This post is by Simon Fenn from Pancentric Digital and it looks at how easy it can be for leadership teams and C Suite execs to lose touch with people within a business, or at least that can become the perception. That in itself can damage innovation, product development and progress by the company. People often need to buy into a cause to an extent, whether that’s a business, faith system or personal set of goals. Insurtech is ultimately about making new ideas workable – and practical economic propositions too.
How can insurtech brands achieve their goals and lead motivated teams? Read on here;
The more senior you are in a business, the less trusted you are. Nearly half of employees are neutral or negative about their CEO. So says a recent Institute of Internal Communication survey.
Facinating research but what a state of affairs! Teams need to trust and believe in their leaders. If the love’s not there, you’re almost certainly looking at misalignments, rifts, at worst demotivation, operational friction, reduced competitiveness.
Direct reports are more trusted
The IOIC survey reveals that employees have far more trust in their direct manager. I guess the closer you are, the more you know, the more secure you feel. A healthy 75% say they trust their direct report, which is 20% more than they trust their CEO. Trust in a direct report touches on the value of small teams, something I’m a believer in and cover in another article here.
Unpacking the trust question, the IOIC report suggests that employees fall into 4 camps, pretty much equally. If you employed 100 people you’d have 25 each of these;
- Total Trusters
- Proof Seekers
- Senior Sceptics
- All-Round Cynics
I’m yet to map the personas to my team, but perhaps we all should. Full definitions of these personas are in the IOIC report. I’m sure it’s reap what you sow. If the trust is low, the fault lies with us.
So how can we fix the problem?
#1 Authentic leadership
Don’t go all corporate on people. Be yourself. Authentic leadership is a type of management style where you act in a real, genuine and sincere way that is true to who you are as an individual. Advocates say it inspires more trust, loyalty and stronger performance from employees.
And there are academic studies to back this up.
An analysis was conducted of data collected from 214 employees working in different business sectors. The results reveal a statistically significant positive relationship between authentic leadership and employees’ workplace performance, which are both directly connected and indirectly linked through the two proposed psychosocial mechanisms. The findings thus indicate that authentic leadership reinforces workers’ emotional connection with their organisations, thereby increasing their individual creativity and, subsequently, promoting better on-the-job performance.
Not definitive, but here’s your ‘authentic leader’ checklist – thx to TechTarget for this;
- Authentic leaders are focused on delivering results, particularly in the long term.
- They are driven by the organisation’s mission and needs, and not their own ego.
- They have integrity and are guided by morals, while also displaying strong ethical traits.
- They are disciplined and committed to their own improvement and growth.
- They possess a healthy amount of and are empathetic to others’ needs.
Footnote to the authenticity point.
I thought the interview with Adrian Newey after his recent appointment as CTO of Aston Martin F1 was interesting. [I’m a bit of an F1 fan.] I’m sure Adrian has a highly competitive, steely side to him but he definitely comes across as authentic, understated, self-effacing almost. Ticks a lot of authenticity boxes. And key to his method (apparently) is going with the best ideas, not his ideas. I’d imagine that’s pretty motivating if you’re in his design team.
#2 Micro-cultures
Count up the number of managers you have in your business (those with direct reports) and that’s how many cultures you have in your business.
Bad news if your job is to push one company culture. Perhaps a multiplicity of cultures is not surprising if you reflect on the IOIC insight that far more employees trust their direct manager than their CEO. Corporatedom has always aspired to the monolithic culture but I suspect it’s never truly existed….and maybe multiple cultures are the natural way anyway.
How you frame and nurture culture, multiple or otherwise, is crucial though. Apparently a third of new workers leave their jobs within the first 90 days of being hired due to unmet expectations and culture misfit issues. The idea of micro-cultures may be the answer. Deloitte’s One size does not fit all research claims that half of execs are partial to the micro-culture principle.
50% of executives report that an organisation’s culture is most successful when there is a moderate degree of variation.
Increasingly, diverse workforces seek greater autonomy and customised work experiences – one where you compete more on agility and customer responsiveness than standardisation and top-down control.
The modern idea is to nurture a ‘culture of cultures’ to encourage diversity of thought, greater innovation, agility and tailored ways of working depending on the function.
I remember many years ago running a Client Development function where we self-organised into two sub-teams, ‘Red’ and ‘Blue’. About 3 or 4 people in each. The sub-team naming wasn’t hugely imaginative (although Blue had the extra cache of ‘Bleu’ due the French guy leading it) but it was amazing to see how two micro-cultures emerged, both gunning for a common aim (happy clients and business growth) but doing it in slightly different ways, and having fun with it – each with their own mini belief system and bells to ring when something good happened or they won a new piece of business.
The micro-cultures really worked here. And it extended into recruitment. They expanded their teams around their particular micro-culture. Newbies knew exactly what they were getting into. The Red and Blue energies and passion came across in interviews. I’d say you’re on to a good thing if you can combine micro-cultures with an authentic leadership that can lift heads and articulate an inspirational common goal.
#3 Internal communication
Improve your internal communications, and trust in leadership trust will rise.
According to the IOIC report, there’s a clear correlation;
Where employees rate internal communication as ‘good’ or ‘excellent’, their level of trust in leaders is higher. This is especially pronounced for trust in senior leaders and the CEO, where the relationship is likely more dependent on communications channels than regular personal interaction.
And don’t clam up when you have significant change going on.
The research suggests that you should proactively share your thinking when something big is coming down the line; treat people like adults, let them have their say. Be clear about the rationale for change, be honest about its impacts. Communicate early, communcate regularly.
For employees that have been through a restructure, if their experience of communication is excellent, their belief that communication is open and honest is incredibly high, at 93%. They also have high levels of trust in leadership.
For those who have been through a restructure and feel communication is poor, these scores are incredibly low.
And here at Pancentric, we’ve been doing our own research on the best and most popular internal communications tools to use. COVID ushered in some big changes here. And some staples remained the same
Video conferencing is clearly the big newcomer and the new utility. Pretty much all businesses are planning high/medium use of video conferencing for comms in 2024/2025.
In terms of structured comms channels, email continues to be a huge player, topping the usage charts pre-COVID and continuing its dominance post-COVID.
Social networking tools and intranets are significant risers with modern intranet platforms increasingly combining the two.
Over 60% are planning high to medium use of intranets, up 18% from pre-COVID times.
That said, it’s not uncommon for teams to moan about their intranet.
Our Brave New World of Work & Comms Report suggests that 77% of employees believe their intranet could contribute far more to the culture and efficient operation of their business. Part of this is going to be the tech. Part of it is going to be the strategy and the content effort you put into the tech. Technology wise 43% of businesses are sitting on old intranet platforms, so for businesses it’s high time to upgrade and re-energise the approach. The new breed of modern intranet solutions, like our HUB Intranet product, are worth checking out.
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