WLP257: Shaping Culture in a Virtual Organisation
Do look out for our special bonus episodes, rounding up recent research in the fast-moving remote work space - and today, we bring you a great conversation with a thought-leader in the leadership space:
02.16 Robert Glazer
Robert (Bob) Glazer previously joined us 2 years ago back in episode 179, talking about values driven culture - at a time when the world was very different. He is the founder and CEO of global partner marketing agency Acceleration Partners and author of Friday Forward and How To Make Virtual Teams Work, with a new book How to Thrive in the Virtual Workplace out in January; on top of all that he also hosts the Elevate podcast.
Robert’s company is fully remote and has always valued flexibility, long before the upheavals of 2020, so he is glad to see the legitimising of the remote-first approach for agencies. A concern right now though is that he knows that people often overlook the cultural aspects of remote working, and that not enough strategic decision-making and proactive conversation is taking place as companies decide about their future of work. His organisation has experienced managing flexible and remote work over the long term, but he is observing his clients and other agencies going through these shifts, as new ways of working become legitimised.
The events in 2020 have the potential to democratise organisations, and reduce hierarchies between those spread over central vs local offices, or office vs remote. But defaulting to hybrid working could be a mistake, if it’s simply what happens because of a lack of examination of values and what will truly work best for each team.
For Robert, high-performing organisational culture centres on vision, goals and targets, and values - all interdependent and interrelated with each other - and these broad elements are underpinned by clarity and consistency. These ‘big 5’ need to be exemplified from the founder on down, through living and owning them, and also making the workflow reflect the behaviours which demonstrate these qualities in action.
Robert’s Friday Forward email newsletter helps reflect and disseminate Acceleration Partners’ values and vision, bringing these to a wider audience nowadays, and also modelling a culture of learning, ownership, and growth and improvement. He tries to keep things at a very strategic and universally applicable level, but interestingly people read different things into his thoughts in reflection of their own values and contexts.
Within the agency they use tools like Tinypulse to check the mood of the team and spot any shifts or trends that surface from anonymous responses, and to ensure there’s consistency between what is being expressed openly and what people are really feeling - because culture is about what’s really going on, rather than a manifesto on a website or a wall.
Do connect via his website http://robertglazer.com/, and check out the Friday Forward book too.
Don’t forget to share your thoughts about culture, identity, and team cohesion in the online space, and do look out for our new service to help you deepen your own team’s connection and relationships - podcasting for connection. Do let us know too if we can help you and your team achieve success with our training, coaching, and facilitation services. We love your feedback - please contact us, or you can tweet Virtual Not Distant, or Pilar and Maya directly, with any of your thoughts and ideas, or if we can help you.
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