or Canada we're now saying well actually we're starting to run these virtually
48:13
these events now and then working really well so I think there'll be a change of approach to how we develop leadership
48:18
capability going forward and those sorts of events I think we'll run more of them online and using this sort of technology
48:25
perhaps you would have done the past won't completely replace it but I think it will certainly change so they're just
48:32
some of the things that I'm I feel I can share with you these few minutes that we've got I hope that's
48:38
useful I think summary for me is this is just been a time of being really in touch with the business really in touch with
48:44
each other keeping everything very practical keeping the language very simple very straightforward and I love
48:52
that point about people just being themselves and being very honest I think we're having more honest conversations
48:57
with people people have being more straightforward than they ever have been so I think a lot of positives come from
49:04
that as we come out of this period and I think also I have to say Katy this event
49:11
and these sorts events that you're running facilitating really are symptomatic I think and how we change in
49:16
our communication as a profession as well and I think that bodes incredibly well for the future
49:22
thank you David I'm going to about ten minutes to take some questions and can I
49:27
also give you on to unmute themselves so first what I'm going to take is one about so we talked about the direction
49:34
of travel towards kind of less formality and hierarchy but sometimes crisis
49:39
management requires quick responses and communications there being a little bit more command and control how do we
49:45
square this with a more collegiate and consultative culture and Dominic I put that to you first because you mentioned
49:51
it's funny more less formal less formal and form of leadership okay I think two
49:58
things one is helping managers be intentional in the way that they or leaders be intentional in the way they
50:03
communicate what they're doing so I guess been more situational in what they're doing recognizing the time for direction and
50:11
the time for support I think the other thing is being clear on why you're doing stuff so if you have to make quick
50:16
decisions explain why they have to be quick and why you have to get there and why it's work works that way and then
50:22
perhaps the third thing to add is when you've done it have time to go back and see how you could do those sort of things differently and involve people
50:28
helping you shape that anyone else I'm
50:33
ex-army so you would expect me to put in a vote here so under control I think
50:39
sometimes we confuse command and control with micromanagement and the one thing we haven't been able to do in this
50:45
situation is micromanage so we have had people to get on with stuff good command-and-control allows us to set the
50:52
direction of travel that people understand what the issue is and then set them free to go and find solutions
50:57
and that's exactly what we've seen and it's great to trust people and empower them and then they can collaborate with
51:03
whoever they need to to get things done and we've seen that happen too okay and somebody's asked do you believe
51:11
this situation will improve hrs credibility within organizations David Peter any views on that for that
51:21
one case um I think it will and I think it masked I mean we've all acknowledged on this call that it charge very much at
51:28
the center so much of this debate all the way from just the operation of stuff we've had to manage with very quickly
51:35
adapting to remote working I would connect people internal comms well-being and these are all big HR themes and I
51:43
think it is a time for us to you know to connect in these ways so that we can all
51:48
gain strength from each other because I think you know on the slightly downside
51:53
if you will is the profession is under a great deal of pressure is under a great deal of scrutiny we talked a lot about
51:58
leaders being under smoothly but I think HR is as well and this is the time for us to to connect and I'm absolutely sure
52:06
and I think it's a very important part of so much of the communications in any way shape or form that we talk about the
52:12
positives of all of this and I think one of the positives really should be that HR is stronger it's more positioned at
52:17
the heart of business thinking because the heart of business thinking is shifting to be much more humanitarian if
52:23
you the world people at the very heart of business and and this whole idea of what stewardship is which is yeah you
52:29
have the state of business financially but you to big things you have in any organization and money and people and
52:35
people make up most of the costs if we don't better understand this stuff and how best to get about more out of our
52:40
people particularly in these circumstances then we will have missed an opportunity but as I said I really
52:45
really believe this will signal a significant shift in where a child's
52:50
position within a within organizations and David do you agree from a practitioner perspective within your I
52:57
do perspectives I think here I think first of all this situation has inevitably
53:04
forced a charge of the spotlight because we've had to step in and actually do our job which is revise the business in
53:10
terms of how to manage the situation for people point of view to understand the legalities and the promises and
53:16
processes that need to be put into place so I think in a sense is it has projected us but it's actually because
53:23
we're doing what we need to do with edge of that makes sense I think the opportunity from here is that many
53:29
organizations are having to look at their organizational design they're thinking about how they're going to operate strategically going forward and
53:35
we're asking a lot about how we've responded in a crisis as an organization so how are these behave powers that this
53:42
is performed or edited through a people in organizational perspective and there will be no doubt a good amount of work
53:50
to do as a result of all of that learning that experience so it's now important HR takes that and start to
53:55
influence the strategies of the organization and make recommendations what needs to happen in the future so I
54:02
think I see opportunity I think it is a very exciting time as well thank you and
54:07
see somebody's asked if you'd expand on what you hope organisations will take forward post lockdown so what learning
