Focus Question: What’s been your greatest learning?

Description
And here we are. In the final week of the year. As you look back at 2020, what stands out, or maybe the better question is, what’s not been memorable, or record setting.

What a year! I hope that you have enjoyed our journey together and want to leave you with some reflection questions:
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The one thing I want to remember about this process is:

• I want to acknowledge _______ about myself:
• I am proud of:
• I have gotten clear on:
• I am going to celebrate my accomplishments by:
• Going forward, 1-3 themes which are important to me are:
• As I step into the new year I will…
• Take a look at the word cloud which captures some of our core themes for the year.

 
Enjoy the conversation and focus!

Activity
Review your notes from the year, highlighting for yourself key themes, learning and insights.
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Celebrate. Love. And Keep on Learning.

Thanks for joining us for this 52 week series. We hope that you will continue to stay tuned to the Remote Pathways podcast. Please take a minute to rate and review the podcast in your favorite podcast player!

Jennifer Britton 

Focus Question: What’s important to note about your work right now?

Description
This year we’ve taken a look at a wide variety of core topics for remote work – from delegation, to team development, feedback, to learning.

This week, and next, you will have an opportunity to take stock of where you have grown and shifted this year.

Growth doesn’t always happen on a straight path, and there may be many twists and turns along the way. This week take a look at the many milestones you have moved through. What are they?

Questions to consider:

• What were the major milestones throughout your year?
• What were your growth areas?
• What were the plateaus?
• What stands out for you?

Another key element of the year has been your vision. Have you gone back to review your vision?  If not, do that now. Notice:

• What was your vision at the start of the year?
• What major milestones did you meet or exceed?
• How did your vision shift?
• Even with a shift, how did it come to fruition?

You are invited to spend time creating your vision for the new year. Check it out.

Activity
 
Review your notes from the year, highlighting for yourself key themes, learning and accomplishment.

You may want to check out Jennifer’s recent year end video at her YouTube channel.

All the best,
Jennifer

Focus Question: What does experimentation mean for you? Look like in your work?

Description
Experimentation is key for business leaders and teams today. Many times, the context is changing so quickly that we don’t have time to complete an entire roll-out before having to make a final decision. That can lead to a mindset of experimentation, where it is encouraged to try things out, see what works and what doesn’t.

In supporting experimentation in our team, we want to:
• Encourage and reward trial and error
• Create safety around not getting “things right”
• Provide team members with time and resources to experiment, beyond their everyday team responsibilities
• Facilitate an evaluation of projects or “Experiments” that are completed or are even at the midpoint
Questions we may ask at project reviews include:

Practically, incorporating more experimentation may look like:
• Putting shorter time windows on projects, with quicker checkpoints to see what is working, and what is not
• Moving projects out of design phase and into beta more quickly so that pilots can be rolled out and/or early adopters can take the program for a test drive
• Looking at testing a couple of different strategies at the same time, with the notion that they may not be as fully developed as they have been in the past. Early results may inform what gets further developed and/or followed
(Originally published as https://www.potentialsrealized.com/teams-365-blog/teams365-1597-teamwork-skills-in-complex-times-experimentation and https://www.potentialsrealized.com/teams-365-blog/teams365-1583-in-focus-experimentation)

Activity
What are the experiments you want to undertake right now around your work? Where could more experimentation benefit you (and the team) with innovation or focus?
 
For more on this topic check out: Section 4 of PlanDoTrack for more on Experimentation.
Experimentation has also been one of the quarterly themes we’ve anchored into this year at the Remote Pathways podcast. Be sure to check out the Community Calls at the Remote Pathways Podcast.  You can find them at this YouTube Playlist - (Remote Pathways Podcast Community Call playlist)

All the best,
​Jennifer

Focus Question: Where are you focusing on?

Description
Focus is a multi-layered word in the remote space. Focus is not only about what we are choosing to look at, what also thinking about what helps us keep our focus.
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#1 – Where are you focusing?
Just as Goleman writes focus is important on three levels – inner focus, other focus and outer focus. Where are you putting your attention? All three areas are key for work in the remote space, and it can be easy to get pulled into certain areas, for example, an inner focus.
 
#2 – Building out your focus muscle
What are you doing to focus your attention? This may be about tuning out your distractions as well as those things that are not core.
Read through Week 43 on Keeping Things Simple and Week 42 on Minimizing Distractions.

Activity
# 1- Consider where are you focusing – inner focus, outer focus or other focus? Where are you not focusing? What’s the danger or trap of not focusing there?
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#2 – What is going to help you build your muscle for focus? What will help minimize distractions?

For more on this topic check out: The Teams365 Blog at Potentials Realized.com.

Best,
Jennifer

Focus Question: What does Keeping it simple mean for you?
 
Description
Simplification in the remote workspace is critical. When contexts vary across a team, time zones are different and cross-cultural elements get in the mix of everyday work, simplification and keeping things simple is essential for high performance and flow.

