Women at Work - Take Control of Your Onboarding

Episode Date: November 15, 2021

How are women who started a job remotely during the pandemic faring? We hear from several new hires about the hurdles they encountered and how they overcame them with the support of their managers. Then, HR executive Amelia Ransom and management professor Beth Schinoff share advice for onboarding, whether you’re starting a new position yourself or supporting a new member of your team.

Over 40,000 businesses have future-proofed their business with NetSuite by Oracle, the number one cloud ERP, bringing accounting, financial management, inventory, and HR into one platform. Download the CFO's Guide to AI and Machine Learning for free at netsuite.com slash women at work. Every person who joins our company receives a copy of Michael Watkins' book, The First 90 Days. I got that when I started. Do you know why that's tradition, Amy B.? Well, I wasn't in on the decision, but I also got that book when I started 10 years ago. And I assume it's because we recognize, we as an organization recognize that it's really important to lay the groundwork from your first day. Right, Amy? Yeah.

Those first 90 days, actually probably the whole first year, when you're a new employee is a formative time. You're sussing out people and how work gets done. You're getting to know your boss. You're establishing expectations and goals, and you're making all those mental notes of how things actually work, what the office politics are, who you want to be friends with. And yeah, so going through that transition for any new job, it's always challenging. But I think it's even more challenging when you're remote and the culture of your workplace isn't already geared toward being remote.

I mean, how do you suss out the social dynamics and the politics and all of the unspoken stuff? Well, and it's not just about remote. I mean, so many organizations, including our own, are in this like betwixt between stage of like, we're coming in the office some days and not others and we're changing the policies. And, you know, there's just so much happening. Everybody's figuring things out while you're figuring things out in a completely new position. You're listening to Women at Work from Harvard Business Review. I'm Amy Bernstein. I'm Amy Gallo. And I'm Emily Caulfield.

How are women who started jobs remotely doing? Was their virtual onboarding helpful to them? Has their boss been attentive and supportive? We asked these questions in a survey, which nearly 200 women completed. Their responses speak to the complexity that new hires have been dealing with. Later in the episode, two workplace experts will give advice for new hires and their bosses on managing the first months of a new job when you're not in person. But first, producer Eleni Mata is here to share highlights from the survey. Eleni, thanks so much for taking the time to do this. Thanks, Emily. This was really interesting to work on.

In general, how did the women who responded to the survey feel about their new jobs? How are they feeling? A lot of women said that they were doing OK. Jenna from Illinois, who is in customer success, told us she's still figuring out how to work this remote lifestyle, but it's the best decision that she's made. Melissa from Canada in financial services said her job is amazing on paper, but there are a lot of spinning plates and constant changes that make it really frustrating. And then there are women who really didn't have much support in this transition at all. Another woman that responded to us from Amsterdam said that she isn't learning as much as she had hoped. And since her boss quit, she has no one to ask questions to.

And Sarah Grace, who is a business manager at a bank, she realizes that the hybrid model really doesn't work to her strengths. Because what I'm really strong in, I would say, is soft skills and everything to do with reading people and communication and kind of understanding what's going on under the surface of a conversation. And that's just, it's just much harder. But of course, I mean, I think we all know that, you know, hybrid working is probably here to stay and I'll have to find a way around that. And then Lori from Oregon, who's in law, is excited about learning new things, but making connections is hard. And making connections has been probably the most common frustration that we saw in this survey.

Wow, so a really mixed bag, and I'm looking forward to digging into all of that with you. But let's start at the beginning of all of their work experiences at their new jobs and talk about onboarding. I know that the quality of somebody's onboarding from a lot of the stuff that we publish here at HBR really influences their immediate and their long-term success in a role. What did women say about their onboarding experiences? So this was another question that we got a lot of different answers. And like I mentioned before, some women weren't really getting support during their

transition. Instead, it was a little bit more of like, oh, hey, you're here. Great. Here's an Excel sheet. And you should probably get to know people feel free. And it's such a big company. I was kind of like, OK. A mid-career woman in telecommunications told us, I got a good deal of onboarding in the first two weeks, but then it dropped off. I don't have personal relationships with people except my boss. It's hard to know what everybody else in the organization is doing because there is limited sharing. Did you see any differences between women who were newer in their careers and women who were mid-career or late career? So the most common response that I got from women that are in their mid to late careers is their experience and how it's really helped them in this transition.

