Picture this – you show up for your first day at a brand new job to find a locked door and no one waiting to meet you. You weren’t given any instructions and aren’t sure who to call. You can feel what was once excitement quickly turn to nerves.

Surely situations like these, which are surprisingly common, can be avoided?

Yes, they can – and should!

With a bit of preparation and information, you can give your new employee the great experience that they deserve. Still, there’s more to setting them up for success than simply greeting them at the door.

Success from Day 1: How to Onboard Like a Pro

Have you ever been chucked into the deep end in a new workplace? If so, you’d know how tough it is. It’s difficult to be a good performer when trying to learn the ropes as well.

Organizational socialization is the journey where new employees become accustomed to the culture of a new workplace. How the existing workforce guides them through the process has significant, long-term impacts on their performance and the business. So we want to make sure that we get it right, helping them become well-adjusted to be the best team member they can be.

Better newcomer adjustment correlates to employee satisfaction, commitment to work, turnover rates, and performance. To stay ahead of the game, organizations need to understand and manage the process of newcomer socialization. If an employee is promptly and thoroughly socialized, there is more likely to be higher retention, accelerated return on investment, and an overall more effective employee.

Successful onboarding doesn’t happen in one day. It’s a continuous process that usually occurs in four stages:

Phase 1: Pre-onboarding

Pre-onboarding begins once your candidate accepts your offer until their first day at work. This time presents an excellent opportunity to make your new hire feel good about what lies ahead. Help employees fill out the necessary paperwork and check in regularly to see if they need anything to make the transition smooth.

Social media giant Twitter is a fan of making the pre-onboarding phase memorable. Before they start, a new hire can look forward to their email address, a T-shirt, and a bottle of wine waiting for them.

Phase 2: Welcoming new hires

Here is where you begin to help your new hires acclimate to their new workplace. You’ll give them a clear picture of the organization, the culture, what they can expect from their role, and how things work.

Preparation is key

In an ideal world, new employees would come on board with plenty of time for handover and training. Unfortunately, this can’t always happen. And when there’s a gap, it tends to make the workload heavier for everyone else.

While you want your employee to work the magic you hired them for ASAP, you can’t just throw them in the deep end and hope for the best. Even in difficult circumstances, you’ve got to take the time to set them up for success. And it all starts with a little preparation that will be worth it in the long run!

Here are some things that you can do to help prepare:

1. Onboarding package

Onboarding packages help your new employee feel welcomed and valued. While you might have a generic onboarding package that you’ve used for years, it may be time to revisit this. An onboarding package should include information that a new hire needs and details about the company that help them connect to its story and mission.

Here are some things that an onboarding package should include:

• Keys, fob, and a lanyard.
• Information sheet. It can include logins, corporate memberships, an office map with team names, and a directory.
• An agenda for their first day or week of work.
• Information about the organization’s mission, vision, structure, culture, and story. If you have an employee rewards or perks system, here is a great place to include details about it.
• A personal welcome message from the CEO or other directors of the company.
• Recommendations and tips. For example, you could include different Chrome extensions or websites that they’ll find helpful in their role.

2. Schedule it in

Making an employee’s onboarding experience awesome will be critical to their long-term success at work. So make sure that you’ve thought about how you’re going to make it valuable and fun.

Every hour of the onboarding period doesn’t need to be filled with activities, but it’s nice to have them scattered throughout to help them adjust. At LinkedIn, new employees are given a hiring plan that outlines their onboarding over a 90 day period. It helps them transition into the company and achieve success in their new role.

Check out these 5 ways you can make your new team member feel welcome:

1. Give them some swag

Fill a bag with branded swag to help your employee feel even more excited about joining the team. It can include stickers, key chains, a tote bag, a clothing item, your product, or something related to your industry.

At Digital Ocean they provide new hires with a balloon on their desk so other employees can find them, a handwritten welcome note, a bottle of champagne, and some Digital Ocean branded items. Popping a bottle after your first day of work? Yes, please.

2. Schedule coffee dates

Booking coffee dates with different employees helps your new team member network. While it’s important they get to know the members of their department, it’s also helpful to know people from all over the organization.

You could also try setting up a mentorship program to foster more intimate relationships. At Buffer, the onboarding program is six weeks long. New hires are assigned three “Buddies” who each play a different role – a Leader Buddy, Role Buddy, and a Culture Buddy.