The notion of “keeping things simple” can flow across a business at all levels –
 
From program design, to customer messaging.
From keeping what you offer simple, to how you communicate and reinforce it. Simplification also relates to workflows and processes.
 
Simplification may also involve creating visuals around a topic to consolidate a lot of ideas into one graphic.
 
In the remote space the more complex a process, the more likely it is to break down. In the remote space, the more complex things are, the more likely there is going to be misunderstandings. These can lead to work breakdowns, lack of alignment, conflict, and many other things.
 
What’s important about keeping things simple in your work?

​Activity
Consider what keep it simple can mean in these different areas of your work:

For more on this topic check out: Effective Virtual Conversations 

Wishing you the best,
​Jennifer

Focus Question: What distractions are getting in your way?
 
Description
Distractions abound in today's workplace from:

• Open concept work areas where visual distractions abound
• Regular bings from email arrival, updates, Instant Messaging
• Being called into meetings which may not be necessary
• Too many open loops or projects on the go
• The blurring of work and professional roles

 
All three of these areas can be quickly assessed if you are committed to minimizing distractions for you and your team.
 
Some initial ideas to minimize distractions may include:
Creating "focused work" periods. Whether it's 30 or 60 minutes a day, focused times, which have no immediate distraction allow us to get things done. Many studies find that our immediate productivity can be boosted by giving projects time windows and a time frames. The Pomodoro technique is one example of accelerating productivity. It posits that focused activity for 25 minutes can be followed by a 5 minute break. Read more about the Pomodoro Technique from its' creator here.
 
Become ruthless with meetings. Moving the needle on meetings may be a goal for many teams today. If you have not yet downloaded a copy of my bookmark for my newest book - Effective Virtual Conversations - on making virtual meetings more effective, download it here. It includes 8 Questions you will want to ask yourself before every meeting.
An initial question to ask your self this year is "is a meeting the best way to communicate this information or is there a better way?
 
Closing email and other app windows at different parts of the day. While it may not always be possible to turn off email for extended periods, it is important to have blocks of time where we are able to focus solely on the task at hand. Providing small work areas for individual and/or groups to meet in for the important pieces of work are critical. It may take a few minutes to get into the flow of these projects, and scheduling in time on a regular basis to have focused work time, is useful in breaking the cycle of ongoing disruption.
 
Ask yourself if you need to interrupt someone before you immediately hit send on an email which could be delayed or bundled with some of the other questions you have.
 
Where does your team get distracted at present? What small, but consistent changes would make a difference to the way you are working?

Activity
Identify the distractions which exist in your world. What is important to take note of?

For more on this topic check out: Teams365 blog posts on the topic of Distractions. Check them out here. 

Best wishes,
​Jennifer

Focus Question: What disruptions are you facing in your work?
 
Description
2020 is likely to be remembered in the history books as the year of disruption. While the year may have started out with a strong focus on what would be possible in the new decade, the global pandemic influenced professionals and businesses alike. As it relates to the global workforce, approximately 3 Billion professionals were working from home at one stage of the pandemic.

This global experience of the reaction to a massive disruption that most in our generation have not experienced, can lay clues for how we approach change, disruption and innovation.

What were your key learnings around this?

In navigating disruption and change some of the lessons learned from this recent pandemic has been:

• Focusing on what’s important at the core of your business
• Considering how and what it can look like in a “new normal”
• Being clear on your business values and philosophies which will remain the same even if the context or processes change.
• Having a strong business vision – Keeping an eye on your vision can help to ground you when the waters around you are turbulent. As I have been sharing this year -when we move our eyes to the horizon (which is where our vision resides), it is different than if we have our eyes on the foreground
• Considering whether you are a disruptor yourself as a business or responding to disruption

This Fast Company article, Navigating Disruption: A Roadmap for Leaders, by Grant Thornton, highlights seven areas you will want to explore:
#1 - Watch for early indicators
#2 - Adopt a broad view
#3 - Take inventory
#4 - Build bridges not silos
#5 - Become more diverse
#6 - Be curious
#7 - Know Thyself

Activity
Identify the disruptions you are facing in your work right now. What are you doing around the seven areas Thornton highlights?

Also consider these questions:

• What’s helping you navigate?
• What’s getting in the way?
• Who else (mentors, peers) can support you in exploring alternative strategies?

For more on this topic check out the Teams365 blog and posts on Navigating Disruption and leading teams through uncertainty. You will find it here.

Focus Question: What questions will open up the space for EXPLORATION, FOCUS, CLARITY, INSIGHT or ACTION?
 
Description
Influence in the remote space can be a more powerful skillset than leadership. Our ability to have great conversations while working with others is critical for success. This entails supporting people to do their best work, when we might not be able to see their context. With that in mind, coaching becomes an essential modality and skillset for remote professionals at all levels. Coaching can take many forms and at its essence it is a partnership between two or more people where the coach helps the person being coached gain clarity, and support action around their key goals.
 