One woman said, I had to take more upon myself. Usually you can easily grab coffee with someone, when now that's much more scheduled. Another woman told us that, I had to create my own onboarding because my supervisor didn't think to plan it. Good thing I'm an experienced professional because it has been a rough ride. It sounds like it came in handy, though, that they knew what good onboarding looked like, and they knew that they were supposed to connect with colleagues. Yeah. You have to go by, okay, what have I done before that has helped me? Yeah. So I can actually move forward. And a lot of women, not just these two, really took it upon themselves

to have an easier transition. Right. So you said a couple of times that a lot of new hires have had problems forming good relationships with their coworkers or with their bosses. And for the people who said that they had success forming those relationships, what did they do? How were they able to make those connections happen? So the biggest theme is women taking the initiative to create the experience that they want at work, whether you're hybrid or remote. Heather is doing that exact thing, and she's taking the initiative to connect with her co-workers through Slack. We have a water cooler conversation where we talk about things that aren't necessarily work related. It's like a muted conversation, but we can still check in. And if people are like feeling like they have the capacity for casual conversations, we go there.

And we also just try to bring in personal aspects of ourselves, like at the end of every week, talking about something that we accomplished professionally, but then also something that like we're really excited about personally to try and create that relationship. And every day we're learning new things about each other. And Mariah, her supervisor, led her to making more connections within the organization. Within my first, I think on my first day, my supervisor noted that I had worked on my resume and then also said things in an interview about my commitment to diversity, equity, inclusion inside the organizations I've worked at. And encouraged me to join the DEI committee and actually just told me to email our VP for DEI and set up a one-on-one meeting with her. So by the end of my second week, I was both on the DEI committee and on a subcommittee, which like, again, helped me meet way more people in the organization than I would have not otherwise and feel like I have a place in the culture as opposed

to like being this floating person disconnected from a lot of the other stuff that's happening inside, particularly being on such a small team. I think it's amazing that she jumped right in and it was with the encouragement from her boss. That encouragement goes a long way. Yeah. Shout out to Mariah's supervisor who really helped her out with her onboarding. For almost every day of my first 90 days of work, I had an hour-long one-on-one meeting with my supervisor, which I have never had. I had

a job before, but I knew it was because she was like really dedicated to making sure that I felt like I knew what I was doing and that I had someone to talk to and that I didn't feel just like completely alone in my apartment all the time. She's so supportive. That's amazing. An hour-long meeting every day. I don't know how many people can do that. I don't know how many people can make that happen. That sounds like a lot, but it sounds like a lot if you're constantly seeing these people every day. Yeah, please, one hour, but very, very supportive. What else were supportive managers doing? So have you ever felt like you're in a task and you're having a really hard time approaching it?

And you're like, how in the world do I do this? Yes. This supportive boss was aware of her employees' emotional distress. And she's like, let's just sit down and do this together. And something that would have taken me like two days, we did in an hour and a half. That was a great point where like now I feel more self-assured. Wow, that's so nice. Ain't that nice?

Because I know the feeling of starting a new job and being like, I don't know what I'm doing. And then, you know, just trying to figure it out on your own. And you don't want your competence to be put into question. So you're like, I don't know if I can ask. But then they got it done quickly together. And it takes a lot of courage to even be like, all right, can't do this by myself. I have to ask for help. Sometimes we just need a push.

Yeah. And for this first project, just getting that out of the way, it makes everything else after that feel so much easier, I bet, for her. It gives her some momentum. So for women who at the beginning of their jobs weren't necessarily getting as much support as they needed, but later figured out how to get support, how were they able to bridge that gap? What we were just talking about, it's really brave to ask for help. I think there's a lot of things that I have decided to ask about that if we were in person all the time, I might not have needed to ask because I could have just observed what other

people were doing. And then I would have figured out what some of the cultural norms were inside the office. But I've had to be more direct in asking exactly like, you know, are you a texter? Do you want me to Microsoft Teams message you? Do you want me to email you? Do you want me to call you? Like, how are we communicating? And Rachel went through that same process too. I was only about a month in and I was feeling really stuck. I really didn't know what to do. I wanted to perform. I wanted to give my best. I was excited about the job and didn't exactly know what they were looking for. It was interesting to see and realize I could start asking for what I needed and say like, hey, I don't know about this or checking in.

