JS Tip 578: Leading from a Distance

Our friend Jaron Stanley at WesTech Engineering asked about leading from a distance. 

Jaron said, “This is an interesting time with so many people moving to remote work. It’s creating new challenges. I worry that if I’m not proactive I’m going to miss something. The problem is that the situation is new and I don’t know what I need to do to be proactive.” 

The Challenge

Distance separates. (We recognize the obviousness of this, but we also recognize the truth of this.)

We’re uncomfortable being alone because we lose the strength of being with our group. Our strength is in our numbers. Our cohesiveness. 

Yet here we are. Essentially alone. We’ve lost contact with our group.

Ardant du Picq, a 19th-century soldier and a leadership scholar, observed—

Four brave hunters who do not know each other will not dare attack a lion. 

Four less brave, but knowing each other well, sure of their reliability and consequently of mutual aid, will attack resolutely. 

This is the science of organization in a nutshell. (Études Sur le Combat, page 110)

The Response

Focus on building the team. Building cohesiveness. Building connections. 

Send a regular short-but-content-rich email to everyone on the team. Report successes and give credit to the individuals responsible for those successes. Report lessons learned. Shared communication is shared experience.  

Send a short-but-content-rich email to selected individuals each day. Personalize it to the individual. Compliment. Keep it short. Keep it specific. Keep it sincere. 

As we engage with our teams, our teams will engage with their work.

We love this stuff.