In the remote space, coaching may take place between a boss and their direct reports, or even two peers.
 
Questions are the heart of great coaching, and in the original core coaching competency framework of the International Coaching Federation, questions may “evoke discovery, insight, commitment or action”. 

Questions are the heart of great coaching, and in the original core coaching competency framework of the International Coaching Federation, questions may “evoke discovery, insight, commitment or action”.
 
In any conversation it can be useful to focus on questions that are:

• Short and to the point- 5-6 words each
• Focused on the topic at hand
• Asked one at a time. When we ask more than 1 question people don’t know which one to ask first
• Often start with a WHAT? How questions will point someone to how to do something – process. WHY questions will point to what’s important about the topic.

Some of my favorite coaching questions can be found in this short video – link to 20 Coaching Questions on my Youtube channel.

As I wrote in a 2017 article on Questions and Team and Group Coaching it’s also important to:
1. Keep them short, concise and to the point. Often the most powerful questions are often only 5-6 words in length
2. Adjust your questions according to the styles and preferences of the person involved
3. Provide an opportunity to focus, identify options and possibilities, to expand awareness, or to facilitate action
4. Notice any biases in our questions. Where are your questions focusing – at the 30,000-foot view OR in the weeds, around action AND awareness?
5. Use the language of the client and watch for “coach-ese” or coaching jargon.
(Reference: Britton, 2017. Questions and the Group and Team Coaching Process) 

Activity
Consider how you can incorporate the key points of today’s session. Make a list of 20 different questions you’d like to draw upon in upcoming conversations.
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For more on this topic check out: My 2013 book – From One to Many: Best Practices for Team and Group Coaching. You will find more about the topic of scaling the coaching conversation to more than one person in the book.

Enjoy!
Jennifer

Focus Question: What is important to communicate in your next presentation? How do you want to capture people’s attention?

Description
As a remote professional it’s likely that you'll be giving presentations to a wide variety of audiences, in possibly both the in person and virtual realms.

Fear of public speaking is usually listed as a Top 10 fear of adults. So how can we prepare to give a WOW presentation?

As a starting point, take 5 minutes to brainstorm. Make a list of everything you could possibly talk about. What are the topics that your clients or customers would really appreciate?

As someone who's been involved in presentation skills training for almost 2 decades, here are a couple of key things to keep in mind:

1. Speak in bullet points – reinforce what the main points are at the start, middle and end. What would you like people to take away from the presentation?
2. Connect people early on to what’s important about the topic for them. We often call this the WIIFM (What’s In It For Me?)

​One of the biggest pitfalls you can experience as a presenter is that no one wants to participate. Tips to get participation happening:

• Be clear with process let people know what process will unfold. Describe what they can expect to take away from the session (3 bullet points). Return to this throughout your session.
• Connect them with their WIIFM – What’s In It For Me? Connect people early in your presentation to how this topic has relevance to them. You might do this by asking the question – What’s important about this topic to you right now? OR Who has a story that they can share? Consider how you will connect people early on.
• Have a variety of strategies to engage people on a regular basis. From the litmus test of incorporating a pace change 7-10 minutes, to a more frequent pace change virtually, we want to keep things moving and involve the audience. Virtually, this can range from breakouts to annotation to polls. Get people involved in the presentation. Bring in their stories and voice.

Activity
Consider an upcoming presentation:

1. What is important to note about the process? What is the purpose? What is the presentation all about? What do you hope people will take away?
2. What will you do to connect people to their WIIFM?
3. What are the strategies you will use to connect people to their WIIFM? When?

 
For more on this topic check out
Section 3 of PlanDoTrack, specifically pages 81 and 82.

All the best, 
​Jennifer

Focus Question: What does renewal mean for you?

Description
The fields of sports and business shows us that teams that excel, are great at both “playing hard” and also resting hard. When working remotely, our boundaries between work and life often get blurred.

Just as physical renewal is essential after a long race, periods of renewal are key in business to help us remain at our prime. What does renewal mean for you? When is the last time you took time to renew?

Decision fatigue, social media burnout, task switching and cognitive overload, take a toll on us as professionals. When things become unbalanced it can also become luggage we bring into our family life.

As solopreneurs, keeping ourselves “at our prime” is key as the business relies on you. Without you there, it’s unlikely that it can keep going for long. Therefore, renewal should take a priority.

Here are some different ways to consider renewal:

• Taking vacation time on a regular basis
• Scheduling time away from our work (i.e. conferences, meetings with colleagues)
• Enjoying a compressed 4-day work week at different parts of the year so you can enjoy a longer weekend
• Having clear boundaries around “when you are ON” and “when you are OFF”
• Swimming/running/hiking/going to the gym over lunchtime on a regular basis
• Going on a retreat

 
What will help you renew?

Activity
 
What are the things that are going to help you renew? Build some time in to do this.
 
For more on this topic consider tracking your routines and renewal via the Daily Monthly Trackers.

All the best,
Jennifer