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We’ve probably all worked with a colleague who doesn’t pull their weight. How do you bring an employee slacking off into line?

You look away from your laptop screen and your colleague is at it again: mindlessly scrolling through Facebook for the fifth time today before their mouse lands upon a clickable link titled: ‘Here’s how my dog knows when my alarm is about to go off’. Unless your colleague is undertaking a project in animal behaviourism, there’s a very slim chance the endearing dog footage is a genuine work task.

We all spend a few minutes here and there checking Facebook, chatting to a colleague about a gripping Netflix series we just finished binge-watching, or taking a quick personal call during work hours. But there’s a point at which a short and well-deserved break enters into ‘slacking off’ territory.

Sean Wilson, CEO of Better HR, says although even the best workers have times when they slack off, this point arrives when the problematic behaviour starts to follow a similar and predictable pattern.

Another telltale sign might be if a colleague is falling behind on tasks, or the quality of their work is being compromised.

Unsurprisingly, your colleague who is watching dog videos all day is probably the same one who’s not pulling their weight on the team project, or constantly missing deadlines.

So how can you approach a coworker who is slacking off, and tell them their work ethic isn’t up to scratch without jeopardising your relationship or causing conflict in the workplace?

Wilson and Dr Allan Cohen, distinguished emeritus professor in global leadership at Babson College, share their insights and top tips.

1. Identify slacking off behaviour

First things first. Before you jump the gun and assume your coworker’s underperformance is indicative of a poor work ethic, consider other underlying causes for their behaviour.

Wilson says maintaining effective communication will enable you to delineate between an employee who is slacking off versus someone who is unsure of what’s expected of them, struggling to stay on top of their workload or not equipped with the necessary skillset.

“If you have strong relationships, you’ll find that your employees will tell you what obstacles are preventing them from performing effectively,” says Wilson. “It’s easy to say that someone is slacking off, but it could be that they’re underperforming and not aware of what you want them to do.”

As many employees are currently juggling work responsibilities and homeschooling, it’s possible they’re preoccupied with other demands right now. In the current climate of uncertainty around COVID-19, various lockdowns, and burnout rates at a worryingly high level, many employees might not have the physical or mental space to give their all to work right now and that needs to be okay.

“Maybe they have three children to juggle at the moment, so it’s difficult for them to focus on their work,” says Wilson.

He gives the example of an employee who needs to set their children up at home for school at 9am, so they might not log onto their work computer at that time.

“But in reality, what you’re not aware of is that at six o’clock in the morning when their children are still asleep, that employee might be putting in the hours then to deliver the same result.”

They might also be underperforming because their home environment isn’t conducive to productivity.

“There could be an equipment issue. Maybe they don’t have a desk at home and they’re sharing the desk with their kids, so that’s causing a lot of noise which is creating productivity problems.

“If you have conversations with people, often you can uncover these kinds of problems and identify solutions to fix them before they become a formal performance management issue.”

2. Open a dialogue

If you’ve explored the possibilities above and still come to the conclusion that your coworker’s tendency to slack off is likely due to a poor work ethic, it might be time to tackle that issue head-on.

Wilson advises doing this before making a call about whether to escalate the problem to someone more senior.

“It’s possible that an employee is dealing with personal issues at home that have nothing to do with the workplace. Going to their manager escalates it from being a genuine issue of concern about trying to fix the problem to calling out somebody else’s behaviour.

“They might have other issues on their mind that are impacting their performance, but if you tell their manager straight away, they might become very conscious that everybody else in the workplace is now looking at them, and that they’re being singled out.

“It’s about making sure those conversations are handled appropriately, and people are given opportunities to respond privately.” 

3. Work together

When approaching an employee who is slacking off, Wilson advises taking a calm and steady approach and  avoiding confrontational language.

Instead, he proposes finding a solution together by asking questions such as: ‘Is there anything I can do to help? Is there something that’s preventing you from doing your job? Is there a problem in the team that is having an impact on you?’

A productive outcome will more likely ensue with a positive and forward-looking approach, says Wilson.

“It’s not about being critical and saying, ‘You’re not carrying your weight’. Help that person to save face by being positive in your communication. The minute you criticise people, they become immediately defensive, whereas if you come from a place of genuinely trying to help people, they’re more likely to be responsive.”

Cohen concurs with this sentiment and encourages employees to “get into a posture of inquiry and exploration, rather than attack and blame” before approaching a colleague.

“Remember to treat the first conversation or two as exploration and problem-solving. Point out one or more examples, or a pattern of the difficulty and its consequences, making sure that the person understands what the ramifications have been and are. Work to get into joint problem-solving: “let’s see what we might do to prevent future problems.”

Come to an agreement about a method for keeping track of progress, says Cohen, who advises considering questions such as: Does the person prefer close monitoring or only periodic checks? How would the person prefer to be managed if deadlines or timelines are not being met? Can you express discomfort with what is desired and look for other alternatives that are mutually satisfying? 

