BOISE, Idaho–Zoom Fatigue is the least of the threats from the new virtual environment, according to one expert, who says the much more dangerous fallout is the misunderstandings resulting from failures in “digital body language.”
That same expert has some advice for how credit unions can actively improve the digital communications experience for both workers and members.
In remarks to the Northwest CU Association’s MAXX conference titled, “Get Big Things Done: The Power of Connectional Intelligence,” Erica Dhawan, an author of and CEO of Contential, said the last 18 months have taught lessons to both individuals and organizations that have come fast and often at unnecessary expense and time due to misunderstandings.
The answer to resolving the new communications challenges, said Dhawan, comes in “connecting intelligently.”
As an example, Dhawan shared one text exchange between two coworkers in which misunderstandings built upon misunderstandings and what should have been a simple, 15-minute exchange turned into “stress and fear over a 12-hour period.”
“We think we have collaboration down, but it’s harder than you think,” said Dhawan. “Employees are wasting up to four hours per week on poor or confusing digital communication.”
Reimagining Collaboration
Instead, Dhawan advised organizations to take advantage of the “opportunity to reimagine collaboration,” and that includes ditching some practices many are unaware of even if they are paying the price for them.
With many credit unions still in virtual environments or hybrid virtual/work-from-home scenarios, the upside in the digital shift is it has enabled more geographical inclusion and helped limit “proximity bias,” where research shows people tend to listen more to those people they see more often and whom they are around. Ideally, the new communications tools being deployed by credit unions maximize the collective expertise across the CU with both employees and members.
The downside is many of the visual and body cues are lost in a virtual environment, leading to more misunderstandings and often contributing to a lack of inclusion. Dhawan noted, for example, that research shows that up to 50% of the time the tone in emails can be misinterpreted, even among family and friends.
Getting Across Silos
Dhawan said the importance of cross-silo collaboration has never been more important, and she shared with the meeting advice, strategies and more related to building trust and collaboration “no matter the distance.”
“How do we use this moment not just to adapt to our new hybrid normal, but create a better normal?” asked Dhawan. “The answer, I believe, is to develop the critical skill called connectional intelligence. Connectional intelligence is the capability to unlock unrealized value, like fully harnessing the power of our networks and relationships. We all know of emotional intelligence was a critical skill, but that was very much built on face-to-face body language in traditional office interactions. In today's age we need to be able to connect with our employees, with our members and with our communities no matter the person, no matter the distance, no matter the channel, digital or not.”
One thing that is not lacking is technology for connecting, added Dhawan, saying if anything there is a “connection overload crisis.”
A Lesson in the Guacamole
Dhawan shared numerous stories of internal communication breakdowns within organizations, as well as how they were resolved, but also shared examples of how new communication channels can lead to product (and sales) breakthroughs.
One such example, she said, is development of the Doritos guacamole chip by Frito-Lay.
“When you think about a product like this you think it would have come from marketing or the R&D team, but it didn't come from any of those networks,” she said. “It actually came from the Latino employees at the company. Frito-Lay had created diversity networks and one of them was a Latino employee resource network. They were primarily asking questions around diversity and inclusion, but they started asking different questions as a unique network, and one that was obvious to them was why don't we have a Doritos chip that effectively targets selected customer segments? They came up with ideas, they pitched them to product innovation—which had never taken ideas from a unique network like this within their company—and this turned into a $100 million product. Then the Asian Network said we want to do this, too they came up with the curry chip that was a best seller across Asia.
“As we think about this moment in time, think about reimagining how we reach our members, how we engage our communities, how are we using our employees and connecting with them in different ways that will allow us to perhaps reach underserved communities and to tap into unique expertise outside of title within our employee base,” Dhawan continued. “That will allow us to truly grow and expand in this time of change.”
Another organizations that offers an example for credit unions to emulate, said Dhawan, is SAP, which developed a virtual peer-to-peer platform for customers to help resolve issues.