This is what I've learned so far. You have goals and expectations for the next month, for the next three months, kind of realizing like, nope, you actually do have the ability to take like your fate into your hands when you start a new job. And I think that's kind of what this process has shown me a little bit. Hearing Rachel say that you can take your fate into your hands, it gave me chills. I've heard this before, but it still gave me chills. Like it feels, yeah, it feels very empowering. For the women who have the option to go into the office, how are they using it? How are they using that to their advantage?

The one thing that I kept hearing is just creating structure. Victoria takes advantage of being in the office to focus on work. Rather than being distracted by all kinds of personal matters, whether it's laundry or an interesting book. I think the other thing is coming in the company new and trying to fit in and trying to get to know the culture a bit better. Being able to speak to people, to see how people interact, gives you a much better understanding of that. At least that's what I found. Sarah Grace uses it as a chance to spread out the people that she meets in the organization. So it is a hybrid model, but in my position, I have permission to go in every day and I usually do, but there will be a different set of people around me.

So most of the other teams, you know, they have team A comes in on Mondays, team B comes in on Tuesdays and so on. So I'm there most days, but then the people around me kind of rotate, which on the one hand is it's good because when you're new to the team, it's really overwhelming to kind of try and meet 200 people all at once. So it's nice to kind of have them clearly separated out and you go, okay, if I meet someone on a Wednesday, that means they must be part of this group. Yeah, that seems really useful. She can space it out. And it's nice that she can go in every day because that way she doesn't miss anyone. Yeah. And there's, from what it sounds like,

if people are spread out, you still have time for yourself. Exactly. What does the future hold for business? Can someone please invent a crystal ball? Until then, over 40,000 businesses have future-proofed their business with NetSuite by Oracle, the number one cloud ERP, bringing accounting, financial management, inventory, and HR into one platform. With real-time insights and forecasting, you're able to peer into the future and seize new opportunities. Download the CFO's Guide to AI and Machine Learning for free at netsuite.com slash women at work. That's netsuite.com slash women at work. Hey listeners, if you want to hear from more leaders to help you answer questions like,

should I talk about my anxiety at work? Or how do I claim my leadership power? Then you should listen to TED Business, hosted by Columbia Business School professor Madhupe Akinnola. The show features TED Talks about everything from setting smart goals to the latest on DEI in business, followed up with a mini lesson from Madhupe on how to apply these I'm Heather Price-Jones. I work in public relations and communications. I have the tiniest apartment. My apartment is so small, it doesn't even have room for a desk. So I sit on my couch. I have one of those little folding tables. I have a little pedal thing I can use if I really need to get my feet moving. And it's just me and my little dog. and we work in here and we sleep in here and we eat in

here. So it becomes a little difficult to like, where does the workday end? Because I'm just here. One of the hardest parts is that I work with social media and that's constantly on your phone and constantly going off. And there's always that ingrained like want and need to check those notifications. It's hard to set boundaries when you're working from home. How have these women who are starting new jobs been able to set boundaries? Yeah, because it's really hard to bring work into your home like this. Heather tackled it in a way that made a huge difference. I've created healthy boundaries with my boss where she doesn't expect us to work on weekends or holidays and especially for social media posts like she wouldn't want me to do that and she's like really done a great job of creating this

atmosphere of if you feel like you need a break and you're having difficulty disconnecting then like you can do it. Or if you're working late one night, you can basically change your hours the next day and sleep in a little bit. So that's nice to have that flexibility. But I try to stay to those hours because then I know in my head if it's five o'clock, then I'm off and I'm not paying attention to it anymore. So Eleni, we've covered a lot of information. We've learned a lot from these different women. What are we taking away about the support that new hires need right now? The support from your supervisor, manager, or superior is huge.

Yep. Some help and some encouragement to talk to other people in the organization. That seemed like a big thing. And setting boundaries, making sure that you know when you're working, when you can turn on and when to turn off too. And if your boss isn't being like necessarily proactive or helping you make connections or giving you the support that you need, it's important that you go after what you know that you need in that job and making those connections. Yeah, just ask. It's so simple. Just ask. Sew it on a pillow. But really, you mentioned before, it's always nerve wracking to kind of admit to yourself, I need help and I really can't do this on my own. Asking for just like just some assistance goes such a long way. I mean, we heard it.