Further strategies to create a positive and non-confrontational environment that encourages collaboration could include:

• Approach the conversation on neutral ground, such as in a small break-out area or at a coffee shop, and avoid a more confrontational set-up such as a formal board room that could lead the employee to feel worried or act defensively.
• Avoid using accusatory statements. “Talking about the impact on you and the work, the inconvenience or other negative consequences for you, and your concern about whether it is possible to help, is much more likely to reduce defensiveness than overt attacks, accusations, sarcasm, threats, and so on,” says Cohen.
• Avoid using ‘we’ statements, which could imply that you’ve been discussing the colleague’s behaviour with other people. For example, “We’ve all noticed that you spend a great deal of the morning doing non-work related tasks” might be interpreted as a group uniting against them, whereas, “I’ve observed that it takes you a number of hours to start on your work for the day” keeps the conversation strictly between you and the other person.

Take responsibility

If the employee slacking off is in your immediate team, you likely won’t have to think very deeply about how their lack of commitment is impacting your workload.

Most probably, their idleness is going to mean there’s more work piling onto your plate. Or, if you’re working on a project together and they aren’t meeting deadlines, that will probably have a negative flow-on effect to the rest of the team.

In this situation, it’s advisable to speak up sooner rather than later, in order to keep your own workload at a manageable level and stave off burnout.

But what if they’re not in your team? Then it’s not so clear cut. For instance, what if you have minimal day-to-day interaction with the underperforming employee? The fact that they check Facebook an unreasonable number of times per day might grate on you, but if you work in separate teams, have different bosses, and produce separate work, what does their slacking off have to do with you?

Probably not a whole lot.

As a general rule, Cohen advises against approaching a colleague slacking off who isn’t in your team.

The reason to avoid doing so, he says, is because organisational norms often frown on people who butt into the dynamics of teams outside their own.

“If you are skilled at raising issues and can talk with the person privately in circumstances that are not too rushed, a direct approach can be helpful,” he says. “But it has to be made in terms of explaining the impact of the work not done, a spirit of inquiry about what problems are getting in the way rather than blame, and a willingness to acknowledge that you or your team may be causing some of the problem.”

But even if an employee slacking off doesn’t directly impact your ability to do your job tasks, Wilson says it’s in everyone’s best interests to hold an employee slacking off to account.

“Putting your head in the sand and not saying when you see a problem happening feeds into the business’ potential to fail, and your job may ultimately fail.

“We all have a responsibility to help a business succeed. That’s what helps them employ people, get pay rises, and achieve success.”

You may hold the position but lack the influence. If you sit behind the boss’s desk, people may have to follow your directives, but they don’t have to show up with enthusiasm and demonstrate loyalty for the long term. Leaders, on the other hand, wield more power when and where it counts.

You’ve heard this axiom from motivational speakers and read it in books: “You don’t need a title to be a leader.” But what you do need are the communication skills to influence someone to follow you—to accept your ideas, to sign off on the proposed action, to fund the project, to encourage their network to “show up” for you.

In practical terms, here’s how those leaders distinguish themselves solely by their communication:

Leaders Build a Persuasive Case

Contrary to popular belief, persuasion, a neutral word, can be used for good or bad. You can persuade someone for noble purposes or selfish interests. When politicians, athletes, movie stars, or managers slip into crass or manipulative behavior, we boycott their events, badmouth their leadership, and say they have no class.

But when a physician persuades an obese patient to lose weight for the sake of better health and longer life, we applaud. When a parent persuades his drug-addicted nineteen-year-old to check into rehab, we support the parent’s efforts. When an engineer delivers a persuasive proposal challenging the feasibility of remodeling a building to city safety standards, we trust that her measurements are accurate and her conclusions are ironclad.

Without a doubt, leaders must know how to articulate their ideas persuasively both orally and in writing.

Leaders Synthesize and Communicate Their Reasoning

They do not force you to trudge through all the trees to convince you that you’re surrounded by a forest. That is, they have the ability to gather a lot of information (incoming emails, calls, meetings, conversations, reports, industry news) and synthesize it to draw sound conclusions.

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A common malady in our day, they do not let information paralysis set in. Instead, they have an uncanny ability to analyze, discard, and combine it to make sound decisions they can explain to others.

Leaders Guide With Apt Questions

For example, if you’re serving on an advisory board at work or in the community, you might lead the group to do some creative thinking with these questions:

• What specifically about the past attempts to solve this problem made them fail?  In what ways is the current plan under discussion different?
• If money were no object, what would you like to see happen?
• How have other industries reached similar goals?
• Six months down the line, what if membership (donors, employees) has dropped 50 percent? What would be our fallback option?

Or if you are talking with a team member (not particularly someone who reports to you), you might guide them to rethink their performance and outcomes on a marketing campaign with the following questions:

• How do you think the marketing campaign turned out?
• What did not go as well as you expected?
•  If you had to do it all over again, what would you do differently?
• May I share my observations? (After you’ve asked their permission, they can hardly refuse to listen. Here’s where you might offer suggestions for improvements.)
• When you do the next campaign, what steps are you planning to put in place to maximize the chance that X happens as you want it to?

Questions—and their answers from the other person––cause reflection, refocus, and guide in the appropriate direction.

Leaders Speak Up—Literally

Nowhere is this communication characteristic more noticeable than in a physician’s office—particularly in a large medical office or clinic with 20 to 50 staffers interacting with patients.  As a caregiver for my elderly parents during the past few years, I’ve had many occasions to talk on the phone with healthcare staffers to set appointments, ask about test results, discuss treatment options, and provide insurance and financial information.

Just by voice volume and intensity (or lack thereof)—even if the caller were speaking a foreign language—I can tell you the “status” of another person calling before they even identify themselves fully.  For example, when the cardiologist’s PA (Denise) calls, the voice is firm, clear, confident. When the cardiologist’s nurse (Teré) calls, she sounds childlike: timid, weak, uncertain.

The next time your credit card company or phone carrier fouls up and you have to call them about an issue, try this experiment: Listen to the voice and see if you can determine whether you’re talking to a follower or a leader, who will “own” and correct the problem.

To communicate like a leader means to speak up in a firm, clear, confident voice. 

Misperceptions abound. Humans are simple creatures. They can make quick judgments on little information as a way to manage complexity and simplify life. In doing so, people can come to incorrect conclusions, whether it be about your intentions or about a company product.

You can readily manage misperceptions to avoid false narratives of and stigmas on your reputation and your company’s reputation. Here are five skills to help you overcome misperceptions:

1.     Use your emotional intelligence.

If you feel something is amiss, reflect on that feeling. In having a conversation with a colleague or reporter, for example, did your stomach churn a little? Did you ask yourself, “What are they thinking?”

You have to be in tune to pick up on cues, whether it is a person’s choice of words or their tone. Don’t read into things or overanalyze things. But if you suddenly get a feeling that something is amiss, it might be worth looking into. Use your gut as a guide.

2.     Be an investigator.

Try to figure out what is amiss. To identify the source or the reason why you think something has gone awry, you have to investigate.

At what point did you start feeling things were off? Was it a word that was said? Did someone mention a name that you thought was odd in the context of your discussion? Was it a nonverbal cue to something you said?

Reflect on the moment that started to make you feel concerned that there may be a misperception. You may even have to research the Internet for something that might have been publicly shared by a news outlet or social media that could have influenced the other person.

Gather information, and think about the situation contextually and holistically to get to the bottom of the misperception.

3.     Be savvy, and respond strategically.

If you have thoroughly conducted your research to understand why there may be a misperception, you have the tools to address the misperception.

There are times when you may have to be direct with your response. You may have to say verbally or in writing, “There seems to be a misunderstanding of…” and then communicate the accurate position. There are times when you do not have to be so direct. To address the misunderstanding, respond by shifting your focus or using particular language that addresses the misperception.

Communicate the facts and start overcoming the misperception. Correcting misperceptions takes time. It may not happen instantly. It can take repeated attempts to ensure accurate perception. Think of it like marketing or branding. Brands, whether it is your personal brand or your company’s brand, take years to build and minutes to destroy. You have to take marketing-like steps to rebuild and regain public trust.

If you are working in an emerging space where widespread trust has yet to take hold, you have the opportunity to shape the field’s reputation. Handling something new, in particular, generates misperceptions. What you don’t know can cause fear and judgment. Be aware of how people are perceiving new ideas to futureproof and sustain the new area.

4.     Educate.

Your response should take an educational tone, not a defensive tone. Your ability to communicate hinges on your ability to clearly explain and simplify concepts. Maybe the misperception exists because what was being projected was (unnecessarily) complicated.

5.     Influence.

If you take an educational tone with your response, you avoid being accusatory. If you want to overcome misperceptions, you have to react with an approachable response to be able to influence the other party to believe in what you want them to believe.

You need to be respectful. You need to be factual. You need to show that you hear and understand the other party. With a disarming approach, you allow the other party to open up and listen to what you have to say. When people listen to you, they have the ability to believe you.

To navigate misperceptions, you need to have emotional intelligence and the skills to investigate, strategically respond, educate and influence. Develop these skills to curtail myths, and ensure the facts are communicated to the best of your ability.

Other than making some people feel miserable, the winter blues can seriously impact work performance. Here’s how you can help employees combat it.

Welcome to winter – the time of year when all we really want to do is eat, sleep and repeat, just like a hibernating bear. It’s not uncommon for people to experience a dip in their mental health during the colder months. For people who already live with mental illnesses, winter can exacerbate some of the usual symptoms. However, for some usually mentally healthy people, winter can create feelings of melancholy, despondency and dampened motivation. 

What makes these feelings extra difficult to manage is that life and work must go on even though those sluggish feelings won’t budge. 

 You’ve probably heard of the term ‘seasonal affective disorder’ (SAD) before. It’s a form of clinical depression described in the Diagnostic Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5) as ‘Major Depressive Disorder with Seasonal Pattern’. While this is likely more prominent countries that face gruelling, icy winters, roughly one in 300 Australians experience it.

While SAD might not be overwhelmingly prominent in Australia, Dr Nick Titov, psychology professor at Macquarie University and executive director of Mindspot, says many people still experience what he calls the ‘winter blues’.

“Wintertime means we can’t do things which we would normally do, and, as a consequence, we often find that our habits and routines change,” says Titov. “So the things which bring us joy and keep us stimulated and engaged, we may not be doing too much. Because of this, we often feel that we’re in a rut or that we’re running on a treadmill.”

SAD vs the winter blues

While the winter blues might not be an official diagnosed mental health condition, we shouldn’t discount the impact that something like this can have on a cohort of employees.

