Digital Innovations // 8 Ways To Inspire Team Greatness

Guest Post By Linda McGaw

In Part III of a 3 part series, Linda McGaw – Founder of DYNALIM – shares with us ways in which digital innovations have made it easier to inspire greatness in teams despite challenges. In the previous instalments, Linda advised on how you as a business leader can renewing your outlook post-pandemic by transforming your workplace & enhancing agility in your organization.

Digital Innovations have made it easier for the world to adapt to the new normal. The 2020 pandemic hit the world by surprise forcing organisations to strategize and to find ways of ensuring that all their operations would run smoothly.

Over the last year, organisations have utilised digital technology to simplify processes and to maintain proper communication with their employees and customers. Softwares such as Microsoft Teams has been adapted throughout the world by organisations to ensure real-time collaboration with their employees while working remotely.

Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work ~ Thomas Edison.

With the massive transition to digital innovations, one element is constant; the HR teams are working ‘overtime’ to manage the transition and it is perverse to digitize the ‘Human’ in HR. Managing change in most organizations is usually an uphill task. Without belabouring the obvious effects of the pandemic on the workplace, organizations can adapt to drastic industry/sector changes, while keeping their teams motivated and inspired by narrowing their focus on:

1. Culture – A culture of collaboration to compete. Digital innovations have made it easier for organisations to transition to remote working hence the increased number of remote workers, leaders are tasked to create an environment of trust. Create autonomy of work, develop a sense of ownership and re-align the collective purpose.
2. Employee Experience (EX)- ‘’Companies that provide high employee experience have 25% higher profit and 37% lower turnover.’’ ~ Happeo. Employee experience is manifested right from acquisition to separation with the employee. Employee retention for top-tier performers post the Covid–19 pandemic will be crucial. Digital Innovations such as Zoom, have made it easier to sustain a good employee experience and to ensure that in-person communication is not completely lost. Treat people as humans then resources and personalize employee relations.
3. Work Environment – Develop ‘happy’ habits outside of work.  Digital innovations have enabled activities such as virtual drinks on Friday ‘Happy hours’, sharing funny office moments, balancing privacy with a developed curiosity into the new workspaces while continuously surveying employees’ mental health.
4. Goal setting – Digitize the performance and reward process. Think OKR. (Objective and Key Results), which is a collaborative tool used to create alignment, encourage engagement while setting measurable goals. Incentivise exemplary performance.
5. Talent Management– Digital Innovations for HR processes capture mobile, social, and cloud technologies to collect and study data while overseeing the employee experience. Explore talent pool sharing to enhance organizational learning, build on existing capabilities and enrich job designs.
6. Engagement– Miscommunication often breeds failure. Leaders should be intentional about the validation of good performance,  personalise online coaching for non-performers, establish structured feedback mechanisms and enhance positive reinforcement towards any change process.
7. Enhance Employee Wellness – Focus on the social safety net to avert burnouts, psychological support via a certified company life coach or an additional medical rider that caters for digital employee counselling. Companies in Kenya such as Hisia Psychology use digital innovations in order to offer therapy to people online. For tranquillity of mind, enhance the medical package (in and outpatient) to cater for Covid related illnesses.
8. Compassion-Driven Leadership– Lastly, the leadership team can lead more with their hearts, develop a sharp sense of social awareness and exercise intuitive responsiveness towards the plight of their respective workforce.

“Our job is obvious: We need to get out of the way, shine a light, and empower a new generation to teach itself and to go further and faster than any generation ever has. “- Seth Godin

About Dynalim Africa

DYNALIM Africa Ltd is a private firm established in Nairobi, Kenya with the sole mandate of providing business process innovations. They achieve this through Business Process Outsourcing (BPO)  and Professional Employer Organization (PEO) of HR support and auxiliary services. They are passionate and intentional about offering personalized experiences with the necessary tools and expertise to accelerate their clients’ business growth.

They partner with you from start to finish, focusing on your needs while producing new ideas, developing effective strategies, providing seamless quality services and designing scalable solutions. Their key focus is to harness their core capabilities which provide a link between Kenya and other African markets and contribute value in the provision of support services such as;  HR and People Strategy, Total Quality Management, BPO services, Business advisory and other specialized projects.