WLP249 The Evolving Nature of Employment in Remote Work
(Yes, this is the right player for today’s episode. We’re having tech problems with the embedding…)
In today’s episode we explore the role of larger enterprises in the future of work, and how remote work fits into this - with two very different interviews and points of view (including one from before everything changed, but… it’s funny how much stays the same!).
As technology changes the way we collaborate, it affects careers and business structures too, and we hope you enjoy these reflections, from two guests with interesting points of view to share.
A tiny bit of news from Virtual Not Distant first:
On the 8th October we have a webinar about sustainable asynchronous communications, in association with regular podcast guest Richard MacKinnon at Work Life Psych - classic webinar style, you can listen in passively, or join in the chat conversation of course. And on the 27th October, when Pilar will be talking about adopting Visible Teamwork in your team through asynchronous communication - to help you put it all into practice.
Both are free of charge and we’d love to see you there. You can keep up with all our news and events on social media, including our LinkedIn Page.
8.06 Erica McMannes, Instant Teams
Erica McMannes
Erica McMannes and Liz Rodewald put Instant Teams together four years ago, to meet the employment needs of military spouses, for flexible location-independent work opportunities. They knew there were companies who needed the dedication and skills that this underserved cohort could bring to that need, so they created the service specifically to bring these two parties together.
They’re industry-agnostic, building remote teams for any industry, focusing on admin, marketing, and customer success teams. They create long-term employment relationships, and have their own software system which helps them scale and build teams fast, carefully vetting and matching their educated and experienced candidates with the right firms, using trusted tools.
Working with employers to ensure remote readiness has always been important for them, because Instant Teams employs the workers and has the duty of care, while placing them in the right work environment.
They help organisations see and realise the benefits of remote working, and the events of this year have inevitably brought new perspectives and opportunities on the role of remote in business resilience. One use case Erica talked about was a corporation which started trading in the 1940s, and needed to transition their customer care department to remote working overnight, but luckily they were already in conversation before that.
“I don’t know if we can even say ‘future of work’ any more, because it feels like it’s upon us”
Erica realised in March that for their teams to survive this crisis, we had to support those people - because they were now working around extreme pressure, including home education responsibilities for many. So they proactively supported their people from a culture and nurturing perspective, helping them muster their internal resourcefulness and flexibility to cope with lives turned upside down, and cope with the stress it generated. While military spouses might be used to coping with change, everyone needed additional understanding and support, and Instant Teams also liaised on behalf of their people with the employees who depended on them - helping them understand the new realities, of working around families and kids at home.
Above all, Erica hopes this strange period will bring lasting understanding to corporations about the potential for working with remote teams, and thus create new location-independent opportunities for many more people - whether they are military spouses, digital nomads, people living in rural locations - building on the existing programmes to encourage people to think beyond typical city centres, and decide where and how we all want to live (Check out our conversation with John O’Duinn in episode 240, for more inspiration on this).
36.11 Art Kleiner, author and consultant
ART KLEINER
Art Kleiner is the co-author of The Wise Advocate: The Inner Voice of Strategic Leadership, author of The Age of Heretics and Former editor in chief of the magazine strategy+business. He and Pilar recorded this conversation nearly a year ago! BUT it follows on nicely from the interview with Erica, because it builds upon the question of how we build careers, and specifically what enterprises have to offer employees, as opposed to contractors?
If corporations exist to try and make a better world, they don't always succeed (check out Art’s books for more on that). They help us to cooperate to achieve goals, and differentiate roles to achieve this, through the shared medium of financial accounting. Enterprises scaled and reduced friction, to become stronger and smarter than the ‘smaller fish’.
But a lot of this size advantage has disappeared in the digital age, now there is no longer a direct connection between size and reach/effectiveness. Which in turn has led to changes in how organisations are led and managed, and expectations for individual activities and definitions of success. We all have to figure things out for ourselves these days, as career and business growth paths are no longer clearly defined.
Opportunity is created by such change however, in conjunction with remote work and the freedom to associate and collaborate with anyone. Relationships with organisations and enterprises are governed by laws, which can vary depending on location/jurisdiction, but interpersonal relationships are more universal. As such, employees can be advantaged by legal structures which create benefits and incentives for them, and this creates a mutual supplier relationship with them as well, that freelancers have to manage without.
So these laws and structures have shaped how we work together at a high level - but right now, everything is in flux, even more so than when Art and Pilar had this conversation in 2019! Check out Episode 244 if you like more of these ‘big questions’, because while they may not have clear answers, they have great potential to make you think.
What will the enterprise of tomorrow look like, and how will those who do the work within it relate to it - economically, legally, and personally?
Don’t forget to check out all the different ways that Virtual Not Distant can help you, with every aspect of remote team leadership and practice, including our forthcoming ‘Podcasting for Connection’ service - which can help you strengthen relationships and the way you share and communicate within your remote teams.
If you like the podcast, you'll love our monthly round-up of inspirational content and ideas: