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"Keeping employees connected to the organization: While travel may not be as important for the remote worker, bringing a team together quarterly for an in-person meeting seems to be a big perk, and definitely helps the employee see the organization as a larger group and how they fit into that organization."
As part of our series about the five things you need to successfully manage a remote team, I had the pleasure of interviewing Deborah McGee.
Deborah E. McGee (deborahemcgee.com/) is the founder and CEO of PZI Group, which provides international human capital solutions ranging from international employment setup to payroll in multiple currencies, domestic and international relocation solutions, decision-making for global employee information, and other related human resources services. The author of The Leadership Attitude: Inspiring Success through Authenticity and Passion, she is recognized as an HR innovator and an authority on human capital optimization, international leadership, and driving organizational effectiveness across borders. Before starting PZI Group, McGee spent 13 years as a consultant with Big Four global accounting firms, then a decade in international human resources and global mobility management roles within corporate headquarters of European and Asian-owned companies.
Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we dig in, our readers would love to get to know you a bit better. What is your “backstory”?
My backstory is quite varied. I started my career in the 1990s, as an accountant with the Big 4 Accounting Firms. I was set on making partner, laser-focused. But the world changed after 2001, not just because of 9–11, but in business Enron happened, and that changed my trajectory for a career. Accounting would no longer be about strategy and “out of the box” thinking, but because of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002, accounting would be about audit and tax…only. That was not my long-range vision, so I completely switched careers and went into human resources, actually international HR. A field that still to this day doesn’t get a lot of attention in academia and in my academic career got no attention. The skill set was learned through experience working at global firms, seeing the day-to-day of how global corporate decisions would affect the talent within the organization, and finding the best way to keep that ROI on talent on a global scale.
On the personal side, because I am a retired military spouse spanning 31 years of service as well, with 22 moves across states and countries, I can personally identify with employees trying to manage that personal and professional lifestyle. Not having to uproot and move their families due to the availability of remote work, since I had to do the opposite all those years, is a huge benefit. Not having to change jobs every couple of years, reinvent oneself and “sell” the skills you have because of a new location is a big plus to an employee, and to an organization. Not losing a talent due to a change in location is a big game changer for organizations and their talent war.
My last corporate role before starting my own corporation (a decade ago) was managing an internal team of 16 global employees across four different regions in the world, with travel and video conferencing.
Can you share the most interesting story that happened to you since you started your career?
Shortly after my career change into HR, when I was working for Lafarge North America (a company that doesn’t even exist any longer but was the largest cement and construction materials company in the world at the time), I got my first internal taste of what happens to organizations during mergers and acquisitions. This organization was the U.S. subsidiary of a 100-year-old organization out of Paris, France. The organization was cash-rich but was only 46% owned by the parent organization in France. It was on the NYSE and was 54% publicly traded.
Over the prior 20 years, every time a foreign national executive (usually French) took an assignment in the U.S., they were given stock options in the U.S. company as part of the compensation package. This meant there were literally thousands of shares of stocks held by individuals from all over the world. Since I had been a tax accountant and knew expatriate taxation and how that was going to be taxed in the U.S. as well as other countries when those shares became exercised, the company knew I was the perfect person to start tracking down all of those outstanding shares, in the shadow of what they suspected was going to be an acquisition of the U.S. organization down the road. That project took over six months to complete, research and document, track down individuals and work records (not the best technology back then), to determine the value of their stock and what amounts would be taxable in what countries, should those stocks become exercised.
When the final decision came down, that in fact the U.S. organization would be bought out by the parent, delisted from the NYSE and all shares in Lafarge North America liquidated, we were ready. We liquidated $150 million in stock shares, withheld and paid taxes on those shares in 30 countries. This was all accomplished in three days. Looking back on that transaction, I still am not sure how we were able to accomplish that feat, but a lot of great colleagues, collaboration, and cooperation across many global divisions to achieve a common goal was apparent in making sure that the regulations were followed, the organization kept compliant and, most importantly, the people were taken care of. One of my execs that I indirectly supported at the time took his payout, retired, and bought a yacht. He named it appropriately, “Last LAF.” LAF was the NYSE name of the shares.
Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?
When I started my career, I was a staff auditor with Arthur Andersen (another firm that doesn’t exist any longer). I was working for a client (Resolution Trust Corporation). The RTC had been formed to audit the failed savings and loan banking debacle in the country in the late 80s/early 90s. I remember talking to a senior accountant who was requiring me to sign my name to write-offs that had to be documented. Here I was, brand new to the field, and I was signing my name to $33M in write-offs. When I asked her, was she sure this was what we were supposed to do, it felt odd and I didn’t think I had that kind of authority, she confirmed to me by saying: “You have the degree and you have the job, now you have the responsibility.”
What I learned from that and took with me all these years later is the importance of your signature. That will last forever, so be sure you read and understand everything you sign your name to.
What advice would you give to other business leaders to help their employees to thrive and avoid burnout?
