How Being in the Office Might Help Teach Unspoken Rules About Leadership

I recently read an article in the Australian Financial Review that made my eyes roll because I thought it was another "why the CEO says you must return to the office" article. 

The article's author, Janan Ganesh, a political columnist for the Financial Times,  says that executives in multiple organisations have told him that  "junior staff who work from home are holding back their career in the company."  

Why? Because I have written and podcasted about this get-back-to-the-office phenomenon before. In those articles and podcasts, I lament that many powerful, privileged people ignore the lessons learned during a global pandemic. 

Lessons Learned During the Pandemic

• That work is something you do, not where you go. 
• Measuring people's contribution to the organisation, not just where and when they sit in an office, is important!
• That (knowledge) workers can work from almost anywhere and, in many cases, be very productive. 
• Marginalised people can often feel less excluded and more included when working remotely.
• The cost of working in an office (commuting and other expenses) puts barriers in the way of people participating more fully in the paid workforce.
• Some people prefer the office as a place to do their work.
• That one size does not fit all regarding work, humans and workplaces. 

So I'm reading the article in question and thought, sh*t, here we go again. 

‍

Sh*t, here we go again. 

I fervently believe that when creating and sustaining workplaces that work for all humans:

1. One size does not fit all (people, jobs and employers)
2. There are three stakeholders in how we "do" work - the person, the team and the employer.
3. The needs of all stakeholders are essential when making decisions about ways of working.
4. Managers need to be trained and developed to create and sustain inclusive and high-performing teams and workplaces. 

I kept reading and began to see a different perspective. Funnily enough, one that mirrored a conversation that I'd had recently with a CEO and HR Director of an ASX-listed organisation. In this conversation, we discussed how young professionals might learn the unspoken rules and protocols without being in the office. 

Each workplace is teeming with unique etiquette and unspoken rules. Through taking a sample size of one (me), I've garnered a treasure trove of insights about the ways to 'do certain things, which includes office politics or human dynamics, as well as some of the skills gained by observing top-notch people doing what they do best. 

The rules about office dynamics will not be found in any textbook or intranet site. I'm talking about both the often-unflattering elements, such as observing how people navigate status symbols (who gets what office/seat/desk), and the unspoken pecking orders, as well as the nuanced art of building and leveraging strategic relationships by building trust by the water cooler. These teachable moments are challenging (but possible) to replicate in a virtual environment. 

You can't necessarily get the complete picture of someone's character or work ethic over a Zoom call, can you? People, particularly those at the start of their careers, might benefit from the undeniable value of being in an environment where they can learn by observation. 

"For a graduate, those first few years of office life amount to an additional degree in anthropology."

Eating Humble Pie

So, what does this humbling lesson (for me) mean? As it turns out, it looks much like what I encourage other leaders to embrace. Flexibility, inclusivity and focusing on what the needs of all stakeholders are. 

In practical terms, it means there is value in ensuring that we provide options for team members to learn and develop their skills in the most suitable way, in the most appropriate environment, at the most opportune time. It also means we must support managers to gain 21st-century inclusive leadership skills to lead without a one-size-fits-all mindset. 

So, I've stopped rolling my eyes, and I've started contemplating how I can better help workplace leaders create workplaces that work for all humans, no matter where that workplace happens to be. 

‍

What about you? Have you found ways of making workplaces work (better) for all humans, no matter where they are located? Let me know!