According to a 2015 survey by McCrindle, 35 per cent of employees experience reduced motivation at work during winter and 27 per cent said their productivity/effectiveness was reduced. 

Unsurprisingly, the tendency to oversleep, overeat and socialise less also peak during winter.

Combine this natural seasonal decline in motivation with our 2021 reality and you have a potential cocktail of misery. 

 “Routines and habits are important for many people,” says Titov. “When people are living in a place where there’s a lot more uncertainty, combined with restrictions to our ability to go out and exercise or have friends around, that is certainly going to compound our poor moods.”

Considering the winter blues affect us every year, do employers have a responsibility to address it? Or should they accept it as a natural cycle that some employees need to move through?

 “I’m not sure if they have a professional responsibility [to address it],” says Titov. “But as leaders, we have ethical responsibilities.

 “We want the people we employ to be as well adjusted, productive and happy as possible. This is going to lead to better workforce retention and engagement. I think there’s enormous benefits for us, as employers, to engage the team and support them to look after themselves.”

There are a few ways employers can go about doing this, as HRM outlines below.

Trimming to-do lists

When employees feel sluggish and unmotivated it’s not surprising that they might start falling behind on their to-do list or missing deadlines. 

“You can really notice if an employee is experiencing winter blues when their work starts to suffer,” says Therese Ravell, director at Impact HR. “Often you can look at their KPIs or performance from last year and see exactly the same problem.”

“That’s when you know there’s a pattern that you need to address.”

 This is when you should reevaluate their workload. Or as Ravell says, “check what’s in their suitcase”.

“I like to use the suitcase analogy because if you overload your suitcase at the airport, you’re going to have to pull something out in front of everyone in the check-in line, which can be really embarrassing, or your suitcase is going to bust.”

What she means by this is that when you’re not operating at your 100 per cent, and you overload yourself, you’re more likely to drop the ball in front of others or push yourself to breaking point.

 “We don’t want either of these things.”

Instead, pack your day like you would a suitcase. Put the big things in first – such as the tasks you have to get done – then fill in the gaps with the smaller things that require less time, such as administrative work. 

Also don’t be afraid to take a critical look at what you’re packing. 

“You don’t need a ski jacket for a beach holiday. Reevaluate what you need and what can be put aside,” says Ravell.

Assisting an employee to trim their to-do list can help them feel more in control of their time. It will also reduce the likelihood of feeling overwhelmed with the tasks they need to complete. 

Salute to the sun

Our bodies produce a hormone called melatonin that makes us feel drowsy and helps us sleep. 

In winter, with the shorter days, our melatonin production is often out of whack with our routine. Sometimes this means our bodies are still producing melatonin in the morning when we’re trying to get ready for the day, leading us to feel sluggish and unmotivated.

The natural remedy to this is light.

In the workplace, make sure blinds are open so plenty of sunlight can pour in. If it tends to be dark in your workplace, lamps and overhead lights are a fine alternative. 

There are plenty of light therapy lamps that claim to treat SAD, but these should only be used with the guidance of a medical professional.

In a remote environment, keeping an eye on light levels can be more difficult. In this case, Ravell suggests braving the cold and having outdoor virtual meetings.

“If I’m on a video call with an employee and I can see it’s very dark where they are [i.e. they might be sitting in a dark room], I’ll often ask if they have a balcony or deck where they can sit and soak up the sun while we talk,” she says.

We should also fight the urge to make every meeting a video call, Ravell suggests, as a traditional phone call gives the person the option to leave their workspace, go for a walk and find some sunlight. 

Make sure leaders are setting the example, says Ravell, adding that she took the call for this interview from her deck to soak in the rays.

“So the things which bring us joy and keep us stimulated and engaged, we may not be doing too much. Because of this we often feel that we’re in a rut or that we’re running on a treadmill.”  – Dr Nick Titov, Macquarie University.

Stay healthy

Mental health is very closely related to physical health, so it’s important to remind staff to stay active.

“I encourage staff to move away from their desks and go for walks, [especially] in lockdown, says Ravell.

She also encourages employees to create daily step goals that they share via their internal message platform. 

“We encourage employees to go for a 30-minute walk and when they come back they can share on Slack if they met their goal or not. This means they’re getting time outside away from the computer and doing some physical activity.”

Of course, getting moving is just one aspect of staying healthy. Good sleep health is also important. 

With our oversupply of melatonin production, our sleep can become disrupted. People experiencing SAD often also suffer sleep problems. This can include insomnia, restless sleep and nightmares. 

Employers can help by encouraging employees to disconnect, suggests Titov. Make sure employees log off on time and shut off from work altogether at the end of the day – that means no late night email checking.

Have a break

At this time of year, many people would usually take off for warmer climates, but with state and national borders closed, that’s nearly impossible for most employees. 

However, this doesn’t mean employees shouldn’t consider taking a break. If done properly, time off can be helpful for an employee’s mental health and motivation levels. 

“If work becomes tiring and employees are losing momentum then that’s a signal that they need to take a break and recover,” says Titov.

A staycation can still provide benefits, he adds. One of his team members, who usually travels this time of year, instead took time off to do renovations around their house.

