The Weekly Exchange: Session 9
Topic: Supervisory Tools and Strategies to Support Telework
Facilitators: Raysheema Rainey, Director of Member Relations & Ginger Haggerty, Senior Associate

Future Topics:
6/2: Continuation of Operations During Crisis
6/9: Strategies and Concerns for Eventually Shifting from Remote to In-Person Work

Supervising During COVID-19

Shifts made within team to maintain connection and collaboration since no longer at office together.

• Taking an online course together or reading a book together
• Coffee check-ins where you talk about non-work topics
• Happy hours at the end of the week to decompress together & support each other
• Using Microsoft Teams or other cloud/web-based programs to communicate
• All-staff meetings on a more regular basis (monthly, biweekly, etc.)

Supervisors ask what support and resources are needed.

• Transition to remote work was abrupt and difficult if there was not telework training

Create intentional space for supervisors to individually check-in with staff on emotional and mental state.

• Provide access to resources for creating a home office environment
• Work let people bring home office chairs and extra screens

Create transparent reporting space to share team and individual team members’ weekly or daily work accomplishments.

• Use cloud-based software (SharePoint, Google Docs, etc.) for people to update live
• Use project management software or color-coded calendars to see what is working and improve what is not

Challenges for Supervision during Telework

• Working with participants -– being creative to incorporate technology
• Zoom fatigue
• On-boarding new people
  • Include them in work and “fun” meetings/check-ins
  • Make sure they get all the materials needed (hand-off in parking lot, mail, be creative!)

What Changes Will Your Organization Continue to Use Moving Forward?

• Encourage use of tele-meetings with participants
• Use collaborative communication tools and software

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Referenced Resources:

• Microsoft Teams is a unified communication and collaboration platform that combines persistent workplace chat, video meetings, file storage, and application integration.
  • This page gives directions on how to send acclaim to your employees and coworkers with the Praise feature
• In the Introduction to Human-Centered Design course, you will be guided through a four-step process for designing breakthrough ideas. This creative approach to problem-solving will challenge you to get out into the real world and test your ideas so you can arrive at exciting, unexpected solutions tailored to the needs of the people you serve.
• Trauma Stewardship by Laura van Dernoot Lipsky with Connie Burk is written for anyone who is doing work with an intention to make the world more sustainable and hopeful – all in all, a better place – and who, through this work, is exposed to the hardship, pain, crisis, trauma, or suffering of other living beings or the planet itself.
• How do you cultivate braver, more daring leaders, and how do you embed the value of courage in your culture? In Dare to Lead, Brene Brown uses research, stories, and examples to answer this question in the “no-BS style” that millions of readers have come to expect and love.
• StarLeaf enables seamless collaboration through intelligently engineered, reliable meeting room systems, superior video conferencing, and secure messaging.
• Harvard’s Coronavirus Remote Work Resources page contains basic principles and best practices that support successful telework under normal conditions, and provides guidance for employees and managers to sustain effective telework now.