Them asking made them feel better about their role and how to proceed with other tasks. And maybe you can't meet with your direct report for an hour a day for 90 days. But maybe you could do something that helps support them, helps them feel like they're getting what they need throughout the day and to start off on the right foot in this new job. So that was such an interesting conversation. And there was a point that hit me. I know it hit you too, Emily. It's where Rachel said that you can take your fate into your own hands. Yeah.

The new job didn't have to happen to her. She didn't have to be the passive participant. She really could determine how her onboarding worked and how she could thrive in that new role. And I found that kind of inspiring. And as a manager, I really appreciate hearing that because it means that this employee, this new teammate, is going to be proactive, is going to bring new ideas, is going to add. And that's who Rachel sounds like to me.

You know, I heard that comment a little differently because I sort of felt bad that she had to take fate into her own hands. I mean, I know how challenging it is to onboard someone. And I know all managers don't do it perfectly. And it takes a lot of time and effort to get it right. going to hear from two women who have advice for new hires and their managers for dealing with some of the most common challenges. Amelia Ransom is an HR executive at Smartsheet, a software company. She started her job in August and is entirely remote. I think one of the challenging things is, you know, on Friday, I was at this same desk working for one organization. And on Monday, I was at the very same desk working for a different organization. So you're basically like just flipping a switch in your head and all of a sudden you're in a new workspace, which is so interesting. That's Beth Shinoff, a management professor at Boston College. Her research focuses on how employees form and maintain friendships, especially when they're remote. Beth and Amelia,

thank you so much for talking with me. Thanks for having us. Thank you so much. Happy to be here. So Amelia, I want to start with you. You are a new hire. In order to get a strong start on a job, what is the responsibility of the manager and what's the responsibility of the employee? I love this question. And so first, I want to pause and do a PSA for managers. But I will come, I promise to answer your question. But we are asking managers to work very differently than we have asked them to work ever. And that's not just because of the pandemic, but yet exacerbated by it. Over the past five, seven years, we've asked managers to lean into thinking about their folks holistically, 360, your mental wellbeing, how are you doing? What are you doing in your off time? When are you closing the laptop and

when are you opening it? We have managers now engaging in conversations about race and mental health. If a manager had told me seven, eight years ago and any HR professional that they were about to have a conversation about race with their team, every HR bell in my head would have gone off. Okay. So we are asking them to do this differently, but we as organizations in many ways have failed to help managers get the skills they need to do so. So I just want to give a shout out to managers that are trying to get this right, that are really, really trying and may feel like they're failing. You are being asked to work differently, and I want to acknowledge that. That said, to your point about whose responsibility is it, it is a shared responsibility, but I put onus on the manager at the outset to open the doors, right? To create the environment such that the employee can thrive.

So making sure people know they're coming, making sure people understand what their role is going to be, knowing who they need to meet with first, and then allowing that person to expand from there. But setting that up, blocking the time on the calendar for anything you think that they need to be doing in those first days and weeks, and then knowing when you need to pull back. Some of the best feedback I ever got from an employee who I thought was still new, who decidedly needed to tell me she was not new anymore and she got this. When she said, I can use less time one-on-one with you. And I thought, success, right? And it was, but I needed to create the environment that allowed her to tell me that.

It's funny that you said that because you remember the example about the woman manager who blocked off like a month's worth of one on one time with her. So I was just thinking that like, that's great. But at some point, like that actually becomes less useful because she's ready to fly on her own. Right. Absolutely. I thought the same thing. I was like, I hope they're checking in to make sure that still works because you could be hampering that employee rather than allowing them to thrive. Yeah. Yeah. So how can new hires do, as Rachel said, Rachel was one of

the women that we surveyed, how can they be taking their fate into their own hands, like day one, week one, month one, in their first year? Actually, this idea of sort of taking your fate into your own hands, organizational behavior scholars have a term for that. It's called proactive socialization. So it's when you proactively take steps to sort of socialize yourself into an organization, like creating connections with the people who you really need to meet, making sure you've done your research,

reaching out to the right people, not wasting their time. And I think that starts prior to the first day. So I still am a big fan of the book, The First 90 Days. It is still relevant for anybody changing a job or position. Like y'all need to read that book. HBR. Yes. So start that journey before day one. Align with your manager on what good looks like. Okay. Do you both share the same goals and do you both have the same vision of what good looks like? Ask people a few key questions. A question I love to ask people is,

