One of my favourite ‘I slid into their DMs’ stories comes from Rob McElhenny and Ryan Reynolds recounting the beginning days of a friendship that has matured into a(n ad)venture with the North Welsh soccer team, Wrexham AFC. If you have no idea what I’m talking about, go watch Welcome to Wrexham. It’s a wonderful story, and basically, a true Ted Lasso drama (seriously, watch that too). It’s also a really lovely parallel with my participation in the Future of Team podcast.

Let me be clear despite the above, I’m no sports fan, but gosh I love a story that at its heart is about a community of people gathered around a project, struggling for whatever reasons, and blown away by someone seeing their value and wanting to contribute, to ease the struggle, and take the team to ever increasing success. Given that by the end of their 3rd year together, Wrexham AFC have had 2 promotions up the league ladder shows that they’re kicking all their goals!!

Well, I have my own ‘I slid into their DMs story.’ It’s not about football though… so let me set the scene…

A year ago, long time WP community leader, James Giroux started an initiative called TeamWP that was spearheaded by a Team Experience Index, a survey of team culture and engagement. Around that he was posting engaging conversation starters and I got excited by the discussion. I could see and feel alignment with what I know and love about development and coaching great team players, so I slid into his DMs to show some appreciation.

The conversation went back and forth and James mentioned that he was planning a podcast and he wondered whether I’d like to be a guest on it. Of course I was keen, but I had the audacity to also say, “sure, as a guest… or co-host…” and James didn’t hesitate to entertain the idea, and very quickly, draft me to the team.

We started recording in November of 2023 and have been refining our approach, content, and our delivery as we’ve got more confident and assertive in our opinions, and more comfortable with each other.

I know I’m biased, but if you’re at all interested in creating environments where the people helping you grow your company can thrive, and where you can get resourced to build your ‘dream team’ then the Future of Team is an excellent place to start.

We have a whole bunch of episodes in the bank that we’ll be releasing one by one, the first one is up now and in it we talk about ‘The Why behind Team and Culture Investment’ it really sets the scene for all the episodes coming up.

We’re having an absolute ball recording these. As we go on we’ll be bringing you more awesome conversations, some of which include interviews with other team and culture enthusiasts and practitioners, we’d love to have you along for the ride.

TeamWP has evolved into Future of Team organisation [here], an exciting initiative focused on streamlining HR for Growth: Tailored Recruitment, Culture Building, and Leadership Tools for WordPress Businesses and you can read all about that evolution here. I’m thrilled to be a part of it.

Thanks James for saying yes and for making the whole process so much fun, I’m so looking forward to everyone hearing our conversations!

(If you’re a Wrexham or Ted Lasso fan, what’s your favourite part of the story?)

Around a food laden table recently, a group of women at various stages in our careers had the chance to share our journeys with our friend, a new university graduate embarking on making the first steps in her career. We found our conversation turning to the challenge of figuring out ‘where do you put your foot first’? How do you start?

What followed was a really rewarding conversation where those of us with the benefit of hindsight, shared tools, skills, and insights that had helped us along the journey.

What a thrill to see a noticeable uplift in our friend’s demeanour at the end of that conversation. With signposts, companions, and some early suggestions of possible steps, it seemed as though the cloud cover lifted over some of the landscape like it does in a video game as you uncover new ground on the map.

So with that conversation ringing in my ears, I’ve listed below 10 things I’ve learned to share with my friend Lucia (with her permission), and I invite you as my trusted network to also share what your best advice for her, navigating the journey into the full time work force for the first time.

1. Figure out what you’re good at, and what motivates you, and start your direction following those things.
   • Nodell’s Motivated Skills cards, Moving Motivators from Management 3.0. and Gallup’s Clifton Strengthfinder have all been invaluable for me. If your budget allows, a session with a career’s coach to explore your intrinsic motivations and aptitudes may also be invaluable (honestly, great idea for family to chip in as a Christmas gift).
2. Define your goals and chose work that takes you closer to them
   • Be mindful that your life is more than just a career so don’t feel as though you must limit your goals just to the work you do.
3. Trust your gut
   • You may not know why you know, but going against your inner knowing diminishes your trust in yourself, so trust it. Validate what you’re feeling with your inner circle as a gut check… but in my experience, when you know… you know…
4. Work is a means to an end, keep it in its place
   • Work can bring career satisfaction, financial independence, discipline, and growth but it need not define you, let all the other vibrant parts of you do that.
5. Every opportunity is a learning one
   • Even those jobs you took to get through your studies will have taught you things. Regardless of what you experience, there’ll always be something you take away from it that can inform and mature you. Nothing is ever wasted.
6. You don’t have to have it all figured out now
   • What you want WILL change, you just have to know… “what do you want, next and will it take you closer to your goal?”
7. Be smart with your money.
   • Start saving early, even a small amount grows, get in the habit now. (If you salary sacrifice into your super, you won’t even notice it’s gone – but future you will thank you).
8. Know that you are valuable and you bring value wherever you go…
   • Living in this confidence requires figuring out how you bring that value. So spend some time figuring this out, write it down, write an elevator pitch about yourself and learn it so you can articulate it, to your boss, to your colleagues, and to yourself when the impostor comes calling
9. Keep a brag doc, and update it regularly
   • It is great for your confidence AND (importantly) for demonstrating your worth to your boss and getting it recognised when you have a performance review.
10. Build and nurture your network, you’ll need it.
    • You’re going to meet many people in your career, and I encourage you to resist the introvert and embrace opportunities to learn more about those who you come into contact with. They’ll have great stories, they will have much to teach if you are open and in return, you have much to teach them.