3. Have a photoshoot

If it’s custom for employees to have their photo taken in front of your company logo or sign, make sure you include your new hire in this tradition. It’s nice for them to have a matching LinkedIn photo to the rest of the team.

4. Send out a welcome email

Welcome them by sending out a company-wide email. An email gets everyone on the same page that there is a new hire and to get excited. You could even take a leaf from ticketing tech giant Eventbrite’s book and put up new hire profiles around the office so that everyone can quickly learn the names and faces of new hires.

5. Set up their workspace

Make sure that their computer, desk, and tools are all set up and ready to go. Go above and beyond by asking before their first day if there’s anything they special they need or want.

Phase 3: Role-specific training

The training phase is critical and impacts how well your employees will thrive. Make it detailed, meaningful, without being overwhelming. Quora is one example of a company that drives hires to make meaningful contributions by teaching them the principles for success. Each new hire is assigned a mentor, given detailed documents on the key concepts and tools they need, and steered towards organizational socialization.

Phase 4: Easing the transition to their new role

Here is where your new hire transitions into a well-versed employee. Keep checking in to ensure that your employee is happy, performing well, and set up for ongoing success. Ask for feedback on their onboarding experience to gain insight on what you can do better in future onboardings.

One of the main contributors to employee satisfaction, motivation, and success is knowing where they’re going and what steps they need to advance their careers. Set up a career guide that tells employees the competencies and training needed to move up in various departments.

At S.C Johnson & Son, this has proven successful. By making the promotion process clear, they’ve found that employees are more empowered and proactive in their career development.

Meetings that don’t have a proper agenda can be a big waste of time. People forget things and valuable company time is wasted when you’re trying to recall what you wanted to talk about.

A meeting agenda removes all the pressure of trying to think of something on the spot. What’s even better is that a 1:1 meeting agenda brings everyone up to speed.

If you called an employee into a 1:1 they didn’t know about they wouldn’t have anything prepared. Unprepared meetings tend to waffle on and provide little to no value for the people in them.

Increase the effectiveness of your meetings by reading this article. We take a deep dive into how to create a productive one-on-one meeting agenda. Effective agendas benefit managers, staff, and the company’s bottom line.

The Importance of 1:1 Meeting Agendas

Before we dive into what an excellent 1:1 meeting agenda looks like you need to know why they’re important. You probably have your own way of doing things but if you’re looking at this article you must be wondering if your meeting plan is as effective as it could be.

Good meetings should help to keep business and personal goals aligned. Remember, your staff isn’t here because they just want to make the business money. One-to-one meetings are a great way to make sure everyone is working towards common goals.

Employees who have regular 1:1 meetings with their manager are 3x more likely to be engaged with their work. The feedback and guidance that comes out of these meetings help employees to advanced their careers. They feel seen and good meetings can help create company loyalty.

There are reports of reduced turnover when businesses implement one-on-one meetings. It’s said that people leave managers. They don’t leave companies. And meetings can help to develop a deeper bond between a manager and their subordinates.

It’s an opportunity to continually train your people. This makes your team more productive and increases their knowledge base to support each other. Regular meetings mean ample opportunity to discuss roadblocks, new ideas, and anything bothering the staff. It can lead to a significant uptick in productivity.

A shared agenda plan

The best change you can make to your one-on-one meetings is to create a shared space to discuss the agenda. Create a space on the collaborative software your team use or have a paper copy that can be shared between the manager and their report. It should be something that’s easily accessed and editable.

If both parties can be fully prepared for the meeting they will be far more effective. Don’t withhold any topics from your staff to try to catch them off guard. Someone unaware of something is going to be unprepared.

You might think that your staff should be prepared for everything but this is highly impractical and completely unfair.

Meetings that have a clear agenda tend to be more productive. Without one, it can be easy to lose track or get distracted. A well-defined 1:1 meeting agenda will keep a meeting flowing and avoid running over the scheduled end time.

When setting the agenda ahead of time be upfront about difficult conversations. A one-to-one meeting is a great place to discuss employee performance and provide feedback. Encourage employees to add areas of concern to the agenda as well.

Allow your staff to prepare for difficult conversations because if they haven’t had time to prepare it can lead to missed information. If their recent performance has raised concerns there could be legitimate reasons behind it.

New agenda items should be added as and when they become relevant. A courtesy would be to nudge the other party to make sure they’ve seen the updated agenda in your shared workspace.

What should you discuss in your meeting?

The right structure is necessary to keep meetings productive and make sure staff can return to work at the agreed-upon time. Below is a list of great topics to help you create a one-on-one meeting agenda that benefits everyone.

Discuss the week: At the top of the meeting, discuss the events of the previous or current week, depending on when you have the meeting.

Hindrances: Ask your employee if there have been any roadblocks they’ve encountered with their duties. If yes, check what can be done to remove them.

Successes: Have there been any wins your report has been a part of? Take the time to praise them and discuss what has gone well.

Concerns: This is the best situation to raise any concerns you may have. Allow employees the opportunity to offer explanations and work together to grow from issues.

Goals: Talk about business goals and your employee’s personal goals. Try to show how these align and discuss growth opportunities.

Responsibilities: Leading on from growth opportunities, you can discuss their current responsibilities. Do they have enough bandwidth to carry them out? Are they ready to take on more?

Action plan: Work together to create an action plan of items they can work on for review in upcoming meetings. It could be undertaking new learning or completing a complex task.

Next meeting agenda: Wrap up the meeting by discussing the agenda of the next meeting. Were any items missed this week? Are there upcoming milestones your report should prepare for?

Tips for your one-on-one meeting agendas

1. Meeting schedule

Don’t let meetings overrun unless absolutely necessary. A good one-to-one meeting should last 30 or 60 minutes depending on how much there is to discuss. Avoid getting distracted and stick to the agenda.

Of course, there will occasionally be unforeseen circumstances beyond your control. Push things to the next meeting if possible, as that can avoid things dragging on.

2. Informal chat

Make time for an informal chat at the beginning of the meeting. This helps to nurture a more personal relationship with your staff. People have a life outside of the office and it’s human nature to appreciate when someone takes an interest.

3. Constructive criticism

Avoid making conversations personal, especially if you have to provide criticism. Make sure the conversation is rooted firmly in their work and not about them as a person. All criticism should be constructive and provide value. What lessons should be learned from the discussions?

4. Negative feedback and feedforward

Nobody likes to hear negative feedback as it can feel like they’re being attacked. Instead, consider framing things as negative feedforward. Feedforward focuses on future behaviors, on things that should be avoided or changed. It can be more effective than negative feedback because it’s less about their character and is less personal.

5. Take Notes

Throughout the meeting, you should be taking notes of what your report says. It’s useful to refer back to when preparing for the next meeting. Share your notes with your employee using your collaborative workspace or give them a hard copy. This will help to keep them accountable and they will be able to use it when preparing for the next meeting too.

We have all been to those unproductive, time-suck meetings where the most important thing isn’t even covered. Or meetings that are irrelevant for half the people in attendance.

Time spent at a meeting certainly isn’t free. Consider a thirty minute meeting with twenty people–that’s ten hours of work.

If the meeting is useless, it’s money down the drain.

An effective meeting agenda ensures you achieve the objective of the meeting and the company works closer toward its goals.

Whether you’re planning the quarterly team meeting with all hands on deck, a weekly status update, or something in-between, here are some pointers to bear in mind when creating an agenda and mapping out meetings.

State the Objective

“If you cannot succinctly state what the objective of the meeting is, you should not have it. The rest of the meeting is useless unless you have clarity around the objective,” says time management expert Helen Seguara.

Keep it Simple

The purpose can be written in one sentence, or even a phrase. Rather than simply naming the topic, a results-driven meeting includes metrics or solutions sought. A meeting about “Culture of Entitlement” won’t get at the heart of the issue. “3 Causes of Culture of Entitlement in the Workplace” gives the topic enough focus to generate constructive discussion.

In order to clarify the “why” for the meeting, it’s helpful to ask “what is the risk if I don’t have this meeting?” For example, if the purpose is to “Map out next year’s budget”, the risk is that the company is not authorized to spend if decisions are not reached at the meeting.

Is a Meeting Necessary?

Also ask if the “why” necessitates discussion. A meeting provides a forum for constructive discussion in order to come to decisions and solutions about a topic or problem.

If the “why” is simply the dissemination of information (e.g., letting everyone know about a new product or software) then it could possibly be accomplished another way. Sending an email and making sure everyone responds is one way to ensure the information is digested and understood.

Narrow the Focus

We have so much going on in our workplaces and issues to address. However, ideally, a meeting has one central objective. A laundry list of items to cover creates lethargy, and poses scenarios where some of those present aren’t relevant to the topics discussed.

First Things First

A meeting isn’t a time to save the best for last, or start with something small in order to warm people up. We’re most alert at the beginning of a meeting, so schedule the most important items first.

Ranking Priority

It can be tricky sometimes to determine which item is the most important. One way is to simply ask: what do I most want to get done at this meeting?

It’s easy to think that urgent topics are the most important. However, as meetings are primarily about discussion, they can sometimes slow an urgent issue down! Rather, focus on what adds value to the team and furthers company goals for prioritizing agenda items.

Rank all other items in order of decreasing importance.

If you have several items on the agenda, business advisor Kristin Arnold suggests labeling them by importance, as you may not get to everything. “A” means something that must be accomplished at the meeting, “B” are things that should be accomplished, and “C” are things that are important, but not critical at the moment.

Clarify Topic and Desired Result

Be specific about the agenda items, stating both the topic and the expected outcome. A meeting to discuss “Podcast” may create a meandering, unfocused discussion. However, “Podcast Schedule” or “Podcast Interview Topics” lets everyone know where to take the conversation.

Adjust if Necessary

An agenda is a roadmap that serves to achieve the objective of the meeting. If the agenda starts to hinder the objective, it’s ok to adjust and let the meeting take a slightly different course.

For example, if the discussion around the central topic takes more time than planned, let things flow. Resolving critical issues when everyone is present is more important than getting to every item on the agenda. For that reason, it’s critical to schedule the most important items first.

Cover the Basics

An effective meeting agenda makes everything crystal clear. Always include the when, the where, and the who.

When

“The longer the meeting, the less is accomplished.” Tim Cook

To value everyone’s time, keep meetings as short as possible. An efficient meeting moves right along and doesn’t allow for tangents or for people to drone on unnecessarily.

When planning, evaluate everything that needs to be discussed to determine the length of the meeting. If there is too much going on, it’s possibly a sign that the agenda needs to be divided into two meetings.

Indicate the amount of time allotted to each agenda item.

Consistently starting meetings on time gets employees into the habit of being punctual.

Where

An agenda always states where the meeting is held, even if that seems obvious. It eliminates confusion for new employees, or if the workplace has several meeting rooms. People showing up in the wrong place creates totally unnecessary delay.

Who

Indicate on the agenda who needs to be in attendance, and why. And indicate the role anyone will play at the meeting—who will present each agenda topic, for example.

For the sake of efficiency, it’s important to allow employees unrelated to the topic to skip out of the meeting and get to work. One way to do this is to have a short staff meeting, then right afterwards a manager’s meeting: this way, important topics are discussed, and with the right people.

Do Your Homework

If a meeting starts without critical metrics or someone arrives not knowing they will to present, it probably won’t be a powerful meeting.

For the meeting to be effective, everyone who is expected to attend needs to see the agenda ahead of time.

Employees expected to present or to bring data need time to prepare beforehand.

Before a meeting, ask yourself “What does success look like?” and think through each step of the meeting. This provides clarity around your objective and ensures you have dotted the i’s and crossed the t’s before entering the meeting room.

Call Out a Job Well Done

A meeting is a ripe opportunity to build cohesion and camaraderie within your base.

In the same way that musicians perform better to audiences than when alone, employees who feel their work is acknowledged by a supportive group of peers are more inclined to do their best work.

This is a widely-studied phenomenon called social facilitation.

Always take time at the beginning of a meeting to call out individuals and teams for work well done with applause or even prizes. Consistent recognition for excellence cultivates a positive environment where productivity flourishes.

Beep Beep! Parking Lots

If you’ve run an effective, well-planned meeting, that means you’ve stuck to the agenda topics. However, attendees may have a pressing issue they want to discuss that’s not on the agenda.

Scheduling “parking lots” into your meeting provides a window to air off-topic concerns or suggestions.

The workplace watercooler was once the gathering point where people could take a breath and connect with another human being. Stories of children, pets, hobbies, and even love interests were shared loosely and with gusto.

Communities tend to happen naturally wherever people congregate, but what do we do when people are not physically gathering?

While people participated in the remote workforce long before the global pandemic, managing whole teams virtually has brought with it some challenges… but also some delightful perks. You don’t have to look far to see great examples of innovation and creativity bringing people together through a screen and microphone.

When it comes to building a truly inclusive remote working community, here are some of our best tips.

Set the Tone

Consider the fact that many people on your team are relatively new to remote work and may not understand the norms of virtual etiquette.

Simple things like changing your background to something silly, allowing your cat to sit on your lap, or starting off the meeting with a fun icebreaker is a great way to set the tone for what is acceptable, while also allowing people to feel comfortable in this virtual space.

Be clear on virtual expectations, write them down, and ensure that everyone understands them.

Do you start meetings with cameras on or off? Do you make use of the raise hand function? Do you encourage use of the platform’s chat function? Whatever your technical standards may be, ensure they are written down and communicated.

Aside from technical expectations, take a moment to acknowledge that people will be working in a number of physical spaces: a home office, the kitchen table, a local cafe, or a coworking space, just to name a few. Some people may even have tiny humans running around. Part of fostering an inclusive work environment is ensuring that people feel welcome and their contributions valued, however and wherever they contribute.

Hold Space for Vulnerability

We may all be in the same storm, but not everyone is in the same boat.

Understanding that people may be struggling with any number of things is the bare minimum. Follow up with this knowledge by creating a space where people feel comfortable being vulnerable and asking for help when they need it.

Leading by example is key, teams will be looking towards their higher ups for what is acceptable. When leadership authentically shares that they are struggling with something, it not only opens the doors for others to share, but also to offer help or guidance.

One creative way that companies are fostering these spaces is by designating certain chat channels to topics and support groups, like ones for parents or those who may be caring for elderly families. Informal water coolers or digital break rooms are also a helpful way to encourage less formal mingling.

It is difficult to be vulnerable with people you have yet to meet in person, but fostering a space where all are welcome and feel as though they are heard will go a long way.

Be Considerate of Others Time – Don’t Micromanage

Back in the day, you could walk by someone’s desk and note a pile of paperwork that needed to be dealt with or filed. You could see books open, full calendars on the wall, and meeting rooms occupied by busy bodies.

While there are still digital ways to see if someone is available like out of office automatic replies, blocked digital calendar slots, or even offline notifications, don’t make assumptions about other people’s time or how they are managing it. If work is being submitted on time, then you can trust that whatever system they have in place is sufficient. If the work isn’t being done on time, it may be appropriate to reevaluate expectations to ensure that they are reasonable.

Before the pandemic forced everyone online, it was a commonly held belief that people working from home worked less. Studies have found the very opposite to be true – people who work remotely tend to actually work more… it just may not be during traditional work hours or even in the same time zone.

If you want to be truly inclusive, you need to recognize that people have a variety of hours that they are most productive and mentally available. Whether someone works early in the morning or late at night, if a task is completed on time, there is no need to micromanage the details in between. Becoming outcome-oriented is beneficial to both leaders and their team and makes the best use of everyone’s time.

Offering a variety of ways that people can check in without having meetings is another considerate gesture. Even if your meetings are as short as 1 hour, if there are 10 people in attendance, you have pulled away 10 hours of potential productivity. Using collaborative technology, it is easy for your team to leave a note with the status of projects or pending to-dos.

You can offer a variety of ways to check in and submit reports without an hour long meeting.

Value Diversity and Inclusion

You don’t have to look very far to find piles of studies demonstrating the benefits of fostering a diverse work environment. A Boston Consulting Group (BCG) found that diversity was directly correlated to innovation which inturn resulted in an average of 19% more revenue for the companies that embraced it. The study also found that it wasn’t enough to simply have a diverse team, diversity needed to be present at all levels of the organization for the most benefit.

Different experiences shape a variety of perspectives. These perspectives then determine how we look at problems and the solutions that we find to solve them. In essence, everyone wins when inclusion is a priority.

It is important to understand that many people were forced into remote work based on situations beyond their control and they may be struggling. Taking extra care to check in with parents and minorities and other more vulnerable or underserved populations will go a long way to show that you see them and value their input.

With a little intentionality and consideration, you can foster an inclusive remote working community that your team is proud to be a part of.

Creating an inclusive environment at work yields a wide array of benefits for both employees and organizations. There is now a body of research on the topic suggesting that companies with an inclusive culture and diverse teams have seen a substantial boost in revenue and value creation.

However, it’s safe to say that the COVID-19 pandemic and the remote-first work that came as a result have affected businesses’ efforts to create a more inclusive workspace.

During such trying times, ensuring that people work in an inclusive space is more important than ever, and addressing this need isn’t necessarily a straightforward task. In this article, we’ll discuss exactly how organizations can embrace their employees and help them feel cared for and included at work.

Let’s dive right in, shall we?

What does an inclusive workplace look like?

The end goal of creating an inclusive workspace is to make every employee feel appreciated while also taking their differences into account. Similarly, it’s crucial to understand how these differences contribute to the organization’s success. To achieve this, businesses must aim to negate any bias towards their least represented workers.

As a result of successfully implementing inclusion practices, all employees will feel that they can bring a valuable contribution to the company’s success. Plus, an inclusive workspace should foster a sense of mindfulness regarding the type of issues that different people might have to deal with, as well as how these issues impact their quality of life and performance at work.

Why inclusion matters more than ever

The global pandemic ushered in a new world of remote work, which has forced unprecedented changes in all of our lives. However, it’s important to mention that various groups of people have felt these effects more than others.

Now is the time when organizations should take care of all of their employees, especially the ones from underrepresented communities.

In an office setting, taking care of each other is more seamless than in remote environments. It’s much more effortless to speak to people, ask them about how they are, and observe their behavior for signs of stress or depression. Working remotely has made these interactions more challenging, which means that both individuals and organizations should take the necessary steps to express care and support.

Inclusion can’t be backed exclusively by systemic or individual efforts; it must always be a combination of both. This way, a company can rid itself of both conscious and unconscious biases in formal and informal processes.

Below, we’ll take a closer look at the steps you can take to contribute to establishing an inclusive environment at work, both from an individual and a systemic standpoint.

1. Create space for non-work chat

Creating an inclusive environment strongly depends on building meaningful relationships. To do this, it’s essential to build trust with the people who work with you, understand their struggles, and share more about your own weaknesses and vulnerabilities. This will enable your employees to express themselves freely and feel understood. While it does seem like a very broad task, there are quite a few things you can do to express care.

Embrace the opportunity to share

Speaking about your vulnerabilities as a leader, manager, or C-suite officer is meant to inform your colleagues that they should feel free to do the same.

People from underrepresented communities have most likely had to deal with indifference, misunderstanding, discrimination, and microaggressions, which often makes them reluctant to speak about their issues. It’s extremely important to let them know that you’re willing to learn about their experiences and take them seriously.

Doing so also provides you with the opportunity to learn more about them and get to know them on a personal level. People enjoy speaking about the things that drive them, they also love feeling heard when they can open up about their vulnerabilities.

It’s also essential to learn about the effects of the pandemic and self-isolation on their wellbeing, which brings us to PEI check-ins.

Physical, Emotional, Intellectual (PEI) check-ins

As we mentioned above, it’s much easier to interact with your colleagues in an office. A work-from-home setting strips us of a wide array of interactions with our coworkers, making it harder to learn about how a person is feeling—this is why it’s imperative to have regular PEI check-ins.

Asking people about how they feel in a casual way is an important tenet of an inclusive environment. As a leader, you should allot time every week to learn how people feel physically, emotionally, and intellectually. These check-ins should be less of a formality and more of an opportunity to remind people that it’s okay to feel unwell during such trying times.

PEI check-ins can be held during work-related one-on-ones or outside them. If you opt for the former, make sure to start your call with the PEI update rather than leaving it for the end of the meeting. Avoid talking about work altogether, place the person’s wellbeing at the center of your focus, and listen intently. Being genuine during these conversations is paramount. If these check-ins feel like a mere formality, they’ll defeat the purpose of building a connection with your coworkers.

Bear in mind that open-ended questions are much more efficient in understanding how a person feels compared to close-ended ones:

• Are you feeling okay?
• How are you feeling?