Remote work is not going away, and it’s been around for decades. It’s just changed over the years, from “taking work home” or “keeping your pager on day and night” to a more formalized, “This is your place of work.” I think for organizational leaders it is important that we take time and talk with our group leaders and our employees, to help them set boundaries. As a leader, we want what we want, when we want it. But often we don’t verbalize this or give enough notice to our employees to help them have time to obtain the needed documentation that we require. I would remind leaders to take the time each month to have those meetings, even a phone call with your groups.
Help them have fun, especially remote workers who need to feel connected to the organization and not on the sidelines. They need to know from their leaders that they are seen and not forgotten, because they don’t get the face time with you that others that are near you do. We schedule “non-meeting” meetings with our group and make sure we are including those remote individuals in those activities as well. When we did “How to grow Begonias” at the start of spring, we sent bulbs to each of our remote employees so they could participate in the event, via videocam.
Ok, let’s jump to the core of our interview. Some companies have many years of experience with managing a remote team. Others have just started this, due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Can you tell us how many years of experience you have managing remote teams?
I’ve been managing remote teams since 2004, so 20 years. When I was the Comp/Ben/Mobility Manager at Lafarge North America, I was located at HQ in Virginia, but my entire team was in Southfield, Mich. at our Shared Service Center (SSC). I spent a lot of time on planes, phone calls and emails, as videocam was not that prevalent 20 years ago.
Managing a team remotely can be very different than managing a team that is in front of you. Can you articulate for our readers what the five main challenges are regarding managing a remote team? Can you give a story or example for each?
Keeping remote employees motivated: Remote employees are no different than in-person employees. Some are “workaholics” and some are “time-punchers.” I insist on “on-camera” meetings. It’s important for them to see me and for me to see them.
Understanding what the workload is for a remote employee: When you don’t see what a person is working on, it’s hard to know how large their workload is; are they over or underutilized?
Building skill sets for remote employees: With an in-person employee, it is often easier to “shadow” them and help them understand their new workload and the skill sets needed. I’ve found that most of my employees thrive without being shadowed. This does require a lot of check-ins from their supervisors who need to review, correct, and redirect their workload. Micro-managing is very difficult to do remotely, so that is a positive for many skill set today.
Keeping employees connected to the organization: While travel may not be as important for the remote worker, bringing a team together quarterly for an in-person meeting seems to be a big perk, and definitely helps the employee see the organization as a larger group and how they fit into that organization.
Looking at the remote worker the same as the in-person worker: In my book, The Leadership Attitude, I talk about one such incident, where a mass layoff was happening inside the U.S., but the organization forgot about how this would affect the remote expatriate workers that were told they were coming back to their job at that location two years later. The job wasn’t going to be there, the supervisor they had before would be gone, and how did they stay connected to their home organization while serving the organization abroad?
Today’s environment has taken this concept to new heights, as the COVID pandemic changed how work would look. Not everyone has embraced the new remote/office hybrid. Our organization has and is growing and becoming stronger because of that change in our leadership’s mentality.
Based on your experience, what can one do to address or redress each of those challenges?
Keeping remote employees motivated: Whether organizations are small or big, there must be small groups within the groups. This helps to keep the flow of information going up and down.
Understanding what the workload is for a remote employee: I’m a big believer in sharing the workload within a group. It builds camaraderie and it also helps to cross-train. This is harder with remote workers, so we utilize tools such as Scribe and recorded video training.
Building skill sets for remote employees: Letting go of “how I want it done” and embracing many different ways to get the job done will help managers with this change.
Keeping employees connected to the organization: While I personally am not a big fan of meetings, with a remote work force this has become a much more needed part of work. But make those meetings matter. Have set agendas, and don’t waste people’s time. Taking the time to have those one-on-one conversations that used to happen around the coffee pot is now happening around the “teams” chat and video call. Institute a “mode” of communication requirement in the organization and set guidelines around that. For instance, if you are “on,” then answer a text or phone call within 15 minutes. Don’t stay “off” more than two hours a day. Use your camera and connect visually with that person. It’s quite funny to see when two people meet for the first time in person after having remote meetings for more than a year… ”You are much taller/shorter, than I pictured you were” …
Looking at the remote worker the same as the in-person worker: As management, you must set yourself to intentionally work with the remote worker as much as the in-person worker. This means the onus is on you, the manager, not the employee, to make sure you see and understand their work capabilities. Since I managed global mobility for large corporations for more than 30 years, I remember all too well star employees in our organization calling me to help them “find” a way back to the HQ and to the jobs they had left. Often “out of sight” meant “out of mind.”
In my experience, one of the trickiest parts of managing a remote team is giving honest feedback, in a way that doesn’t come across as too harsh. If someone is in front of you much of the nuance can be picked up in facial expressions and body language. But not when someone is remote. Can you give a few suggestions about how to best give constructive criticism to a remote employee?
We train and work with many organizations in understanding and giving crucial feedback and having those difficult conversations. We have had to let people go via remote and we always do this via camera, never via email or written notification only.