“[That person got] a lot of joy and satisfaction from doing that. It may not be the same as a holiday, but it’s still going to give them quite a lot of benefits.”

Employers can help by actively encouraging employees to take time off where appropriate. Also, ensure employees are aware of your organisation’s leave policies and how they can apply for it. 

It’s important to remind employees to be kind to themselves if they are experiencing SAD or the winter blues. Poor mental health can make your brain feel fuzzy and slow. Until the issue is resolved, they’re unlikely to be at their peak performance level, so managers and colleagues needs to be prepared to support them through that.

On the bright side, before you know it , spring will roll around and encourage a warmer, sunnier disposition. 

Zoom fatigue is real.

According to researchers at the Stanford Virtual Human Interaction Lab, all that time you’re spending on Zoom or video calls is wearing you out at a much quicker rate than traditional face-to-face meetings.

Jeremy Bailenson and his team of researchers found four key reasons for Zoom fatigue:

1. Excessive amounts of close-up eye contact

Unlike in traditional face-to-face meetings, on video calls everyone is looking at everyone all of the time, and typically at a closer eye-to-eye distance, given how close people tend to sit to their screens. This presents us with a much more intense cognitive experience.

2. Seeing yourself on camera is fatiguing

Imagine someone was following you around all day with a mirror. That’s essentially what it’s like on video calls — we tend to spend too much time focusing on our appearance instead of the speaker, and for the more self-conscious among us, it can become incredibly taxing mentally.

3. Video calls dramatically reduce our usual mobility

Whereas phone calls allow us to ‘walk n talk’, most video calls demand that we sit still, in one location, and plan our day around our video calls.

4. Cognitive load is higher in video calls

The typical non-verbal cues we pick up on in traditional face-to-face communication are not as obvious when it comes to video calls. Our brains need to work overtime to both send and receive non-verbal signals.

Solutions to Zoom Fatigue

Fortunately, there are several quick fixes to the abovementioned challenges.

1. Get out of full-screen mode and sit further back from your screen.
2. Hide self-view.
3. Use audio-only calls instead where sufficient (WhatsApp or good old fashioned phone calls might suffice here)
4. Turn away from the screen from time to time during video calls.
5. Don’t have a meeting if you don’t really need to 

When it comes to remote work, most organisations are still at level 2 in the 5 levels of remote work.

Many are simply recreating the traditional office online, along with all of its shortcomings — back-to-back meetings and email overload.

Learning when to use video calls and when not to use video calls will go a long way to getting them further up the pyramid, because let’s face it, life’s too short to spend entire days in back-to-back Zoom calls, and most meetings don’t need to happen.

It’s a good time to be a graphic design graduate in Australia, according to professional networking platform LinkedIn, which says the discipline recorded the fastest-growing number of entry-level job listings over early 2021.

In a new report, LinkedIn states the number of entry-level job listings for graphic designers grew by a larger margin than any other profession in the first quarter of 2021 compared to the first quarter of 2020.

The Australian job market’s appetite for design graduates speaks to a digital transformation accelerated by the coronavirus pandemic, said Matt Tindale, country manager for LinkedIn Australia & New Zealand.

Retailers transitioning to e-commerce have sought out graphic designers to package their digital offerings, Tindale told Business Insider Australia, with subscription services and software as a service firms also seeking visual solutions for online markets.

“I think it’s very much aligned to the macro growth,” he said. “We’re seeing the shift in sectors that are much more related to the digital transformation of the economy generally: digital content creation, marketing, and therefore graphic designing.”

The next fastest-growing category of entry level job listing: teachers, followed by sales workers, product managers, and electricians.

LinkedIn said improved opportunities for graduates in those fields contributed to April’s hiring rate increasing more than 116% on a year-on-year basis.

The pandemic has also influenced how those graduates can expect to work. The number of job listings for remote working positions has increased 14-fold since January 2020, Tindale said, with “real desire” for flexibility “trickling down to the graduate postings at the same time.”

And would-be employees are increasingly saying that flexibility is a precondition for their employment.

“We think globally the request for remote working and flexible working conditions is progressing markedly,” Tindale said. “That is just absolutely happening.”

The equation works both ways, too. Many employers have been forced to look further afield due to skills shortages, borne of international border closures and other long-running gaps in Australia’s skills mix.

“So it’s from an employee demand perspective — a lot of people wanting more flexibility, the ability to work from home or remotely outside of major cities — but also as a consequence of sometimes skills or labour shortages, and companies having to go outside of the traditional large cities,” Tindale said.

The overall hiring data comports with the findings of dedicated job listing platforms Seek and Indeed, both of which reported massive spikes in job listings over April as Australia’s economic recovery from COVID-19 started to pick up speed.

Those findings run parallel to the unemployment rate, which has fallen to 5.1% faster than most economists predicted at the height of 2020’s widespread lockdowns.

LinkedIn says the industries which reported the highest number of job listings between January and March this year were Software and IT services, followed by construction, corporate services, manufacturing, and healthcare.

An additional 50,000 full-time jobs drove the unemployment rate to 4.9 per cent in June, its lowest level in more than a decade, but Sydney’s prolonged lockdown is expected to slow the eight-month hiring spree.