Notice how the first question can only be answered with “yes” or “no,” and it’s at the person’s discretion whether they’d like to elaborate on their answer. By asking an open-ended question, we express our willingness to learn about how a person is doing.

Give people what they need

Aside from learning how people feel, it’s important to understand how you can help improve their wellbeing both within work and outside it. It’s safe to say that as a leader, you can’t effectively create an inclusive environment if you don’t really understand the issues that your colleagues are dealing with.

Consider making some thoughtful changes to your workflow that will make everyone just a little happier collectively, but don’t hesitate to learn about every individual’s needs and make adjustments accordingly:

• Ask your colleagues about the things that distract them or about the challenges that prevent them from being present at work;
• Consider making your meetings a few minutes shorter. Many people find social interactions hard in general. A bit of extra time will help them decompress and allow them to prepare for the next call. While this doesn’t seem like much, it means a lot to the people that need it;
• There’s a chance that there are people among your employees or team members who are “onlys” (the only person from a particular community). Often, they may feel left out or demotivated to speak about their issues or challenges. Make sure to spend some time chatting with them to learn more about their experience and how you can help them feel included and safe at work;
• As a leader, it’s essential to be willing to have challenging conversations about the mistakes you’ve made when interacting with underrepresented communities at work if you’ve done so. State your desire to learn and invite people from these communities to share their perspective and teach their colleagues how they can improve in this regard;

2. Identify communities that are most vulnerable to remote work

While supporting employee mental wellbeing is central to an inclusive workspace, it’s important to identify other ways of improving your colleague’s quality of life. Both short-term and long-term improvements can contribute to this goal.

Financial support

There is a variety of reasons why particular employees might need financial assistance during the pandemic—it’s important to learn about every person’s struggles and understand how you can be of assistance. Take a moment to think about the people that don’t really need extra income, but rather need reassurance that they won’t unexpectedly lose their jobs.

Here are a few suggestions:

• Offer hazard pay for your most vulnerable employees;
• Make a commitment to protect your employees’ jobs and income for as long as possible via flexible hours or shorter work weeks;
• Offer additional paid time off for the employees that need it most, like seniors, for instance;
• Join forces with other businesses or industries to help your employees find additional income sources;

Adjusted workflows

For many people, working remotely means that there will be a significant overlap between their professional and domestic responsibilities, and dealing with both can be pretty challenging. There is a variety of things an employer can do to assist them:

• Allow children to participate in meetings to relieve the stress some parents experience;
• Allow employees to define their own work schedules, so they can juggle both domestic and work-related responsibilities more efficiently;
• Offer logistic assistance to provide the right software and hardware for employees with disabilities;
• Offer flexible hours or extended paid care for people with care responsibilities;

Mental wellbeing through tech

Never hesitate to provide your colleagues with psychological support through apps and online resources. While expressing care personally is an essential part of an inclusive workplace, people will benefit greatly from additional resources that will help them deal with anxiety, depression, and solitude.

• Offer a package of mental wellbeing products like meditation or psychological support apps. A great addition to this would be tools and webinars on dealing with anxiety and depression;
• Ensure that your colleague’s work schedules are respected at all times to avoid remote burnout;
• Focus on maintaining your team’s spirits up via virtual happy hours and similar activities;

Adjusting jobs to individuals

We can’t really predict how long the COVID-19 pandemic will continue affecting our lives. Therefore, it’s essential to think about longer-term strategies to protect the vulnerable communities in your workforce. Here are a few things you should consider:

• Stay committed to remote work. Working from home is gradually becoming the new standard for the vast majority of office workers. Committing to continued remote work will allow your company to reduce the gender pay gap, create a better environment for people in the LGBTQ+ community, and grow your representation of people with disabilities;
• Consider offering non-transferable paternity leave. Remote work has made substantial changes in family roles. As an employer, you can help support this shift in perspective by allowing both parents to take paternity leave so that children can have the support they need. This enables both men and women to take their caregiving responsibilities seriously, as well as stimulate men’s participation in care work;
• Continue investing in your employees’ mental and psychological wellbeing through PEI check-ins and technology;

Better HR processes

As your company invests more time and effort into creating an inclusive culture in a remote environment, it’s essential to make changes in a wide array of human resources processes:

