Joanne Kaldy

As you move forward on your leadership journey, you won’t get some very important education and insights in the classroom or online. To become a great leader in the new world of workforce challenges, unexpected crises, and ever-changing technology, you need to increase your leadership capacity by:

• Leaning into tension. Jumping right to fixing a problem puts pressure on everyone and causes tension. Consider first focusing on the background and how you got here. This will give your team time to brainstorm, learn, and collaborate.
• Making sure your words and actions match. Avoid sending mixed messages to your team and losing their trust.
• Accepting multiple truths. Realize that there is no one answer for every problem. Weigh the pros and cons of various possible solutions, so that you can feel confident about the one you finally choose.
• Surrounding yourself with people who are different than yourself. Create a team with diverse skills and … [Read more...] about (7/8) Five Ways to Increase Your Leadership Capacity

As companies work to eliminate sexism, racism, and other problems, some are turning to the idea of hiring a culture leader. This role entails:

• Growing and implementing the company’s culture strategies.
• Ensuring organizational alignment.
• Revamping learning and development efforts.
• Helping to create a people-first environment where everyone feels safe and valued.

Exit interviews may not enable you to keep some employees, but they can help you attract good workers and keep them over time. So make sure your exit interviews aren’t just perfunctory but actually help you mine for useful information. Toward that end, consider these questions as part of your exit conversation:

• Why are you leaving our company?
• What ideas do you wish you could have implemented during your time here?
• What do you think is the most important skill the person taking over your job will need?
• Do you feel like you had the support you needed to succeed here?
• What will your salary and benefits be like in your new position?
• What was your experience of our company culture?
• What advice would you give a new employee here?

Addressing the staffing crisis in long-term care has been receiving national attention, including in a recent proposed House appropriations bill. Among the provisions included in the bill:

• $3.1 billion for Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act Grants.
• $303 million for registered apprenticeships.
• $3 million for a Direct Care Workforce Demonstration project to reduce barriers to employment.
• $48 million for the Geriatrics Workforce Enhancement Program to support geriatrics training as part of primary care delivery.
• $324 million for nursing workforce development programs.
• An additional $200 million for Alzheimer’s disease/dementia research.

You may think that all the enhanced efforts to communicate and collaborate during the pandemic held your team together. In fact, it may have helped tear it apart. According to a recent study, during the pandemic:

• Weekly team meetings increased by 252%.
• 6 billion more emails were sent.
• The average after-hours work increased by 28%.

• Create a safe space to have open discussions about mental health.
• Model and practice empathy consistently.
• Encourage a work-life balance among workers and managers alike.
• Focus on more personalized communication; resist bombarding workers with information.
• Use feedback to make changes that meet new employee … [Read more...] about (7/4) The Pandemic Changed Us. Now Companies Have to Change Too.

It is important to understand moral injury and how to deal with it as we come out of the pandemic and face an uncertain future:

• Moral injury involves the psychological, social, and spiritual impact of events on people with strong values who work in high-stakes situations when they have to act in ways that conflict with those values.
• Situations in which people experience moral injury include those where a person has to turn away patients despite them suffering because of staffing shortages or overcrowded facilities; having to care for dying patients who are isolated from their loved ones; and being prevented from speaking the truth about what is happening in their organization.
• Symptoms of moral injury include strong feelings of guilt and/or shame, anger, contempt, self-criticism, and loss of trust in others.
• Understanding moral injury can help workers realize that they're not failing because they don’t have the skills to cope.
… [Read more...] about (7/1) Moral Injury: What Happens When Exhausted Health Workers Can No Longer Provide the Care They Want for Their Patients

While the worst of the pandemic might be behind us, anxiety and burnout aren’t going away any time soon. Complicating this, suggests a new study, is a decline in the level of empathy among employers:

• 69% of employees say their organization is empathetic, down from 72% last year.
• 69% of CEOs believe it’s their job to build empathy. However, few workers identify the CEO as playing the most important role in promoting workplace empathy; instead, they say, direct managers are the greatest source of empathy-building.
• 79% of CEOs say they struggle to be empathetic, and 77% worry that they would lose respect if they’re seen as being too empathetic.

During the pandemic, your employees were watching how you handled challenges, unprecedented crises, and sudden change. Loyalty has evolved from those instances where they liked what they saw. You can build and maintain a stable workforce to showing new hires and existing employees that you can keep them safe, happy, and productive during times of uncertainty. Take these 5 steps:

1. Listen, understand, and act on employee feedback. Seek input from workers about problems and their ideas for solutions. At the same time, ask them about the policies, programs, efforts, and opportunities that they like and appreciate.
2. Expand learning and development opportunities. Over half (60%) of employees say their employer didn’t offer any professional development or training in 2020, and some workers site this as a reason they sought new jobs. Don’t forget to create opportunities to tackle new challenges and take on new roles.
3. Prioritize well-being in your company … [Read more...] about (6/29) 5 Ways to Attract, Develop and Retain Top Talent Amidst Uncertainty

There is real room for improvement when it comes to communication between front-line workers and their managers. In a new survey, 40% of workers said that communications from management show that they are “out of touch” with their employees. Among other findings:

• 42% of respondents said that communications from leadership were often irrelevant.
• 30% of workers actually said that internal communications actually have interfered with their ability to do their jobs.
• 1 in 4 workers said their company doesn’t have a “go-to” channel for important updates; and 32% said that if there is such a channel, it doesn’t work for them.