A critical appraisal, beyond remote work

Many managers are reflecting on the post-COVID telework model and which people are going to join it and which people are not. The answer should be based on the characteristics of the job. But also from the assessment of the professional and personal profiles of the candidates, their knowledge and skills. And of the trust that is placed in each of them by their leader. In the end, when you balance aptitude and attitude, aptitude adds up, but attitude multiplies.

If you are immersed in that reflection, be sure to read the advice that I share below.

Now is the time to make the decision.

You’re going to have to make a decision, and you know it. To do it with foundation, it is best that you base yourself on objective data. Think that you cannot take it based on discriminatory criteria or that violate fundamental rights. Besides being unethical, it is not legal.

To help you, here are some reflections that you can apply to each of the people who could telework. You have probably heard and corroborated them with practical examples many times, but you have hardly seen them in writing. They are very basic and are based on a classification according to attitude towards work:

  1. Due to their willingness to assume new functions, you can distinguish between:
  1. People who you have to ask for everything and who you have to pursue to do their job. And yet, they either take a long time to do it or they just don’t. Your real skill is being the people with the most free time in the office. They have a tendency to procrastinate.
  2. People to whom you should only give general guidelines when they are entrusted with a task, simply accept the order and fulfill it in a timely manner. You can identify them because they are those that have more work and less time to lose.
  1. By their degree of initiative you can distinguish between:
  1. People who are limited to executing what you ask of them, nothing more and nothing less. They tend to have a passive listening attitude, with few contributions. As Xavier Marcet says, “No one in the company knows how they got there, but everyone knows that they will never leave.”
  2. People who ask you about the next job as soon as they lose their jobs. They tend to be the ones who receive the most assignments in the office, and yet remain receptive. In short, they give a lot and demand little
  1. By their attitude towards the company, you can distinguish between:
  1. People for whom everything is wrong, everything can be improved. They are mailboxes of complaints and claims with legs. A thousand problems come out of his mouth, but not a single solution. They are permanently bitter and end up embittering those closest to them.
  2. People who are used to providing solutions to your company’s problems, even when you don’t ask. Of course, they show critical attitudes to areas for improvement (don’t trust someone who doesn’t express any criticism) but this is always with a constructive sense. You will identify them because they give multiple answers to a single question instead of giving a single answer to all questions.
  1. Due to their willingness to motivate, you can distinguish between:
  1. People who are permanently unmotivated. They are like lost souls, dragging their feet around the office waiting for the time to go home. To put it in some way; “They are there but they are not.”
  2. People who come from home motivated. Normally, they are optimistic people, who transmit ‘good vibes’ to their environment. You never have to give them orders, he just makes them accompany and help them achieve their goals. The notes ‘connected’ with the purpose of the company.
  1. By their ability to take risks, you can distinguish between:
  1. People who only have a single skill or knowledge. They don’t want to get out of their comfort zone or stop being the most experienced person in their functional niche. They live exclusively for today, they are not worried about their professional future or, obviously, that of their company.
  2. People who feel the need to change, to develop new skills. They perceive that they live in an increasingly volatile, uncertain, changing and ambiguous world. These people put in extra time to develop new skills. even if the company does not provide them with the resources to do so. If necessary, they do it with their own resources and outside of working hours.
  1. Due to their attitude to discipline in the company, you can distinguish between:
  1. People who live in permanent fear of being fired. They often find legal mechanisms to ensure that it is not practically impossible to do so.
  2. People who know if they are not going to be fired, the truth is that they do not care in the least. And the most curious thing is that their supervisors try to take care of them so that they do not leave of their own accord.

Confidence is the key.

What’s up? Have you been able to reflect on it? If they win the a): do not reach a telework agreement with her. In short, if you don’t trust them for face-to-face work, you won’t trust them to telework either.

But if a) predominates in your team, you have a serious problem. And if your company is smaller the problem can be huge. Even an obstacle to its development and to its viability, something that goes much further than allowing is teleworking or not. At that point, the next item for reflection has to do with whether you have the right leadership styles and whether the exercise of hierarchy is going well.