Total hours worked were dragged lower by Victoria’s recent two-week lockdown, but employment remained resilient, recording only a slight decline as employers chose to keep workers on the books.

Unemployment was 0.4 percentage points lower than at the end of March when the $90 billion JobKeeper wage subsidy expired, and 2.5 points below the peak of the coronavirus pandemic a year ago.

The latest result comes after more than 115,000 people found work in May.

“With the June labour force survey pre-dating the current COVID outbreaks it has further confirmed the strength in the economic recovery,” BIS Oxford Economics chief economist Sarah Hunter said.

To create a company that experiences consistent growth, you'll need to duplicate your efforts and drive forward to build the business. As a performance-focused leader, you understand that you can't wear all the hats on the org chart if you're going to experience exponential growth.

When you can cultivate a high-performance team that's engaged, it creates systems that intentionally grow businesses.

Building this high-performance team allows you to be the business leader, and not always working in the business. High-performance-focused executive leaders foster a healthy corporate culture and give their team everything it needs to help build the company.

Here are three practical ways any executive leader can cultivate high performance, build an independent team and leverage growth strategies to build any company effectively. 

Related: What Cultivating a High-Performance Company Culture Means to 8 Business Leaders

1. Give your team all the training and support it needs to understand growth. 

One of the best investments any company can make is in the training and education it provides for its team. The more your team understands growth and areas of improvement, the more they can implement training that helps build a business.

Employee education is an underutilized area of growth. The good news is that you can give your employees education and training through digital means. You can create courses, use an internal podcast, and have private videos on a wide range of topics that give your employees the tools they need to succeed. This training helps build your company.

One intelligent and modern strategy is creating a library of training content and educational support that helps employees understand the vision of your company and the way to be successful at their jobs.

Investing in outside training from professionals is a great way to jumpstart this process. It could be you turning on zoom and documenting various areas relevant to your employee's growth. It also means every member of the executive team is consistently training themselves.

Use today's tool and access to the Internet to create a network of training that's easily accessible to employees and that gives them all the tools and strategies they need to become successful.

2. Hire based on where your company is going — not where it's at currently. 

The natural inclination is to hire team members and employees based on your company's growth trajectory. A high performance-focused strategy is hiring based on where your company is going.

The goal is growth, and to grow, you'll need to put the systems and team members in place that could foster change at the next levels. You need a future vision when creating a strategic plan that leads to the building of any company.

When you're hiring, think about what your needs will be going forward. Look for team members that are self-motivated and hungry to be the best at their jobs. Look for employees that have already demonstrated their ability to foster growth. 

If a team member isn't working out, you can't be afraid to make the hard decisions or make decisions from a place of scarcity. There are great self-motivated and high-performance-focused employees that will ultimately help your company grow.

Related: 4 Ways Market Leaders Use Innovation to Foster Business Growth

3. Be intentional about leading through consistency. 

One of the best forms of leadership is modeling the behaviors you are seeking to instill. Your team will learn from what they see, not what you tell them. A high-performance focused leader leads by example.

If you're going to foster and cultivate a team committed to your company's growth, you must be intentional about your consistent growth. You have to continue to educate yourself and be committed to being a student of your craft.

Create routines and schedules that help you grow as a person and as a leader. Invest in your education and then any necessary outside professionals that help you understand how to be better at what you do. Make decisions from a place of authority, and be clear about your boundaries. Don't let outside circumstances and other people's agendas dictate how you spend your time and the ways you invest in your growth.

It's a great time to build the kind of team that helps your company grow. The digital information age has created opportunities for growth and the ability to cultivate a team that's focused on high performance.

Use these three strategies to build a self-motivated team committed to self-education, and all of this ultimately helps the bottom line of a company. Be the example of what high-performance looks like, and your team will follow.

In recent meetings with clients, I have experienced the despair that many CEOs or Human Resources directors experience because they feel that they cannot understand millennials , they express that it is impossible for them to work with us, that “neither we know what we want, how do they are they going to know? "

First, I want to clarify, I feel that it is condescending to speak of millennials in a general way. According to classic definitions "a millennial is someone born between 1980 and 2000", and trying to put all the people who were born in the last two decades of the 20th century in a single definition I think is not very correct and functional for companies. But popular culture has been in charge of creating this label and as such, many of us are systematically described and dismissed as: "it's that it's millennial."

For practical purposes, what do we of this generation want from a job? Apparently it is a real enigma for human resources departments , thousands of complaints: "they are not satisfied with anything", "they want to be paid as bosses, when they have no experience", "they are not willing to start from the bottom", "they change working all the time ”,“ they are the crystal generation, they can't take anything ”.

Is all that so different from what a Boomer, someone from Generation X wants? What are we looking for? Why don't we adapt to the work system of companies? The reality is that like the rest of the generations we want to have jobs with purpose, that give us a reason to get up every morning and learn something every day, that give us the way to change, in addition to the fact that we cannot stand dictatorial bosses.

Some companies, for example Google or Facebook, have decided to make their offices more fun places, including snack bars , and ping pong tables in the meeting rooms. Sometimes when I enter those places I feel that I am in a kindergarten more than in an office. But is it what I want? Treat me like a child, with padded floors and bold colors? Having nice offices helps, but we know that a job is much more than that.