I find that often when there is a problem with productivity or job performance, the employee also recognizes it, even if they don’t want to admit it.
When a new employee starts our company, we invest in self-awareness training and assessments for them. We need them to be self-aware and we need to understand the best way to connect and adapt to them. Having this from the start makes having those difficult conversations much easier later in the employment. Routine check-ins, weekly meetings, and one-on-one phone calls usually keep these conversations from becoming difficult.
Before I became a self-aware leader, I would take “critical energy behavior” as push-back or not being willing to be a team player. Now I understand the behavior and ensure I’m giving that energy the tools they need to understand any constructive criticism as improvement opportunities. So, I’m going to put that back on the leader to be self-aware and learn to connect and adapt their behavior to the employees to ensure that criticism becomes an improvement opportunity instead.
Can you specifically address how to give constructive feedback over email? How do you prevent the email from sounding too critical or harsh?
As I said, being self-aware and learning how to connect and adapt is a crucial soft skill for anyone, not just for leadership. It’s a two-way street, not one-way. That being said, if I understand their behavior preferences, I will send all of my communication that way. I always write emails, stop and rewrite, and often if it is a difficult email I’ll walk away and then come back to it. Otherwise, because of my direct nature, my written communication will always come across as harsh.
I actually have no feelings in any written answers if I am asked a direct question. It’s when it comes to managing people’s emotions, and self-worth and making sure that they know I hear them, and I appreciate them — that’s when I need my soft skills to become more important.
If you don’t really know the individual, then start with something simple:
Start with appreciating what they have done.
Go into what needs to be changed.
Give them examples of how you will support them, what that change looks like to you, or what your expectations are of those changes.
End with leaving the door open for any additional ways you can support them in this required change. (Not helping them; that is a different meaning.)
Can you share any suggestions for teams who are used to working together on location but are forced to work remotely due to the pandemic. Are there potential obstacles one should avoid with a team that is just getting used to working remotely?
This was the situation for my team, along with most of the country/world during the pandemic. But since we’ve been through it once, we can easily go through this again.
Set your expectations on what remote work looks like — hours, dressing for work, communication during work hours, family/childcare needs.
Stay consistent in your expectations. Things will come up and it will have to be tweaked routinely, so be flexible, but persistent.
Find ways to promote connection and jobs well done — Ecards, gift cards, shout-outs during group meetings, etc. These are the types of things you would have done during in-person work, but now you have to be creative while still delivering the same type of message — We Value You.
Don’t be passive-aggressive — With remote work, since you are not physically seeing/hearing or talking with them every day, it’s easy to let an email or a comment slip into “What did they mean by that?” Be sure and address concerns head-on and early. Don’t let dislike of conflict affect your team’s connectivity.
Address issues with infractions of policies/rules for remote work immediately. With remote work, things are highlighted more than with in-person work schedules. You see and track when a person is online, what they are doing and when they are not. There isn’t any “hiding” in the cubicles with remote work. Because of technology, remote work is possible, but also organizations have more access to data than before remote work.
What do you suggest can be done to create a healthy and empowering work culture with a team that is remote and not physically together?
Don’t forget to have some fun with your remote people. So often we jump right to the meeting, the agenda, the reason we are here. Stop and spend time talking with people. When you were in person, there were sidebar conversations before the meeting, after the meeting, and sometimes during the meeting. Now that is tougher to do, but without it so much is lost in the connection. Find something that works for your organization (Tell us about your coffee mug? What did you and your family do last night? What is new with the kids?) and keep it going. Connection doesn’t have to be lost during remote work, it just takes on a new look and a new skill set for us all.
You are a person of great influence. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger. :-)
During this new work movement, people are bringing their whole selves to work. Their authentic selves. You now know who has kids, and who has cats vs. dogs. What type of work environment they have at home is indicative of their work environment in the office. Being inclusive and responding to people, connecting with people, however, that mode might be, will keep humanization in the remote work world. Without it, we are lost. We need touch, we need emotion, we need connection. If we can’t do it physically, then we must make an extra effort to do this in a remote setting.
Having faith in our workplace and being open to talk about many different subjects face-to-face — not in an email/or in a text, but willing to show your face when you speak your truth — will make people understand and believe what you say.
Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?
My favorite life lesson is one I highlight in the book, The Leadership Attitude: From Jeff Stein: You must set your own boundaries for work. You can never give enough hours, enough effort, and enough productivity for an organization to satisfy it. An organization is not a person, it is a thing. Set your boundaries, discuss this with your people in the organization, and stick to them. Let people know what your non-negotiables are, and they will respect them, even when times get chaotic and tough.
Thank you for these great insights!
View the article: Deborah McGee of PZI Group On Five Things You Need To Know To Successfully Manage a Remote Team | by Authority Magazine | Authority Magazine | Aug, 2024 | Medium
For more insights from Deborah E. McGee, visit: deborahemcgee.com