I am really interested in hearing from you… what was something you’ve learned that you wish you knew way back at the beginning? And, if you found this useful, please share it with the entry level friends in your circles as well.

Free Download – here’s a free PDF of the carousel images above to share/save to keep you motivated, and if you want to follow future posts as I break these 10 things down, sign up below.

Here in the south east of Australia we’re in the early weeks of spring.

It really crept up on me this year. I was so absorbed in the routine of my everyday wintery life that for a minute I might have thought it was going to be like that forever. I would have no complaints about that, Winter is actually my favourite season. I can be home, warm, safe, and in a predictable routine that is utterly comfortable. I can also wear an Oodie and Uggs all season, what’s not to love?

However, seasons change and the cosiness of Winter has given way to the pollinated, damp discomfort of Spring. (Yes, yes, with the picturesque beauty of greenery, blossom, and new life, but also with the *sneezing*…)

In the last 6 months I have had a similar experience in my work with Human Made. A change of season snuck up on me.

So comfortable was I, this transition took me by surprise, and in the intervening months we have collaborated to see what a next season could look like for us and our work together.

With both blue skies and rain clouds, much like a Victorian spring, this season is coming to its end today when I will log out of our work-spaces for the last time.

What phenomenal ride of creativity, growth, learning, and relationship the last six years have been. I am leaving HM with a heart full of gratitude and respect for the wonderful people who seek to build a beautiful workplace where humans make a more beautiful web.

I do not know what’s going to come next other than a long rail trip to explore the red centre that I’ll embark on this Saturday. I’ll spend November recharging my batteries, exploring both my environment and whatever possibilities the next new season of work may contain. But whatever that looks like? I’m ready to see it all unfold.

I am so grateful to the leaders there, to Tom, Siobhan, and all my friends at Human Made. Those whom I’ve met, served and been served by in my time there are collectively, and individually, one in a million.

This was first posted on LinkedIn a couple of weeks ago, I’m saving it here for my own archives.

How was your last week?

I don’t even know how to begin to describe last week. It was week 5 of my work year and after a week’s holiday I was surprised that from Monday I woke up every day feeling nauseated and anxious which made it impossibly difficult to concentrate and feel like I was making any useful contribution.

In trying to keep going and feel like I was getting anything/something done I kept putting how I felt aside and tried to keep moving, so by Thursday I had two tearful calls one after the other with a friend and colleague, and one with my boss. I’m very thankful they’re both safe places to have a bit of a cry even if I wasn’t really able to articulate clearly what was going on behind the tears.

In waking up Friday with a headache indicative mostly of the tension I was holding in my neck and shoulders I opted to take the day off and look after myself; clearly battling through wasn’t working. Of course then I started feeling stupid that after a week off I couldn’t even manage 4 days of work (stay with me, it gets better).

I am, at my core, someone who prefers to avoid big feelings and pain (Enneagram 7), so my brain will concoct all sorts of ways to do so included, but not limited to, having thoughts like these:

“Start looking for another job, other jobs will be better… ” and the counter-arguments which sound like “no one else would have you, your skills aren’t really transferable and you’re too old to change at this point in your career, face it, you’re doomed” (Hello, and EFF OFF, Imposter and Depression).

Here’s the thing, I’ve been here before, when waking up with that feeling in my stomach grows, and sometimes even turns into dry retching and a total loss of appetite. I didn’t want things to get to that point so I started employing some tools I have learned to explore and ameliorate this state.

I start with reminding myself of the following:

1. “Depression lies.” I’ve learned this in the words of both Wil Wheaton and Jenny Lawson, battlers whose words on the subject I’ve read for years and for whom my occasional flirtation with Depression pales against in comparison. It couldn’t possibly have been true that after only 3 weeks of the year, which I’d started with great enthusiasm and productivity should be ashes without an obvious trigger point.. clearly something else was going on.
2. Feelings are just feelings, they’re not truth, so acting on, making plans on, and changing big things based on feelings like this are very risky. Don’t make any sudden moves.
3. This feeling doesn’t last forever. I’ve been here before, most recently for a fairly big stretch of 2019, and it passed, it will pass again.
4. I am living in a f*cking pandemic. Nothing about this is normal, all the usual support acts of flying back to NZ for a dose of family, or heading to Bali for a week of relaxation, massages, and humid warmth aren’t options. This is hard, but I can find ways to meet the needs these activities support (more on this below).
5. I have feelings like this (as often as not) because something in my world feels out of alignment or control. So it’s important for me to actually sit down and explore what that might be, and what steps I can take to start to take back a feeling of order and control over my world.

Then I started looking at my circumstances and addressing some of the challenges I know can lead me down this road…

1. How much time I’m spending alone focused inwards. I suspect, that as lovely as my holiday was, it may not have been wise to have gone alone for this very reason, it was still a week of me alone, just like I am at home, and that the longer I spent by myself, the less I wanted to do suggests that in hindsight as pleasant as it was, also may have been a trigger, or a signpost, that this current state I was heading towards.

Action: Scale up the plans to meetup with people now that you are actually allowed to.

2. Inventory my proximity to other humans for sure, but note that it’s also about how many people I have in my world who I can be real with, and who hear me out when I’m having big or difficult feelings. This is a small number of people, and one I regularly need to take inventory of, because having people around who reach out after me is an even smaller number. Being the one in relationships who is expected to be the one to drive the connection may not always be healthy for me. If care for each other isn’t mutual, is the benefit also mutual? (This is a hard question I’m a little scared to ask).

Action: I need to dig into this a bit, or start talking honestly with some of my friends about what I need instead of always being the one worrying about what they need.

3. Digging into the thoughts and feelings that are bigger than I want to confront, or are feeling like they’re out of control. For me, actually writing things down helps, and if you’ve got this far you’re reading some of my ‘processing.’

I’ve started writing out some thoughts that are helping untangle what’s been building up in my mind and heart. Much of it hasn’t seen the daylight yet, nor will it, but actually getting the air onto these thoughts, sharing them with people I trust really helps me see which I should keep, and which should be swept away as untrue, unhelpful, or unnecessary, as well as what should be shared as it may help others.

Action: Keep writing out and processing these thoughts, sharing where useful, saving where future Dee might need it, and discarding that which is untrue and unhelpful.

So how am I today?

Much better, thanks. I’m not there yet, but my thoughts are not nearly as dark, and I’m not nearly as anxious as I was, and right now, I’m not feeling like puking… a big win…

I got here by:

1. Running some errands that have been on my to do list for months and were mocking me.
2. I booked the massage I’d been given for Christmas, and what do you know it was Thai, so the decor, sounds, and smells of the spa made me feel almost as though I was back in Bali.
3. I hung out with people. I invited myself over to a friend’s for dinner on Friday, I had my cousins over to play board games on Saturday, and I spent all day board gaming with friends (in real life) on Sunday. (I appreciate that this is a privilege born of long lock-downs in 2020 and so I’m sorry if it’s a trigger for those of you still living in lock downs).
4. I had a big ugly cry.
5. I wrote this post and blocked out the framework of another one which I’ll dig into during the week.

How is the following week looking for you?

A lot better. Thanks.

Image Attribution: While I created the header image, the source content was Instagram where I found this post on Karen Akunowicz’s Feed

“To be is to do”—Socrates.
“To do is to be”—Jean-Paul Sartre.
“Do be do be do”—Frank Sinatra.

As I write today, I am looking at and listening to the waters of the Gippsland Lakes, whipped up just a little into waves that don’t so much crash on to the shore as they do crinkle. My view, filtered by lanky trunks of assorted eucalyptus was earlier filled with a flurry of red and blue Crimson Rosellas determinedly and noisily asserting their rights to the seeds I’d thrown out for them.

I have been looking at this view for a week, some days blue and green as you’d expect here in the Antipodean midsummer, some days greyed by clouds and rain or even hazed and shimmering brown in 40 degree heat. All of it hours from home, away from the laptop and office, cut off even from the telephone which struggled to find any kind of signal. So here, the air has remained quiet, as indeed have I.

I thought I was coming to Raymond Island to make it a base for excursions and exploring but for the whole week all I’ve  really wanted to do is read, play games, watch nonsense on the TV. To sleep late, and go to bed later, to cook and eat simply, drink gin (which I didn’t ration well enough and finished a day too early), and to do what most would call, nothing. So that, is exactly what I’ve done. Nothing. 

It sounds like bliss, and it absolutely has been, but even so, the whole time I have struggled to make peace with the idea of being peaceful, of allowing myself to slow down and ‘be’ instead of constantly ‘doing’. I’ve worried that my host has thought of me as lazy and has felt my presence awkward, which is me projecting my fear onto him, he’s given me no such evidence that this is true, and why should I care what he thinks? What he has said that this happens to everyone who comes here and the testimonials in the visitors book bear this out. The place has a magic that just makes people stop, breathe, and rest.

So, on the eve of my return to the city and the bustle of ‘real life’ here I am meditating as to how I want my year to look as I go home, how I want to take how this week has felt and use it to shape my world in 2021. I do not want to return beset by the constant need to have something tangible to show not just for my work, but for my existence. If 2020 has taught me anything is that it is unsustainable to go through the year with a wave building behind me of things I need to do or will need to have done ‘this year’ because that wave builds only to crash, regardless of whether the circumstances of that crash are a global pandemic or my own frailty.

So, while I don’t make resolutions, I am resolved that in 2021 I shall  be kinder to myself, to adjust my expectations that productivity is always visible. In my role of supporting people in their endeavours I will recognise that measuring my effectiveness and productivity may actually also be in the intangible, in a kind word, a supportive smile, or a gentle nudge that helps their direction instead of only in an article published, or a project delivered. In 2021 I no longer want to measure my value in what I’m doing. I want the lesson of this delightful week retreat and reflection to be one of learning the value in my being as well.

Bonus Content: Met a neighbour

I posted this quote on Twitter today

“How do you explain what it feels like to get on the stage and make poetry that you know sinks into the hearts and souls of people who are unable to express it?”

Nina simone

It’s a quote that speaks loud to me on a number of levels, initially as a singer who recognises that peculiar thrill of performing the ineffable to transform the experience for an audience.

It also speaks to my inner jazz enthusiast who first was introduced to the music of the author alongside the great artists of the era, and genre, which influences still, the soundtracks of my best days.

I posted it today however, because it also speaks to me in the context of my professional community, as from now on this name is now forever associated not just with her music and activism, but with the release of WordPress 5.6, ‘Simone’ named of course for Nina Simone, legendary singer, songwriter, musician and activist.

I couldn’t be more delighted to see a release named for such an iconic woman. Even more so because it is in fact, an iconic release.

It’s an iconic release because for the first time the squad responsible for it is made up entirely of people identifying as women and non-binary. Entirely.

I’m not going to give oxygen to the critics who decried the plan citing that involvement in these things should be merit based instead will amplify core developers like @peterwilsoncc who have been involved in multiple releases when they say…

Most WordPress releases run very smoothy. The WordPress 5.6 release has been the smoothest I have seen for several releases. The release squad brought an extra layer of polish.

Peter Wilson

From my view as the co-ordinator, there wasn’t a single person who didn’t deserve to be there on merit. By removing this one barrier to entry they were unleashed to do amazing work, and undoubtedly to participate again in future releases. This is why representation matters so much.

It wouldn’t have happened without the idea first being proposed, and a plan put in place to actually make it happen, amazing mentorship from previous squad members, and from a community who have embraced this release and this squad, for which we are all very grateful, thank you.

Fabulous work by the release team! #representationmatters https://t.co/cpT7lxPFcU pic.twitter.com/E0iHGk6p4a

— Mike Little (@mikelittlezed1) December 9, 2020

The tagline ‘Code is Poetry’ is synonymous with WordPress. On this occasion, the code we delivered in Nina’s name does for our users what her music and poetry does for her audience, it gives people a way to give voice to that which has sunk into their own hearts and souls.

I am grateful, and awed to be a part of it.

Also, updated to include massive thanks that are due to my employer Human Made who made it possible to spend some of my work time every week working on this effort.

The Problem

One of the areas of work I’m less strong in is follow-up. I may be in a meeting, even a 1:1 and be taking notes about what we’re talking about, even documenting action items. However I’m not always disciplined about following those notes up, turning them into action, or keeping all that note-taking in one place, thus it often really only helps me process what I’m hearing. It doesn’t always turn into work.

So, last year I decided I needed to make sure the things I need to action are kept in one place in a useable way so that they were not only documented across time but were also easily acted upon.

Evaluating options

I experimented with a number of tools and processes people or blog posts had recommended. Things like Trello, Asana, Remember the Milk, even Bear, (the text editor I drafted this post up in) took a turn at being my To Do list manager. I also experimented with a Github project to keep track of my work.

They’re all great on different levels, but they all meant having to log in, or pick up my phone and log tasks which I just didn’t do consistently. Even with browser extensions and other facilities to access them, none of them, however much gusto I started with, managed to gain any traction in my day to day workflow.

Over and over, I’d find myself taking notes in a book or pad on my desk just to the right of my trackpad. Once again, I’d lose notes tearing off the paper to use a clean page (who doesn’t love the possibilities of a fresh clean sheet to start writing on??!) and the action, follow up, or the thought would end up in the bin.

The Actual Solution (for me)

At a company retreat in 2017 a colleague did a short talk about Bullet Journalling and while I actually don’t recall a single thing about her talk other than the words ‘bullet journal’ (sorry Kat), it piqued my curiosity. As a result I dug into some research about it when I got home.

What a world I stumbled into… just a quick search on instagram with the bulletjournal or bujo hashtags may be enough to impress (or intimidate – as it did me). From simple origins, bullet journalling has morphed into amazing works of art that don’t just track to do items, but document peoples’ lives.

In my experiments with it, I have stayed pretty true to just the core process which I have been using all of last year and into this one. The fact it’s followed me into a new year is a testament to its effectiveness. The fact that I haven’t got sidetracked into documenting anything more than my to do list has helped. I doubt I would have kept up trying to document any more than that.

Here’s how it works

Tools

Start with a journal, one with dotted pages because you can then rule the pages up into formats that work for you. (Flexibility. Marvellous.)

Mine’s red, natch.

Last year I used a Moleskine notebook, this year it’s a Legami one, which I like because the paper is white, and because the page numbers are already printed in the book, and because it has a contents page built in… so it’s giving me a head start. Also, though I had pages left in the Moleskine, I opted for new year, new book. Yessss.

None of this matters. Book. Dots. Next.

I have a ruler tucked into the back of the journal (pockets rule) and carry black marker pens of various widths, because stationery, and because they were on sale for half price at the local newsagent which is closing down . So I can update it/rule it up at any time.

I mark up the journal into two layouts.

• A monthly calendar at the beginning of the month on a single spread
• Followed by weekly calendar across a double spread

I used to add page numbers to every page and add a contents page at the front of the book but never actually ended up using it. I had stick on tabs for each month on the old journal, but the new one has a built in bookmark, and the book is mostly open at the current week when I’m working anyway.

I document my lists like this.

On the monthly page I add signature events that I want to be able to see at a glance. As often as not these are personal events, birthdays, paydays etc. I don’t usually use them for work related events unless they’re important deadlines (reviews, feedback deadlines etc.)

On the weekly page I document like this, it’s where the bullet in bullet journal comes in.

I write a bulleted list of all the to do items I want to get done that day, this includes but isn’t limited to tasks, meetings, basically anything that needs attention.

The benefit of a page that limits the number of lines for each day means I don’t have one long to do list that may sometimes seem unconquerable and I can plot priorities. I can plan into next week so that anything that isn’t immediately needed doesn’t mock me, it’s out of sight and therefore mostly out of mind.

When I’ve completed a task? I draw an X through the bullet. Done.

If I don’t complete my list? I write an > through the bullet so I can see it got punted and I copy the undone tasks to another line in tomorrow’s panel, or later in the week.

That’s it.

Benefits

• The core benefit is that I can see what I need to day, can see what I got through yesterday, and can see what I’m going to be doing next week.
• I get a sense of accomplishment when all those bullets have been crossed out.
• I have all the things I’ve achieved in one place, it’s helpful to be able to look back on it and have a jog for my memory when I’m reporting back to my manager some of the highlights of the time between 1:1s.

Challenges

It’s not particularly transparent – maybe this is important, I’m not yet sure. I know I certainly don’t need to see what my team are doing every minute, maybe my team don’t need to know my to do list. That said, some of the feedback I’ve received this year is about working in the open, so I’ll be exploring ways to make some of what I’ve got going on, and coming up more visible, maybe the Github project will come into its own here.

After posting this in our intranet someone asked me how I manage the backlog of things that aren’t in the day to day list. I didn’t have a strong answer… partly because I don’t have a deep backlog (I probably should, I have lots of things I’d like to do), but this system doesn’t lend itself to project style management where there’s a lot of work and a long season to spread that work over, it’s specific to productivity today, and tomorrow. So, I’m going to do some more thinking about deeper backlogs and circle back. Maybe the Github project will come into its own here as well.

Next

Finally, I’m adding a new item to track this year, I’m adding in the hours I’m doing each day, just to keep an eye on the time I’ve been ‘on’ that day. What I’m hoping this will do is help me make sure I’m not overdoing it.

So that’s it. A simple but deadly process that’s working for me.

What do you do to keep track of your to dos?

In our two previous discussions we have talked about the challenges of cross cultural remote work and followed that with the need for closing the gap between diverse distributed teams. In this concluding chapter we discuss what steps we need to take to meet those challenges.

Who’s Accountable?

Whose responsibility is it to create open, inclusive and welcoming spaces for people who are diverse from the dominant culture in your workplace?

I believe that first it starts at the core, so if you’re accountable in your workplace, for the health and wellbeing of your staff, if you’re a leader or manager in your company who’s driving the values and forming the culture of your team and your company, you need to be the ones leading by example. This includes but is not limited to making policy to ensure your online workspaces are open, accepting, and encouraging.

Create opportunities for people to be who they are, to express their cultures, don’t assume that they will just wear yours while they’re at work.

After that, I believe the responsibility to take steps on this path is personal. We as individuals, as colleagues have the power to reduce these gaps…

Something that I have learned, and a challenge for you… if you are from the dominant culture in your workplace, it is your responsibility to take the first steps. It is not the responsibility of our colleagues whose culture differs from ours to initiate our education. It is our own. Then, as we take up that call, we need to create the opportunities for that education to happen.

At Human Made, one of the things we do that allows people to express themselves happens at our retreat. Every team member prepares a short lightning talk to highlight some area of our life or interests to give each other insights into our story. This creates a great conversation starter not just at retreat, but when we’re back in our homes and working together online again. Knowing a little bit more about each other helps us to grow closer together.

Of course, this one-off annual event isn’t enough, I believe we should explore other opportunities throughout our normal work to encourage similar moments. If you have any ideas or are already undertaking initiatives in this area I’d love to hear about it.

We have to appreciate that our colleagues who aren’t English first speakers may be grappling with fears that their language isn’t good enough, or their phrasing is awkward, that their accent creates barriers to understanding and this may totally affect how they conduct themselves in conversation, in Slack and on calls.

Secondly, if you are like me, someone who is from the dominant culture and you have colleagues whose culture is different than yours, please be curious about other’s way of doing not just work, but life! People’s hidden depths and fascinating stories will surprise and delight you.

As a native speaker it is my responsibility as it is my English speaking colleagues to be empathetic to those in my team who aren’t, and this empathy should flow into how we interact with each other, the values in our workplaces, and the way we build our teams. No one should feel lesser because of their difference; No one.

Practical Application

So what does this mean practically?

If you are running a company with this diverse workplace what are you doing that supports people who now have to speak a 2nd or 3rd language in their work interactions?

When they start with your company, do you buddy them with other similar people who can help them feel less inadequate about their language?

Do you have slack channels to support 2nd language speakers? Are first language speakers in those channels helping smooth communication?

Ask your 2nd language speakers what will help them and put those supports in place.

If you are a native language speaker do you need to simplify your language in Slack to accommodate speakers of other languages? Use how you would you speak to your grandmother or an older person as a guide? Would you expect them to understand ‘AFK’ or ‘BRB’? Take a beat before you hit publish and ask yourself, would you speak to Nana this way? Would it help your colleagues to do so? Do you need to rethink your jokes? Or explain them to make them more accessible?

When someone asks for help, for clarification, for explanation about language, or how things operate in your workplace, explore what led to their need to? Is there change required to reduce that barrier in future?

But as I’ve said, it isn’t just language that creates barriers, sometimes I need to slow my task oriented approach just a little to allow more time to connect to and build relationship with my colleagues rather than just getting on with the job. Asking how they’re doing, how’s the family, connect.. then work…

Are there ways we can recognise celebrate other cultural holidays or stories, or practice of our team members? When I was working at an onsite with a client in Sydney some years ago it happened to be Diwali, the festival of lights in the Hindu faith. That day at the office the team members celebrating brought along a feast of wonderful Indian food, and shared it with everyone. Are there ways we can create similar experiences virtually? Let’s try!

In our workplaces we need to encourage a culture that allows for people to ask without shame when they don’t understand something and be mindful that they may not feel confident to ask, so we have to create space and opportunities to do so, and connect them to people who may have had the same, or similar experiences in joining your team.

You are not here merely to make a living. You are here in order to enable the world to live more amply, with greater vision, with a finer spirit of hope and achievement. You are here to enrich the world, and you impoverish yourself if you forget the errand.

WoodRow Wilson

The important thing, I believe, for everyone who’s from the dominant culture is to be mindful. Never assume that someone else’s experience of work is the same as yours. And most of all, don’t be afraid to ask questions, invite conversation. Take every opportunity to enrich your world and in doing so, enrich each others’.

Don’t ignore or be afraid of difference, embrace it, both your own experience of work and life, and that of your colleagues, will be larger, the distances between us will be shorter, our world will be smaller, and we will bring our differences to our workplace, and all be stronger as a result.

In part 1 of this series we talked about the challenges of cross cultural distributed teams and established that the multiple challenges of remote work all come down to issues that create distance in teams. In this post I’ll outline some of the ways we can reduce the distance between remote teams.

Make the World Smaller

The first starts with making the world smaller. When we’re working so far apart, how do we do this?

Take every opportunity to meet in person.

This is a recent photo from our company retreat where we all got together as we do once a year or so. Times like these forge stronger, more robust relationships. If you’re a business employing distributed teams who wants to facilitate a great team and company culture should be a high priority.

You may not be ready to have a company wide meetup in some exotic location, but can you facilitate groups near each other to get together? Encouraging, and facilitating people who are relatively close to attend local meetups, conferences, project kick offs, or other events that provide a shared interest and common goal will kick start relationships that will provide opportunities for new shared understandings about each other. This will make working together in future a smoother, more empathetic experience.

Turn on your Video

In those moments when you can’t meet in person but need to connect, use video calls. This may be a no brainer; you probably already have a premium account with Zoom or Skype… but let me ask you this, in how many of the calls you connect to do you not turn on video?

I am often guilty of doing this… especially if I’m taking a call early and haven’t had coffee… but I’m trying to default to leaving the video on, again, because we’re trying to make the world smaller, actually having video decreases the gap, being able to see someone’s body language, facial expressions, to see their laughter, not just hear it is another path to reducing the virtual distance between us, even if it doesn’t reduce the physical distance.

Use excellent tools

And of course, tools and apps can also help reduce the distance.

We have recently been working with an agency whose team are predominantly Japanese speakers and we had some concerns about how we were going to be able to communicate smoothly with this external partner on our project and only a single Japanese team member. An off the cuff comment from someone prompted us to search for Slack tools to help and we found and installed an app that translates your conversation in real time.

This marvel will reduce some of the challenges we were worrying about in having only one native Japanese speaker on the team. Now he may only have to check translations, rather than feel the pressure to be doing the translating for us. It will also increase the amount of conversation that is possible, another way of reducing the distance between people.

You can see in this image, Shin and I discussing using this conversation as a demonstration for a WordCamp talk! He’s typing in Japanese, I’m of course in English… and yet.. there we are both finding ourselves on the same page.

Make yourself Bigger

A second way to keep reducing the distance between ourselves and our colleagues from other places is to be prepared to grow, and to change.

Doing so is not complicated.

• Have an attitude of willingness to learn
• Don’t assume your way is the only way
• Keep an open mind, stay inquisitive
• Listen actively by paying attention to both verbal and nonverbal cues
• Take time to learn about your colleagues cultural differences, people are interested in sharing where they’re from, their culture and story, don’t feel embarrassed to ask about such things, invite connection and feel your world grow bigger as you do
• Have a genuine curiosity about how difference unfolds in your workplace and be willing to change your work environment so that it is really inclusive.
• Keep it simple, speak and write in language that is easy for all, even if that means altering how you would normally conduct Slack message, or calls – slow down, simplify, pause for people to keep up

The culture of your company or team, derives from the participation of all the people who are in it, not just from initiatives from the top down. Embracing difference, and creating a culture that celebrates the uniqueness off all the people in the team gives us all an opportunity to learn to grow bigger even without having to leave home as I did way back then.

Embrace Difference

Embrace and encourage people’s differences, don’t try to avoid them.
Recognise that cultural events are important to individuals and also to the group and invite team to share their cultural heritage and celebrations with you.

The retreat I mentioned earlier took place in late in February and we were all together on March 1st, a significant day for our 3 Bulgarian team members.

On the first of March in Bulgaria it is customary to share with your friends and family these red and white bracelets made of yarn called Martenitsi.

They are a celebration of the changing of the seasons and are shared in winter. The wearer will wear their Martenitsa until they see the first sign of spring… maybe a blossom on a tree, or a stork returning to its nest. When that spring comes it’s the custom to tie your martenitsa to a blossoming tree to wish it the good health and joy you have had while wearing it…

As a consequence in the spring you can see the martenitsi in the trees where everyone has tied their bracelets in the celebration. I was lucky enough to be in Sofia last week and saw these beautifully decorated trees.

Because we shared this tradition together at the retreat, these martenitsi we exchanged are now in the 4 corners of the world… France, England, United States, Germany and Australia, and probably many other places that didn’t get shared in our Slack channel…

It has been wonderful to share these traditions with our colleagues and I am resolved to encourage other regions and cultures in our company to share their own traditions with us.

So, now that we’ve identified the challenges, and proposed some ways to reducing the distance between people, how do we go about doing it? We can talk about it, and do all the reading we can find about cross cultural working, but at the end of the day, what are the action steps, and whose journey is it to take those first steps towards closing the gaps? We’ll examine the action steps in the concluding part of this series.

What traditions have you learned about from your colleagues? What traditions of your own have you shared?

Cross Cultural Work in a Distributed Workplace

The idea for this post came out of the company I work in, Human Made, a distributed company of nearly 70 people, representing around 24 nationalities, across 16 timezones. We operate in English, but for many of us, English is not the first language.

