Welcome to the second part of our interview with Laura Petruccelli, Director of People APAC at Contino, who joined Contino just two weeks before Australia went into COVID-19 lock-down.
In this second and final part of our interview, Laura tackles topics around the challenges of building social relationships in a virtual office, preventing burnout working remotely, and the exciting work landscape moving forward.
“Building meaningful relationships at work is critical to engagement and building a community-based culture.”
- Laura Petruccelli, Director of People APAC, Contino
On the recent Talenza Future Workforce panel, you raised a question about the challenges of building relationships with those you don’t interact with everyday working remotely. Why are these interactions so important? And have you figured out a solution?
“This is definitely a challenge that I felt that I faced when joining Contino and basically becoming 100% remote work from day one. Everyone is different and has different needs. I know that myself, as an individual, I struggle to make connections over the telephone. I’m much more a people person. I don’t think we have a silver bullet here, and we will continue to evolve this, but I think the key is offering a variety of opportunities in varying formats for people to meet and interact and some of it also just comes down to time.
“We operate using a squad model - which is a cross functional team of people who are formed for a specific program of work. That squad then disseminates when an engagement ends and new squads are spun up when a new engagement starts. These squads then have regular ceremonies (stand ups, weekly calls etc) where they come together. So new team members will always get the opportunity to meet different people just through the way we work - even remotely. In fact the best bit about the move to remote work is that now our delivery teams across different states are working together, whereas previously we were far more state-based focused.
“We also have social communities covering various interests that people can join which gives them opportunities to meet people who they don’t work with on a day-to-day basis but share similar interests with. Our lunch and learn series gives people exposure to a different audience and the opportunity to interact with other team members.
“We have always had a thorough onboarding and induction process and we’ve spent a lot of time and effort ensuring that we maintained this. We’ve transitioned it into a virtual process enabling our new Continis to have a virtual meet and greet with people from across our business. Building meaningful relationships at work is critical to engagement and building a community-based culture.
“It’s no secret that people who make friends in the workplace are more likely to remain with the organisation longer than those who do not.
“We want our people to love coming to work (or working from home as the case may be) and love working with the talented people they work with. It’s key to our culture and key to retaining our fantastic team.”
It’s easy for people to feel a sense of guilt walking away from the computer working from home. With many of us continuing to work remotely, how can we overcome this to avoid overwork and the risk of employee burnout?
“It’s imperative that leaders build an environment that rewards outcomes now more than ever. The amount of time someone spends at their desk does not equate to a high quality outcome. We need to build an environment where we communicate, communicate and communicate again to our people on what is important and what success looks like.
“I share the example of a team member I spoke to early in the transition to remote working. She shared with me that she was tied to her desk and felt guilty when she did walk away from her computer. She was exhausted and letting work take over her personal life, not taking anywhere near enough time to recharge her batteries or get out and maintain her pre COVID exercise routine.
“I then encouraged her to talk to me about what a normal pre COVID work day looked like, and through that conversation she revealed that a typical day would involve commuting, coffee with colleagues, casual chats with passing team mates in the kitchen and of course work. I pointed out to her that in pre-COVID times she wasn’t in fact spending 8 hours at her desk, she was actually stopping and going out for coffee at least once a day and catching up with colleagues in the kitchen and that she should feel comfortable replacing some of those activities with putting a load of washing on or going outside for a walk.
“While it might sound obvious, sometimes when you’re in the thick of things, you just can’t see these obvious correlations, so it’s up to all of us to help point some of these things out.”
“We also spoke about using simple tools like every day creating a set of objectives for the day, then once she achieved those objectives she could give herself permission to end her day - irrespective of whether it was at 3pm or at 6pm. If you complete what you set out to achieve, then you did what was expected of you and sitting at your desk all day every day is just not sustainable and in fact reduces productivity.”
As an advocate of silver linings, what are you most excited about moving forward?
“COVID19 has accelerated change in the workplace that would have taken decades to instil. These last few months have proven that, for many of us, we can complete our work from anywhere, and that means we don't need to be in an office to achieve.
“I love the fact that the concept of being a Digital Nomad will become a reality for so many.”
“You want to trial living in another country for 6 months or travel the world but don’t want to leave your job or take a career break for fear it might interrupt your career progression? Go for it! Or perhaps you can’t afford to travel without a regular income - this makes it so much more accessible. We have proven you can complete your work from anywhere if you have a computer and a solid and reliable internet connection.
“It broadens the talent pool, both domestically and internationally truly opening up a global job economy. Working in technology there are so many emerging technologies and skill sets and sometimes our talent pools locally are just too narrow. Being able to tap people on the shoulder from other locations and not requiring them to relocate means that companies with reputations of being great places to work, just like Contino, will have access to so many more talented individuals.
“It also accelerates gender equality. In so many family households, the male parent still plays a ‘breadwinner’ role and isn’t as present as they’d perhaps like to be in their children’s lives. Women still, more often than not, play the role of primary caregiver. The ability to work from home opens up these caregiving responsibilities to be more equally shared. More fathers can do the drop-offs and pick-ups or attend milestone school occasions, and more mothers can be present for important meetings or work full-time rather than part-time, and therefore giving them more and better exposure in the workplace. They will more likely be considered for promotions and roles that potentially they were overlooked for in the past because of their perceived reduced commitment due to other responsibilities.
“While we have some challenging times ahead as we work through COVID-19 and the economic pressures this pandemic has imposed on us, everything in life has a beginning and an end. When the economy begins to show signs of expansion and restrictions imposed as a result of COVID-19 are lifted,
“we will without doubt see a new way of working that only 6 months ago we would have thought is decades away. This is exciting and the opportunities such change brings are plenty!”
What are your favourite shows/movies from the past few months?
“Oh dear, this might tell you a little more about my personality - but particularly during lockdown, I was devouring shows like The Great, Working Moms, Ozark, Family Guy and White Lines. Thank goodness for the internet and streaming services with so much choice on hand.
“I particularly love a good comedy, I just find them brilliant to unwind to and have a chuckle. Life can be so serious so it’s nice to spend half an hour to an hour getting lost into a silly show and totally switching off to the craziness around us.”
Final thoughts? Anything else you’d like to add?
“My mantra in life is ‘This too shall pass’. That relates to both the great, happy and fantastic experiences as well as the not so good times in our lives. So, while COVID-19 has been a challenge and a change that none of us were expecting, I try to stop and be present.
“I try to make a conscious choice to think about these things - it’s not always easy but it certainly helps me not get buried into the doom and gloom that the media particularly portrays. We always have a choice - I choose to make the most of this scary, crazy and exciting time and I hope that this helps some of the readers of this to do so, too.”
“Find the good in the situation and what opportunities this change is presenting us to develop and evolve ourselves.”
That wraps up the second and final part of our interview with Laura Petruccelli, Director of People APAC at Contino. Be sure to check out part 1 here.
This conversation was brought to you by Pioneera.
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