Virtual Hangouts & How to Lead Your Team Virtually

On 22nd April, The Courage Factory’s Amanda Parker joined IE Business School’s DACH Alumni Chapter to host a virtual hangout on How to Lead Your Team Virtually. Over 60 of you joined us from all over the region to talk about what it means to lead a virtual team, especially during today’s climate of uncertainty.

You shared the challenges you are facing at the moment with leading your teams virtually.

Some of the struggles we discussed were:

• Managing super extra workload for the whole team
• FInding the right mix between team communication and 1-on-1 comms
• Having THE "difficult" conversations
• Being able to feel the mood of people
• Missing the interactions at coffee machine with colleagues
• Too many meetings all of a sudden
• Work day never ends, somehow you feel you work longer than on-site.

We discussed these 4 Best Practices;

1. Showing Compassion & Empathy
2. Communicating Effectively
3. Practicing Self-Care & Resilience
4. How to Lead in a Crisis (This is Not Business as Usual)

There was a wealth of tools, knowledge, and ideas from everyone who joined as you shared tips, tricks, and commitments that you’ve made to yourself and your teams.

Some of the commitments you made during today’s session were:

•  Making more one on one calls just to check in on how they are coping.
• Start every day with a walk or run. So I at least know I ve been out once.
• Asking people what they need - its simple but I hadn't done that!
• Put the phone on silent, turn out notifications in WhatsApp.
• Sit in the sun each day during lunch break.
• Have more online coffee breaks with my team to chat.
• I will start with the Self-Care. Because if I am not ok, others will be affected by start.
• Setting boundaries - blocking some time as "unavailable" in my calendar.

Thanks for the great feedback that’s already been shared. Here’s what you had to say:

“I just attended a fantastic virtual leadership event hosted by Amanda. Really great content. I would highly recommend The Courage Factory.” - Belinda Holdsworth

“An amazing session Amanda! Super useful. Many thanks!” - George Tsiakas

“Amanda...thanks for the session. Good advice to brush up my leadership skills. I very much liked the call to action to make one commitment today to improve my virtual team leadership. I’ll let you know how it went.” - Simon Philip Rost

Here are some links I promised to share with you following today’s session:

•  How to be productive and establish routines
• How to give effective feedback - a feedback model developed by CCL
• How to set boundaries when working from home
• Leading in the new “normal”

Thanks again to all of you who showed up today!

You were an active and engaged group - and it was genuinely fun to watch the discussion unfold! Just by signing up to participate it is clear that your commitment to your team and to be a better leader is strong. It was great to interact with you all and to feel the energy and enthusiasm for this topic.

If you want to continue to enhance your virtual leadership, sign up for the Leading Virtual Teams Online Course - which has a special launch price of 27EUR until the 8th of May!

If you want more personalized support, schedule a 20-minute discovery call with Amanda to learn how Leadership Coaching can support you to reach your goals.

Please continue to share your commitments and other key learnings from today’s masterclass in the social sphere (we’re on Facebook, LinkedIn, and Instagram) - Be sure to tag @couragefactory in your post!

Amanda is the Founder of The Courage Factory and an Online Leadership Coach who helps leaders clarify and connect to their inner purpose to find more fulfillment in their work & life.