What we want are stable jobs (more after the pandemic ). In a study presented by Hays on the workers of Mexico 2020, it is said that 46% of workers want job security, that is, a company that shows that it wants them there working, that is willing to pay talent well, but also that Invest in training your people for better teams. That is, let us know that they want us there.

It is true, in my current work team, in a tech startup dedicated to Artificial Intelligence I lead a team of 15 people, of which only 3 people are over 30, the rest are in our 20. What common denominator exists in all of them?

Millennials, like any other employee, want to feel like a useful person on our teams and receive clear and defined direction. As leaders, we must learn to ask for things, be orderly by delegating, and constantly communicate goals.

I have had to learn this, be consistent, sure of myself and our direction. Although at the same time showing my vulnerability and authenticity, I do not know everything, because we are opening a new horizon, I do not know because nobody else knows it, but I trust my people and our capacities.

We want to feel part of something more important than ourselves. Yes, gentlemen, we are the generation that was born knowing that we are a tiny grain of sand in the infinity of space, we know that our existence is the blink of an eye in cosmic temporality, that is why we want to make that opening of an eye count, and We know that to do so we must join with others, expand our networks, form collaborative teams, be open to external contributions and criticism.

That is why the need to belong to companies that are making a change in society as we know it, in our case: using artificial intelligence to optimize recruitment processes, promoting the use of talent, encouraging active people to be in place where they will be able to develop more and better and in less time to enjoy the world.

The gregarious, larger-than-life leadership mould needs to be challenged, says New York Times best-selling author Susan Cain. It’s time we elevated quiet leaders.

Standing on that iconic red dot, lights blaring down with a crowd of hundreds staring on in anticipation, Susan Cain was well and truly outside of her comfort zone. 

She had just spent seven years researching and writing her book, ‘Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking’. As a self-proclaimed introvert, the idea of years spent in her own company working on a passion project was pure bliss.

The irony, of course, is that when you write a best-selling book about being quiet and sell over two million copies world-wide, you have to be the opposite of quiet about it. Promotion tours, interviews and, if you’re lucky (or unlucky, depending how you view it), Ted Talks become part and parcel of your day-to-day life.

As Cain was preparing to deliver hers on the power of introverts, she recalls feeling “quite terrified”.

“Even very seasoned public speakers, people who are never scared of it the way I was, freak out a little bit about Ted. You’re on that red circle all by yourself [and] it can feel like an intimidating setup. A lot of those people who might seem very calm really aren’t when you see them backstage.”

After her Ted Talk – which has since amassed over 28 million views – the floodgates opened and Cain was well and truly thrust into the public spotlight. In the nine years since then, she’s become “perfectly fine” with public speaking – she’s desensitised to it now.

Now a seasoned public speaker, Cain will be sharing her message about harnessing the strength of introverts and quiet employees at AHRI’s Convention TRANSFORM 2021 in August.

Understanding the difference

Perhaps the most common misconception about this topic is that introversion and shyness are inextricably linked. The idea that all introverts are terrified of social interaction or lack self-confidence simply isn’t true. You can be a shy introvert; you can be a shy extrovert. It’s all about where you derive your energy from.

“Introversion is about the preference for quieter, mellower environments and for getting your energy through solitude, interactions with smaller groups of people, or work that you love to do,” says Cain. 

The two are often conflated because “there’s a shared bias in our society against both traits”, says Cain.

In saying this, a lot of Cain’s work also focuses on those who are shy because she thinks our workplaces also need to do a better job of catering to shy folk. So while shyness and introversion sometimes overlap, it’s important we view them as separate personality traits.

A good way to think of it is like this: you might be someone who thrives in a professional networking setting. You’re working the room, socialising up a storm. You’re confident conversing with your peers and rubbing shoulders with the bigwigs, but when it’s all over, all you want to do is head home and curl up on the couch for the weekend. In this case, you might be a confident introvert. 

Extroverts, on the other hand, are more likely to want to continue chasing the rush they feel from surrounding themselves with others – they might head out to the after-work drinks following the event, or pack their schedules to the brim with social events that weekend.

“Introverted leaders, if they’re managing proactive employees, are more likely to solicit the ideas of those employees and run with them, as opposed to an extroverted leader, who will… [put] their own stamp on things.” – Susan Cain, author of Quiet.

Next, it’s important to understand that most people will sit along the spectrum of what experts call “the north and south of temperament” – people aren’t purely extroverted or introverted and some are ambiverts, placed squarely in the middle.

It’s also important to acknowledge that being introverted isn’t a choice – it’s actually hardwired into our neurobiology, Cain explains. Introverts have a more reactive nervous system and are more sensitive to the various stimuli they’re exposed to, she says, whereas extroverts’ nervous systems are less reactive.

Embracing quiet leaders

There are plenty of reasons to embrace introverts as leaders, says Cain. They are thought to be highly creative, great at observing social behaviours and effective at leading others.

In the era of remote work, introverted leaders could become even more of an asset, Cain posits. For example, things they might have been less comfortable doing in the physical workspace, such as presenting to a large group of people, become easier when you’re dialing in from the comfort of your own home.

