Covid fatigue or proficiency gap – how is your team starting 2021?

photo by Standsome Worklifestyle on Unsplash

As you start to focus on your 2021 business objectives, now would be a good time for a pulse check with your team. How are they reconciling their adjusted work routine? Has your team settled into the new way of working? Do they have what they need? Have they adopted and adapted to the working arrangements you have created during covid?

When people go through rapid change (covid), they can adapt and keep pace for a certain time, using adrenalin and determination to get through to the desired adjustment. It’s when the adrenaline wears off and things settle to the new normal that reverting back to old ways is most common. This is also when you start to see gaps in proficiency. Where what you trained people to do is not producing the desired output months later and results are less than expected. Problems start to show in work efficiency and productivity.

It’s easy to blame this on covid fatigue. To dismiss the productivity gaps as part of the times instead of a symptom of something missing or in need of adjustment. It’s true, we are all impacted by covid fatigue at the moment, it’s impossible not to be. But how do you differentiate so you can you improve what is in your control?

The way to analyse this is to review and summarize the changes you made to work processes and working conditions. Next, summarize the impacts to work routines each of these have had. These are the elements you will use to create your list of measurement questions for your team feedback session. If you have multiple teams, use the same questions for all teams so you can collate the responses and get an overall measure on results for the organization.  

I recommend holding the feedback session in person (using Zoom or Teams etc.) so that your team can benefit from the assessment discussion and learn what is impacting their colleagues. If you have too many employees to make this practical, select 10 – 12 participants who are a good representation of your teams.

The results will show the key areas you need to address so your teams have what they need to begin the year. You will also have insight into how covid fatigue is impacting your team and their productivity. The good news is, while you may not be able to do anything to change covid, you will have clarity on how to continue supporting your team(s) through it. This feedback practice is good to repeat quarterly to stay intune and aligned.

Often simply being aware and creating a space to acknowledge and talk about it is enough to help people get through it. Regardless of your results, the process itself helps your team refocus, resolve potential obstacles and get aligned.

If you would like to learn more about this or to schedule a free consultation on how to create a custom change analysis, visit cindyshaw.ca or connect with me via email cindyshaw@me.com.