Policy & Practice | December 2021

Don’t go it alone. Leaders should encourage staff to be involved in strategic planning and sharing outcomes. This approach allows staff to relate better to those as champions of change.

workforce have less opportunity to organically connect with others on a daily basis. Thus, it becomes more necessary than ever to create opportunities in which staff connect. For example, for leaders and supervisors, it becomes even more essential to schedule and commit to having one-on-one supervision with employees. Taking the time to celebrate, appreciate, and recognize staff for accomplishments, anniversaries, birthdays, and the like, provides another opportunity for staff to connect to each other and to the mission of your organization. This can serve as another point of grounding or connecting for staff health and well-being. This recognition could occur during meetings, over email, in a video, or through other means of messaging. Staff can even get creative about how this happens, creating a new monthly award that gets passed from one staff person to another. 6. Communicate clear expectations that exhibit transparency. We all know that human beings, in general, feel safer and more secure when they know what is expected of them in any given situation. Expectations for behavior in and out of the workplace are not an excep tion. They become even more relevant when staff is adjusting to a new set of work circumstances like returning to the office full time or implementing a new hybrid work schedule. The more clarity that exists around remote or hybrid work guidelines, the better. An informed staff is a happier staff. Intentional, regular, and trans parent information sharing and communication are also important. In the absence of accurate or factual information, employees will default to filling in the blanks on their own. The results can be unsettling, espe cially as employees look to yet again establish a new normal for themselves with regard to their work schedule. Taking the time to connect and share information with staff on a regular basis leaves less room for uncertainty, confusion, or for staff to create a new narrative.

7. Keep employee mental health and well-being at the forefront. Transitioning from working remotely full time to being fully back in an office space or to a hybrid schedule may be a welcome change for some but could cause stress for others. Managing this change might require staff to take inventory of what parts of their lifestyle will be affected and how to best manage those changes. Work–life balance might adjust for employees in ways they did not need to think about before, such as child care options, less time home with pets who may have dif ficulty adjusting to being alone, or care for elderly parents. Leaders are encour aged to ensure staff is aware of their employee assistance program options, should they need support. 8. Seek opportunities to utilize personal strengths. Regardless of the physical space staff is working in, there are several mantras that still hold true. One of them is a sure-fire way for staff to expe rience job satisfaction: the opportunity to utilize their strengths on a regular basis. Ensuring that opportunities exist for staff to experience fulfillment in the workplace leads to higher productivity, higher staff retention numbers, and overall improved staff morale. 9. Demonstrate patience and grace with change management. Often change does not happen overnight. Too much change, too quickly, can have detrimental impacts on organizational culture and the shape of new working models. Leaders

should demonstrate patience and grace through the change process by allowing staff to feel heard and having some control over the new working models. The goal is for everyone to transition through the change successfully. Fostering the opportunity for staff to be innovative in creating new systems and tracking mechanisms can greatly help move the change forward. strategies and outcomes. Leaders often feel obligated to lead the way in strategic planning and with acknowledgment or recognition of successful outcomes. Narratives are best shared by those with lived experience. Don’t go it alone. Leaders should encourage staff to be involved in strategic planning and sharing outcomes. This approach allows staff to relate better to those as champions of change. Overall, leaders should focus on the benefits of staff returning to in person work or to hybrid models. Not all will buy in to the changes, but there is great value in returning to a com munity of support with opportunities to regularly engage collectively in a safe environment and group setting, all working toward a common goal. Giving focus to the benefits and gains of returning to work could possibly bring greater comfort and ease some of the anxiety of staff hesitant to leave their homes. Trinka Landry-Bourne and Kimberly James are Organizational Effectiveness Consultants at the American Public Human Services Association. 10. Encourage staff to share successful

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