Getting Ready and Feeling Ready
… Well they are two different things
The arrival of the 2022-23 academic year is here. Students are arriving on campus, residence hall rooms are being given one final check, faculty orientation is underway, deliveries of golf-carts are being unloaded and summer is over. As I speak to HigherEd Pros and faculty, a common theme is that the summer was both a respite and a blur. Long-delayed vacations, weddings and other life events were happening at an aggressive pace, all the while, back at work - we experienced the departures of long-time colleagues and the arrival of new ones.
When it came to June and July, people seemed to put themselves first - some intentionally and others because they had a ‘use it or lose it’ directive regarding vacation time and PTO. Offices were staffed flexibly, yet consistently, with staff available in person or remotely. Blurred Zoom backgrounds replaced the actual walls of hotels, Airbnbs, in-law homes or RVs. Our hotspots and wifi were pushed to their limits as we fulfilled our responsibilities, but made time to reboot. And now, we are here on campus staring at what is ahead of us.
Some offices look different, not only where we work, but how we work, and who we work with. New leaders making moves, seasoned leaders settling in, and throughout all of it comes the students. Remember them? The folks we are here to serve, challenge and support. However, without a reality check on how YOU are doing and how well you are prepared for the year ahead, the students won’t receive the center-stage treatment that they are hoping for. Conversations with colleagues feels eerily similar campus to campus, individual to individual, with a common mantra of, “I’m ready, but I’m not ready.”
Let me ask you. Do you feel like you are tired of the constant pivot of the last 2+ years, but when faced with reality, you are unwilling to return to the pre-pandemic ways? If you answered yes. You are not alone. If this feeling is making you feel like you are struggling a bit, that is normal.
Leaders need to be tuned into this organizational struggle, and by leveraging two opportunities: process and people, they can be positioned for a more successful 2022-23 year. Consider this:
Processes: we know that every department is embedded with ‘pandemic business practices’ that are worthy of becoming standard practice. Rather than label it a ‘new practice’ or a ‘pandemic change’, start calling it what it is: our process. Students do not know any better… they don’t remember the practices pre-March 2020. The current process is their process and while you may not have been striving for it, the world of work changed around you. Now is the time for leaders to embrace the process, clean it up, polish it off, and love it for all its glory.
People: With the arrival of ‘new’ faces that may have never met all their coworkers outside of a Zoom screen, we need to roll back and make no assumptions that any level of meaningful connection has taken shape. However, we cannot force interaction and create cringe-worthy approaches to orient one another to staff that is neither new, nor inexperienced in our culture and our ways of work. Leadership can utilize the pandemic as a viable reason for changing management style and techniques. Acknowledging that work can be done differently (in-person/ hybrid/remote), but that doesn’t mean that nurturing an effective team is pushed to the wayside. Leaders must consider where collaboration and trust must exist in the year ahead.
While the burden may be sitting on the shoulders of leadership, those on the team also have a responsibility to highlight where opportunities exist to utilize ‘process and people’ toward a more functional organization. An organization where every individual knows the difference between getting ready and feeling ready.