About the Event
At this LIGHTNING Round, we had an open, honest, and energizing discussion about the new realities of leadership. As we all continue to navigate a mountain of challenges…the global pandemic, geopolitical conflicts, environmental disasters, and more…it’s only natural for the way we lead our teams to change.
For the last two and half years, we’ve been on a steep learning curve and now, as things begin to reach homeostasis, it’s time to reflect on what has worked, what hasn’t, and what we want to keep developing in this “new reality.”
Our partners at Deloitte facilitated our discussion with insightful questions like, “What has impacted you most as a leader in the last 3–5 months?” and, “What practices/tactics have you found helped/hindered in being an adaptive leader?”
As always, our AWESOME Leaders had some incredibly insightful answers. Here’s what they shared…
- “I am a lot better now about telling my junior leaders that it’s ok to feel overwhelmed.”
- “In the beginning of the pandemic, I saw a lot of fear from women and especially mothers. They were apologizing for their kids and for disruptions. Now I make it a point in every meeting I’m in to say, no matter who is there, to never apologize for our kids. We have so much more flexibility now and I think that’s amazing.”
- “We’ve started thinking about the employees as the whole person. With the higher turnover we’ve seen, being sensitive to personal priorities, and allowing personal time, is so important.”
- “We are looking to allow flexibility for schedules of warehouse workers.”
- “The pandemic really pushed technology years ahead and we weren’t ready. We’ve had to think outside the box or else our customers won’t get the goods, so there has been a lot of learning. It’s fascinating and draining, but we’re trying to focus on the question, ‘how is this going to make us better?'”
Thank you to Deloitte for their continued partnership on our LIGHTNING Rounds and thank you to all our AWESOME Leaders who attended and shared their thoughts. All of YOU are what makes us AWESOME!