54:14
that you mentioned that you hope that the organisation won't lose yes hello Rachel I saw your question I think we
54:22
want to hang on to those real lessons around adaptability to being able to
54:27
take our skills and transfer them and apply our skills and talents differently
54:33
and more broadly across the business and I think that's what needs to go forward I think also lessons around agile and
54:41
flexible working and our ability to step up and solve different problems I think
54:48
the things we want to lose as some of that hierarchical rather stiff and clunky policies things that slow us down
54:55
and things that don't allow us to take those decisions in peacetime as it were
55:01
more quickly and in a more agile way okay and somebody's asked about
55:08
resilience and the importance of resilience to kind of the whole organization and taking a whole company
55:14
approach to resilience is that something that anyone can chat about what they've been doing in their organization to
55:20
boost that and how the importance of resilient leadership yeah I think so our
55:26
health and safety teams and our public health teams have been working very hard to really help people to become much
55:33
more resilient thinking about your mental health your physical health and well-being constant reminders of that
55:40
whole organization reminders that this is something that we have to sustain so
55:45
yes I think it's a really important thing and I wouldn't want to gloss over it it's been absolutely writ large over
55:52
our response all the way through not resilient communities and resilient organizations yeah mentioning through
56:02
our research we've done a lot on resilience particularly through the crisis and as you said so at these
56:08
different levels individual resilience organizational resilience so there's some good stuff that we'll be posting
56:14
very shortly on the outcome of that research but it emphasizes those points and and let's not forget in the
56:20
individual resilience that the Brazilians leaders is really crucial and we do need to pay attention to our own
56:27
and individual well-being it's it's so often the case that leaders want to
56:33
present that strong image all the time but we're vulnerable as well as we said and so part of resilience is recognizing
56:40
where you are vulnerable and being honest about it and and yeah we've seen it all out to Boris Johnson's have to
56:47
deal with it personally as well so that's say right individual and collective and organizational resilience
56:54
are all part of this bigger debate that's emerging and question on the tech
56:59
somebody using teams broadcasts for the Executive Board to give updates and take QA and David what are you using as an
57:08
organization to kind of get those broadcasts across and maybe I'm Dominic what are you seeing people using and working quite well yeah Microsoft team
57:16
seems to be the favorite technology for our business so I think people have been using zoom then a few
57:22
concerns came up around security and I think I think it depends on what you're using I think for more
57:28
sensitive meetings what team seems to be the go-to but I've seen people using
57:35
whatsapp video calls they just seem to be dipping into what works for them perhaps it was in our business so that's
57:44
Katie and Dominic when you're doing kind of broadcast maybe company or company
57:50
why do we got any quick tips on making a tech workers work for you missed you sometimes can feel I'm not really a
57:58
great technician but what I think is having an open conversation about it so if things are not worth your things are
58:03
going down if people are having problems with their IT creating an environment which they could just say that I think that makes the whole conversation much
58:10
more productive and effective but like David it we're seeing it most people using teams bit of zum-zum some sort of
58:16
mostly teams but I think it's about the way that you do it I mean that conversation about it and one quite a
58:23
big question but I'm just gonna ask it quickly and maybe one or two people give a quick response and how do we think Co
58:30
mid-nineteen will affect HR and leadership and communication after we get back to whatever normal looks like
58:37
so I Peter what you think the kind of long-term impact might be yeah I think as we've already explored on this call
58:44
lots of things whether it be flexible working that we yeah we will understand me can work in these more agile ways and
58:51
I think has used it very hard after ideas the idea of trust because if we're
58:56
honest why we made such little burger something so flexible whiteness because we haven't trusted people in these circumstances so so trust I think one of
59:03
the big outcomes and all of this and I think it will drive also some different ways in which we understand each other
59:09
individually so I think the collective cultures that come out of this I think can be positively reinforced and as I
59:15
said in my opening remarks our values can be really really reinforced you know the flipside of these things if we're
59:21
not making rifles the decisions some of these things can be damaged but I think there's a very positive outcomes as
59:28
examples that we should be looking for thank you and afraid that's all we got
59:33
time for it's afternoon I'd like to thank top panel so much for giving up their time and sharing their stories and tips are
59:40
openly this webinar will be available on demand from this afternoon so feel free to watch it again if you like or share
59:47
it with peers and colleagues as Peter mentioned also I'd like to recommend an excellent piece coming out from CIP
59:54
Dee's head of research and thought leadership ed Houghton on leadership in crisis and organizational resilience
59:59
which is gonna be published tomorrow that's gonna be well worth Courage I'm just quickly to flag on next couple
1:00:05
of webinars on Friday we're gonna be exploring how HR teams can look after their own well-being we know how hard
1:00:11
all of you are working and next Monday we'll be talking about line managers supporting them during this crisis and
1:00:17
beyond a reminder to keep using the CIPD coronavirus hub for resources the theater CIPD communities for support and
1:00:24
if you're a member the HR inform helpline for individual responses to your toughest questions so that's all
1:00:30
from us this afternoon thank you very much and have a good rest of day goodbye
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