what do I need to know that's not written down anywhere? Because there are those unwritten rules that are part of the culture that you want to understand so that you can already start to engage with the culture. And then we're saying this, but I think connecting on a level that isn't just about the work. At a previous organization, I started a thing, we just called it the hot take. And it was just a question every day. Do you like Twizzlers or Red Vines? Are you an evening person or a morning person? And it really was a great way to get people connected to me. And I got to ask them questions. During the pandemic, we took it online to Slack. And so we just, again, it's a fun question you can ask every day. Like, do you fold your fitted sheet or not? Like, it's just fun and

engaging and you get to know people and create an opening to deeper conversations. So, Amelia, you mentioned that you should try to get on the same page with your boss, try to figure out what good looks like and how you can be successful in your role. What are some questions that you could ask to try to figure that out? A couple of questions. One, is there anything currently in flight that I need to jump into or get into right away? Yeah. Right? As I'm doing my onboarding, is there anything currently in flight? Two, at 60 days, at 90 days, I'd like to be prepared with this or have this completed or do this.

So, for example, for me, I'm 90 days today. Congratulations. Thank you. I have been marching toward a presentation for our executive team on what my roadmap is for next year. And so we aligned to that before I even started. I wanted to be prepared to do that. And in fact, we're doing part of it this afternoon. So that is what good looked like to me. I wanted to make sure it looked like that to my manager. So what that meant is I'm not going to have that at 60 days. I'm not going to have that at 75 days.

I'm going to have that by 90 days. We'll be prepared to have that conversation. I mean, one of the interesting things, Amelia, is that you're walking into these conversations with your manager already having a game plan for what you want, right? So you're not really relying on your manager to say what good is. You have an idea of what good is for you. And so I think, you know, back to your earlier point about taking some of the burden away from managers, that's another way that employees should be doing that a little bit is having a sense of what they want or need before walking into conversations with their manager. What does the future hold for business? Can someone please invent a crystal ball? Until then, over 40,000 businesses have future-proofed

their business with NetSuite by Oracle, the number one cloud ERP, bringing accounting, financial management, inventory, and HR into one platform. With real-time insights and forecasting, you're able to peer into the future and seize new opportunities. Download the CFO's Guide to AI and Machine Learning for free at netsuite.com slash women at work. That's netsuite.com slash women at work. So Beth, you heard Eleni mention that making connections was one of the most challenging parts of starting a new job. I'm wondering if you can tell us some strategies that new hires or their managers could use to try to make that a little bit easier? You know, this is where the manager can really step in and sort of set the stage for

the employee by creating one-on-ones for their employee, like with people who they know they actually need to meet or have to meet or should meet in the organization. And so in some ways, a manager has to sort of create a personalized plan for every new hire who's starting, especially remotely, because they don't have the opportunity to sort of run into others casually at a photocopier or in the hallway or have the meeting after the meeting where you get introduced to somebody who you wouldn't otherwise meet. So really making sure that they have the opportunity to meet those individuals so they don't feel like they don't know who to go to when they need to get their work done. And then I think what new hires can do, they can do some research to figure out who they need to connect to. If their manager isn't connecting them to the right people,

maybe they can ask to be connected to those people. But I also think that if you have any opportunity to go into the office as a remote employee, exploit that. Use that to meet as many people as you possibly can, because we just don't have the technology to really proxy for that in-person connection. And so, you know, really make sure that you're going in on a day when you can meet the people who you need to meet. Exactly. Yeah, I'm thinking back to when I first started this job. And you'd bump into people and they'd be like, hey, do you want to have a coffee or do you want to get lunch tomorrow? And if I had started this job fully remote, I would have really been missing out on those types of little casual encounters,

those random experiences that you have just by bumping into people or just being in close proximity to them? Yeah, because you know what remote work does is it takes away all of the informal interaction. You're only connecting for work related reasons. Yeah. And so if you have no reason to reach out to somebody for work, then you'll never meet them when you're remote. Right. Listen, every opportunity when I started with the company and someone said, I'd like to get on your calendar or meet with you. Yes, yes, yes, yes. Anything somebody tried to include me in, I showed up for. Just to meet people, to show them who I was, to let them know what I was we were having a conversation about tea. And I just was like, oh, I'll just send you some and try it and see if you like it. I mean, it's a $20 investment, right? That's great. Another colleague sent me something. And I've sent book links to people because we found out we had a shared interest. And they're like, oh, thank you. It's that kind

of connection. So yes, ask about the work, ask about how work gets done, but make sure you ask something about the person, about what really excites them, or you see something in their background of their Zoom and you're like, oh, where is that from? Like this thing on my wall is from Brazil, right? So you just ask those questions and get to know people, but you're right. We have to proxy for that bump into people, you know, dynamic that happened in offices. And let's be clear, some people were always remote. We had remote workers before the pandemic. And so this has been a way to really include them.