Unlocking Connectional Intelligence
In a relatively short time, there is a new marketplace for the exchange of ideas, Dhawan reminded.
“I like to say that in our modern marketplace body language has disappeared as we think about connecting internally and with our members,” she said. “I like to say we have now infused what I call digital body language into all of our cues and signals. This is not video skills.”
Four Laws of Connectional Intelligence
Dhawan urged credit unions to recognize and practice what she called the four new laws of connectional intelligence: Value Visibly, Communicate Carefully, Collaborate Confidently, and Trust Totally.
Value Visibly
“In our modern world, valuing visibly is valuing our colleagues’ time and schedules. It's avoiding things like chronic cancellations, endless delays, not having a thoughtful agenda before a meeting,” she said. “It’s starting every meeting by truly clarifying ‘here is what success looks like for all of us and here's how I'm going to engage all of you to participate, and if we all stay present I'll end the meeting 10 minutes early.’ That will quickly avoid multitasking and get everyone on the same page.”
In short, said Dhawan, it’s about watching the clock.
Dhawan cited an example of one person who has reimagined how to run team meetings so that before the meeting she distributes the questions she wants her team to be ready to answer and then everyone shares answers in the chat tool. One of the outcomes has been increased participation by introverts and junior employees.
Practice Radical Recognition
Dhawan said responding to an email on which someone likely spent some time with a “K” or “THX” doesn't feel like valuing visibly anymore.
“What was implicit in traditional office must be explicit in the virtual office,” Dhawan said.
Acknowledge Individual Difference
The pandemic has highlighted differences in how introverts and extraverts wish to communicate, said Dhawan. She said, for example, many members prefer a virtual-first relationship. Many introverted employees really thrive in a virtual or hybrid space, especially when provided with thoughtful agendas, she explained.
“Our digital fatigue is forcing us to be much more thoughtful about how we meet, how we design for inclusion,” Dhawan said. “I like to say, especially on video, you have to think more like a TV show host than an office host. You have to set up what the goals are, cut people off if they go too long, summarize what you heard and create downtime in between meetings. Even simple things I've seen, from having meetings be 20 and 45 minutes instead of 30 and 60, so you enable that mental health break…I think when you're running hybrid meetings it's important to have a remote host and a live host. Make sure the remote host has the first half of the agenda or even the entire meeting. This will remove proximity bias and will ensure that you were much more thoughtful about collective expertise across your team versus just those that you usually see.”
Dhawan also reminded that digital natives and digital adapters have different adoption rates and practices, and that goes for members, too.
Communicate Carefully
“The second law is communicate carefully. One example I'll never forget was sending a message asking ‘Do you want to speak Wednesday or Thursday?’ The response was ‘yes.’ In today's context, reading messages carefully is the new listening and writing clearly is the new empathy.
“If you add a new channel, have you set norms so as not to create a culture of overload,” advised Dhawan.
Collaborate Confidently
To truly reimagine breaking silos within teams requires more than just replacing the traditional body cues and traditional interactions, it requires collaborating confidently, according to Dhawan. “I like to say this is saying what you will do and doing what you say. It's having clear norms within your teams of how silos work together, and how they can best interact to avoid duplicative work and have regular ways to connect.
“The rise of the digital workplace has caused us to be hasty, to reward the person who responds quickest. It should be to reward thoughtfulness over speed.”
Trust Totally
“This is the hardest one,” said Dhawan. “It's not natural to be looking at a video camera on our screen to engage with our colleagues and with members, but I would argue that it is the most important. It's giving others the benefit of the doubt. Check your bias, assume good intent and don't assume others are OK if you haven't heard from them. Constantly check in ask what's going well, what could be improved.”
Dhawan says she knows of teams that have completely redesigned staff meetings, including for psychological safety.
She also urged the creation of “hybrid water cooler moments” in order to foster exchange.
Dhawan said credit unions interested in obtaining a free digital body language toolkit can do so by visiting https://ericadhawan.com/dbl