You can see from the map that the greater proportion of our team are from countries like the UK, USA and Australia, and as a Kiwi born Australian, it’s only the white Australian and New Zealand cultures that I can really speak accurately for. So, where I discuss the experience of others I have learned directly from them and offer their thoughts with permission.

In the world of distributed work we hear practical ways of managing remote teams… tools used to communicate, managing time across time-zones, working with a flexible workforce.

In this series, instead of looking at the practical ways to run a remote team, I explore the social, emotional and even spiritual challenges of remote work.

Things that affect a team’s experience of work and can have a huge effect not just on productivity, but on engagement, relationships and at the end of the day, enjoyment, confidence and ease in the work we do.

In part one I explore these themes by identifying 3 challenges of working a world apart, in part 2 we’ll explore ways to meet those challenges, and finally, hopefully take an opportunity to enlarge our own world by learning how we can influence the world we work in for our colleagues in part 3.

Three challenges of cross cultural remote work

Time

As someone based in Australia, if I’m meeting with the American team, meetings happen super early for me so that I may meet them before they clock off for the afternoon or I’m catching them after 5pm…

While they’re pouring their evening wine, just quietly, I may still be in my pyjamas…

At the other end of the day, when I’m finishing, my colleagues in Europe are just starting. So if we’re trying to catch each other, one of us may be running out of steam after a busy day, the other may not have had coffee yet… entirely possible that neither of us operating at peak performance.

Furthermore, as someone who manages a team of people who spans all the geographical regions we operate in, it’s impossible for me to meet with everyone without it being inconvenient for at least one group.

To get around this we may well have 2 meetings where if we were all colocated, it would only be 1… this puts stress on available time to do other things so it adds pressure to my to do list.

Finally, as much as we become accustomed to working asynchronously, in some cases no amount of excellent note taking makes up for having all the voices together. We work with these inconveniences, but stress on a normal cadence of 9-5 work doesn’t help the social and relational aspect of being on a team, or for that matter, help your family life.

Challenge number two is one of language.

Language

Even given that in our workplace we all speak English, it’s easy to assume that everyone communicates or understands the same as me. This is not the case, native speakers use idioms and phrases that either mean nothing to non English speakers, or mean something completely different!

By way of example, this is Ignacio. His first language is Spanish and I believe his bemused face is because of all the acronyms in Slack that he was having to look up on Urban Dictionary…

Because he’s a super guy he documented them all for us in a glossary, translated hilariously and some of which you can see here, or in its entirety if you follow this link…

Acronyms is an easy example, we use them ALL the time, especially in these days of texting and Slack conversations. We move fast and contract what we’re saying to speed things up… but this doesn’t make it easier for those who are not first speakers of the dominant language.

But, even if you’re speaking the same language, the meanings, or the usage in different cultures may change… For example, if you asked me to do something for you now… when would you expect it to happen? Eventually? later? Shortly? Or Immediately?

And if I said just now?

And what about if I said now now or finally, right now?

This is Jade, she’s from South Africa, and she recently shared with us how they use NOW where she’s from… and to pretty much everyone’s surprise, this is what she showed us…??

Now… means I’ll get to it eventually… it doesn’t even necessarily mean TODAY!!

Just now? I’ll get to it later, sooner than eventually… but… later..
Now now… well, you might feel like you’re getting somewhere close to immediately… but… well… basically it means I’ll get to it as soon as I can… finally, if you said right now then you’d be getting somewhere!!!

Isn’t it wild? In Jade’s context, only one of the iterations of the word now, actually means immediately… which contradicts what most of the English first speakers in the company would expect!

Culture

The 3rd and final challenge is that of culture, which is not one I feel as though I can speak to with great authority because I have only truly experienced my own culture. Additionally, the way I interpret someone else’s responses and behaviour is also through the lens of my culture and not always with a deep understanding and empathy for theirs.

That said, from my reading and conversations with people at work here are just some of the elements of work that may be different according to your culture

• How loudly and assertively we disagree
• The value of silence in a conversation
• Task oriented versus relationship oriented is not just personality related, it can be cultural too
• Whether you start from a place of trust rather than suspicion will vary according to where you’re from.
• People from different backgrounds may demonstrate skill sets and effectiveness in different ways

Of course, this list is not definitive nor is it particularly detailed. I’m sure there are a great many other ways that culture affects how we express ourselves and how our expressions affect our own and our colleagues’ experience.

These challenges of diverse, distributed work have a common thread in that they contribute to distance between people. I think we would all agree that in order to have productive, enjoyable working experiences we need to close that distance. The next post in the series will explore how to do so.

What’s your experience of cross cultural work been like? Do you have any funny or informative stories of miscommunication? Any challenges you’ve navigated that we’d all be able to learn from? Drop a comment below, let’s chat.