In many instances, this has helped us create more inclusive environments, believe it or not, than offices ever could. Yeah. So in the survey that you guys did earlier, there were people talking about how the beginning of starting any new job, you're kind of bored often, like you just don't have as much work as you do once things ramp up. So you can really use the first week or month of your job for relational reasons, right? To make these connections and to say yes to every invite that comes at you and to really get to know people as like a way of sort of like supplementing the work that you just don't have until you have that work. And then sometimes those connections just feel like you're too busy to make them. So really using that time wisely. I like you saying that because I feel like it gives people permission to do that.

And sometimes you feel like creating those social ties isn't necessarily part of the job, but it is part of the job. And all the research says that you're actually better at your job when you have these relationships. So it's not just for your own psychological and social well-being. It's for the organization's well-being, too. Yes, exactly. So So Beth, what about setting boundaries with people that you've just met? Yeah, I mean, I think, so you know, to Amelia's point about how a lot of this work happens before, that's something that you should think about before starting any new job is what are my personal boundaries? What are my preferred work hours? But Amelia probably is still dealing with this and figuring this out right now. What if your coworker wants to send you emails at midnight? I think the thing to ask, I would start with a question. Are those your

preferred working hours? How do you work best? What are the best ways to engage with you? I think as you're meeting people, those are questions you can ask other people. And then you can share your own. I'm best at Slack or I'm best on email. I tend to work these kinds of hours. I work for a global company, so people are always on and always off, right? So we understand that it works that way, but really stating upfront how you anticipate working and then re-evaluating that. Can you be your most effective by doing it the way that you've set out that you're going to do it? Are you suffering in some way? Is your family life suffering because you said, oh, I'm going to work these hours and all of a sudden you realize, oh, I need to rethink that

and try to reshift. Give yourself permission to do that as well. But I always like to start with my hand out to say, how do I best engage with you? Tell me more about you. And then I would like to tell you about me as well. So that is actually like one of the keys to relationship building online is matching your own communication style and medium to your relationship partners, the other persons. If that person likes to talk on the phone and you're a text person only, that relationship is never going to work because that person's never going to answer your texts and you're never going to pick up their phone calls. So you really have to be flexible when you're working remotely across the different media and not really glom on to just one, right?

And then also, like Amelia said, ask, how do you like to communicate? And then tailor your communication style to that person's rather than waiting for them to tailor it to you. So in the survey, several of the women said that in the first few weeks of starting their jobs, they met a lot of people, started a lot of relationships, and then it sort of fell off after that. How can they sustain those relationships? I think one of the first ways is to set up recurring meetings when it makes sense. And you could do that for five minutes, 10 minutes. It doesn't have to be a half hour or a whole hour. It can be really simple.

And you can just check in beforehand. Hey, do we still need this time today? I'd love to catch up just to see how you're doing or what you're working on and how I can support you. But keep the momentum going. And I like to do that by setting up recurring time with people that I really felt connected to or wanted to stay connected to. I also use other tools like keeping a running list of things I found interesting about a person.

Like, oh, I met Beth today and she really likes to do this thing or she's really working on this. So when I check in, I can go quickly to that list, remind myself, reground in it, and then open up with something interesting to ask that person about what they're working on or what they feel good about this week. Oh, wow. How organized. Right? But sometimes we forget, or at least I forget. I have so many people that I'm meeting with and connecting with that I might lose the thread on a particular person and I don't want to do that. And so I really will. I'll just take a quick note. You know, Beth lives here. She does this. She was training for a marathon. Let me ask her how that's going. Like it's just a way to quickly ground in the conversation so that I don't walk in just with nothing. Yeah. So sometimes when you are trying to get to know people, you can realize that your colleagues are overwhelmed or exhausted or they just really don't have a lot of time. How can we navigate around that a little bit?