• Reevaluate hiring, pay, promotion, and termination. Your employees’ quality of life has changed drastically since the beginning of the pandemic, so has yours. Approach any decision regarding their employment and pay with this in mind and make the necessary adjustments to evaluate their work with their mental and psychological wellbeing in mind;
• When reevaluating these facets, make sure to have a diverse crowd voice its opinion on these changes;

3. Lead by example

It’s essential to take into account that your efforts in building an inclusive culture won’t automatically translate onto the rest of the company. The results of your inclusion policies will rely heavily on your leaders and higher management. A study published by Gartner suggests that about seven out of 10 employees think that the companies they work in fail to inform them about the means of promoting inclusion.

It is essential that everyone in the company is encouraged to value every employee’s contribution by expressing care for one another, advocating for respect and equality, as well as playing an active part in their colleagues’ growth and success.

To ensure that the inclusion strategy is successful, it’s important also to visualize what success exactly means in this regard. HR leaders should invest quite a bit of time and effort into translating what inclusion means on both a theoretical and a practical level.

There is a wide array of things that an inclusive management can do to promote these values in the rest of the company:

• Make open commitments towards inclusion and ask your colleagues to hold you accountable. This will help promote the cause and motivate fellow workers to take part in such commitments;
• Motivate your colleagues to participate in various inclusive practices, which they will commit to on a weekly basis;
• Promote fairness within your team. Make sure to give credit to the people that came up with a solution to a problem and always return the conversation to the person that was interrupted. It’s also important to spot people that are typically passive during meetings and help them join the conversation to make their voice heard;
• Set an example by becoming a true ally of members of underrepresented communities at work. Consider calling out male-centric work culture and language, as well as instances of non-inclusive and unfair behavior;
• Be curious about other people’s experiences and seek to learn from them. While this may sound like a straightforward thing to do, it does demand a fair amount of mindfulness and intention. Listen carefully to what your colleagues have to say and prevent interruptions, especially when it comes to members of underrepresented communities. Actively seek out their opinions on work-related matters so that they can share their perspective on things;

4. Remain committed to the cause

The focus of our article revolves around building a long-lasting inclusive culture in your organization, and it’s important to underline that a mere one-shot diversity training simply won’t cut it. As a leader, it’s essential to opt for changing behavior rather than just informing your coworkers about inclusion. Your efforts should be organization-wide and conducted over a long period of time.

• Your company’s C-suite officers and board members must show their public support for inclusion policies, incorporate diversity and inclusion in the company’s purpose, and take responsibility for the success of these changes;
• Aside from showing its support for the cause, the higher management itself should become a diverse and inclusive space. Increasing the number of people from underrepresented communities that are part of the strategy process is instrumental in building and maintaining a diverse and inclusive culture;
• It’s essential to rethink and reform the hiring and selection processes since they can often increase bias. For instance, often, jobs are advertised exclusively to graduates of certain universities. Another common issue is that managers very rarely select people from minority groups for client-facing or revenue-generating positions;
• Set clear and measurable inclusion-related objectives for your managers. A few examples of such goals are employee engagement, equity, and psychological safety. To ensure that these objectives can be measured, consider setting KPIs for each of them;

The bottom line

The vast majority of businesses around the world have suffered from the uncertainty that was brought upon us by the global pandemic. However, there’s no doubt that employee experience should be at the very top of your organization’s priorities.

Investing time, money, and effort into keeping your employees happy and cared for is essential for talent retention, higher productivity, and overall business success.

Let’s do a quick recap of the steps higher management, leaders, and individuals should commit to in order to create a more inclusive environment at work:

• Make some space for non-work chat. Even providing people with the most basic emotional support can be extremely useful when done genuinely. Ask people about how they feel, and listen carefully. Learn more about the troubles they’re going through, understand how you can help, and don’t hesitate to normalize sharing by telling people about your own vulnerabilities;
• Identify the people that need extra support and provide them with the additional financial, emotional, and technological assistance to improve their quality of life;
• Call out exclusive behavior and lead by example. Inclusion is more than just company-wide memos and seminars. It relies on the dedication and mindfulness of individuals;
• Inclusion is not an end goal. It’s a continuous and long-lasting transformation process.