Many introverts also prefer to lead smaller groups, rather than “being the one who infuses a bolt of energy into the group when they enter the room”. We know that establishing connections in a remote workplace can be difficult, so having someone at the helm who understands the importance of being intentional with your actions and values one-on-one time can make all the difference.

“I think of somebody like Douglas Conant as an example. He was the CEO at Campbell’s Soup for a long time [until 2011]. He’s very shy and very introverted. He used to find out who the employees were who had really been contributing and would then send them personal letters of thanks and appreciation.

“Those letters meant so much to people. He was often writing them while he was commuting to work, so it wasn’t as [emotionally] taxing for him [as in-person meetings], but he still could show how much he cares.”

Research has also found introverts are better leaders “in a dynamic, unpredictable environment”. This is especially true when they are paired with proactive team members.

“Introverted leaders often deliver better outcomes than extroverted leaders do,” says Cain. “One reason for this is that introverted leaders, if they’re managing proactive employees, are more likely to solicit the ideas of those employees and run with them, as opposed to an extroverted leader, who will, by virtue of having a more dominant or irrepressible personality, be putting their own stamp on things.”

Cain clarifies that not all extroverted leaders will do this, and most will theoretically be open to elevating other people’s ideas. It’s just that introverts tend to give more space to other people’s point of views. They’re not in the spotlight because they want to be but because they have something important to say.

Changing mindsets

It can be difficult to rise in the ranks as a softly spoken employee. In her book, Cain points to research which shows that larger-than-life, gregarious types are thought of as more likeable and competent in their roles, whereas their quieter counterparts are often described using negative descriptions such as being “ungainly” or “having skin problems”, a reflection of the archetypal ‘school nerd or shy kid’ we’re fed through popular culture since childhood.

Changing these perceptions begins at the hiring stage, says Cain. 

Instead of assessing candidates for their abilities to think quickly and on the spot, she suggests giving them an idea of the questions you’d like to ask ahead of the interview so they can prepare – unless these skills are an inherent requirement of the role.

“Also, [do] additions for job interviews, where they’re actually performing the role in question, as opposed to sitting around and chatting, which we know doesn’t really work anyway.” 

We also need to get the message out there to those who wield the power that introverts are often passed over for leadership opportunities for reasons that have nothing to do with their competency levels. 

“I always say that every manager should think of one person they know in the company who is very dedicated and talented – [someone] who’s not a so-called ‘natural leader’? Could you sit down with that person and find out what their true ambitions are – what their true goals are? What could you do to help that person along the way? And a lot of the time, it’s small tweaks, like making sure they have a little bit of extra visibility in a meeting… so next time you might give them something to lead in a meeting.”

The person might need a little training, she adds, such as enrolling them in a public speaking training, but investing in great talent almost always pays you back tenfold. Cain is the perfect example of how far you can get with a little bit of practice: from a phobia to the Ted stage.

Not only do we need to cater to introverts in the recruitment and succession process, we also need to design work to better accommodate them.

“It’s really important to have spaces where there’s a mix of social and quiet, private space that people can move freely back and forth between as they wish.

“It starts with the physical, but then it also goes to how we structure the actual work day. We could structure it so there are times of the day when there’s going to be team meetings and conference calls… but other times are reserved for quiet and reflective ‘head down’ work.

“Putting those kinds of structures in place has a practical effect, but it also has the emotional effect of sending out the signal that we’re making space for all our different styles.”

The history of the extrovert

So how did the loud, gregarious leadership archetype first come about?

“When I first started researching my book, I wanted to figure out if the human preference for extroversion was evolutionary or cultural. I found a lot of evidence for the cultural argument.”

Back in the 19th Century, in the western world, the preference for extroversion was much less pronounced as we lived in what historians refer to as ‘the culture of character’.

“That was a situation where people were living in small towns with people they knew well, so they judged each other more on the content of their character,” says Cain.

“But what happened in the 20th century, as we left our small towns and moved out to big cities where people didn’t know each other, [was that] the impression you were making on others became much more important.”

This is when we entered the culture of personality.

“If you look at the self help books from the 19th century compared to the 20th century, the 19th century ones use words like ‘honour’, ‘integrity’ and ‘character’. And then the 20th century self help books are more about ‘magnetism’, ‘charisma’ and likeability.

“We just started to cultivate the reverence for the larger-than-life personality. So somebody who was an introvert and quieter [or] more reflective, you know, just didn’t fit that bill.”

While this personality type has dominated at the top of the org chart for decades now, Cain says things are starting to change.

Shifting the dial

When Cain first wrote her book, she hoped it would be like the early literature on feminism – one person puts their opinion out there and a movement is born. And that’s what she’s starting to see.

“In the last ten years, there has been much more of a focus [on this topic] – people actually want to call themselves an introvert,” says Cain. “A friend of mine teaches at Harvard Business School and she used to give a personality test as part of her leadership course. She said in the old days no one would admit to being an introvert. They would answer the test questions in such a way that it would mark them as an extrovert. [But] that doesn’t happen anymore.”

Considering our workplaces are a tapestry of personality types, it’s encouraging to see an array of personality types are having their time in the sun. It seems we’re moving away from the cookie-cutter leadership mould and learning to not only embrace different temperaments, but design work in a way that allows each group to flourish.