I think one thing that we can do is use this time to get work done together, but independently. And then in that time, if a newcomer has a question or a new hire has a question, they can just ask it on the fly. And it's so much less pressure to do that as you're working through something versus having a laundry list of questions that have just built up over time. And I'll give you an example. So I have a very close colleague who works in Wisconsin. I work in Boston. We actually work via Gchat together on different projects all the time. And this allows us to get stuff done separately, but to ask each other questions as we're going so that it's much more fluid

and a much better use of both of our time than just meeting for the sake of meeting. Yeah, I wanted to ask how planned these recurring meetings should generally be. Do you think that there should be an agenda every recurring meeting, or is it okay to kind of have them all be sort of whatever comes up? I like the idea of just checking in maybe the day before to say, hey, I'd love to talk about this or

this, or what do you have that you'd like to talk about? Do you want to do a walking meeting? Do you want to do, you know, something else altogether? But also sometimes, you know what I like to do to people? I like to send someone a message and say, Beth, I am keeping this meeting on the calendar, but I'm not going to show up. And so you get to keep that hour block or 30-minute block on your calendar and do whatever the heck you want to do. Talk to you next week. Oh my God. and do whatever the heck you want to do. Talk to you next week. Like sometimes that's the best gift you can give anybody is not another meeting, not another, I got to be on camera or I have to be on kind of thing. I literally do. I'm like, you know what? Catch up next week. Keep it on

your calendar though. And keep it moving and check in next week or whenever you need to. Yeah. I love these ideas. Amelia, so some relatively new hires are stressed about the fact that they don't know things that they feel they should have learned a few months ago or a year ago. How do you suggest employees approach their boss or their colleagues with those lingering questions that they have? Spoiler alert, they don't know everything either. So keep asking the questions until you get the answers that you need. And when you know things, be that person. I have a colleague that whenever we're in a meeting together, she is that person chatting me separately to let me know what the acronym means that I may be hearing for the first time,

or maybe for the 10th time, but I've heard so many acronyms that I don't remember. And so she's so gracious to say, do you remember what that means? Or remember that thing is connected to that thing? She's incredibly gracious that way. And so I want to be that person that shows up for other people in that way. So just ask. You think it's going to make you look bad? I promise you, I have never in all of the years I've been an HR professional and other professionals as well, I've never once thought that person just asked so many questions. I love the questions. They're great. And they challenge me on the answers. Yeah. But I still think for some people, it's really hard to do that, right? Even if they've convinced themselves that no one's going to judge them harshly. So maybe they reach out to someone who they really trust, even if that person doesn't seem like the person who's going to have the answer or know the right person for that question, just ask it anyway, and they can at least point want to be the person who's always asking one question after the other, they can write down all of their questions so that they have it in front of them when they talk to the person so that it's not like 10 minutes later, here's another question, another question.

But instead, you're using people's time wisely because everybody is overworked, overwhelmed, tired. So just some things that can kind of like increase your confidence and actually asking those questions if you are more scared to do that. And I get it. I'm not trying to diminish how people might feel about asking questions, but I really want in particular women to know that this is something that everyone else, read those who identify as male, are doing all the time. I've never had a man ever pause and say, I shouldn't be asking you so many questions. It has literally never happened to me, but people who identify as women do it regularly. The thing that I do proactively is when people show up in particular people of color and in particular women in front of me apologizing for questions, we got to shut that down. Yeah. I will. I will take no apologies for questions.

Thank you so much, Amelia and Beth, for being here with me. Thank you. Thanks for having us. That's our show. I'm Amy Bernstein. I'm Emily Caulfield. And I'm Amy Gallo. Our editorial and production team is Amanda Kersey, Maureen Hoke, Rob Eckhart, Erica Truxler, Tina Tobey-Mack, and Eleni Mata. Rob and Maura compose this theme music. we are working on an episode about how the concept of professionalism has changed since the pandemic and how women are navigating what feels authentic now i'm sitting here in my jeans and my hiking boots and most of my makeup came off on my mask earlier today. So that's my appearance. In terms of sharing my emotions or sharing other personal details, I think I'm feeling a little bit more comfortable about it.

I think that people have opened up much more. I mean, it definitely seems like the norms have shifted in some way. Yeah. And we would love to hear from you all, our listeners, about how you are showing up both internally and externally at work these days. Is it different now? Are you pushing some of the norms you would have never pushed before? And are you getting any pushback from that? So email us and tell us about your experience at womenatworkathbr.org. Thanks for listening and for contributing.