Professional Team Management 3: Adapting to Diverse Work Styles

There is a lot of talk about remote work these days, but I myself have been familiar with remote work for a long time, as my previous job had a remote work system in place. Remote work itself is just one option of work style, so it does not mean that remote work is new and good, and traditional office work is old-fashioned and not good.

However, as work styles diversify, it is certain that more and more people will work in different places or at different times (which has been the norm in global companies for a long time). How can we create same-directed value with the same vision among such diversified work styles? This is also an important theme in product management.

Why do we need to deal with diverse work styles?

Why do we have to deal with diverse work styles in the first place? In a nutshell, it’s because it’s inevitable in a professional team.

Accepting a variety of work styles will allow us to gather the wisdom of various professionals without restricting the time and place of work. In fact, in the AI business that I am currently involved in, the team is made up of people with the most appropriate skills for the business and products, regardless of where they are located (base). Also, the working hours are rather different depending on the lifestyle of the person. In addition, professionals are often involved in many projects at the same time, transcending the boundaries of their organization, company, or even their personal projects.

When trying to combine the strengths of such people, accepting diverse work styles is now a prerequisite. In other words, as we try to maximize the potential of the team and the expertise of each person, work styles will inevitably become more diverse.

The ideal state from a product management perspective

On the other hand, what about when you think about it from the perspective of product management? In reality, it is almost impossible, but if you can create an environment where the best team of professionals can gather at the same time and place to achieve a certain goal, and discuss with each other closely at a distance where they can see each other’s faces, that is definitely ideal. This is because physical closeness is the closeness of the heart.

This closeness leads to trust, and with trust comes the ability to share visions deeply, constructively discuss ideas, and immediately correct any misunderstandings. In addition, face-to-face communication facilitates not only agenda-driven discussions and conclusions, but also serendipity. The closer the better, I think that’s the main principle.

On the other hand, as I mentioned earlier, in order to gather the power of professionals, it is necessary to accept a variety of work styles. The key is how to solve this dilemma.

How to solve the work style dilemma

The first thing to consider is what to prioritize, i.e., do we accept diverse work styles to prioritize individual strengths? Or do we prioritize ease of management? The answer to this question is simple: give priority to individual strengths.

It goes without saying that the power of the individual is the source of all value, and it is irreplaceable. The challenge that needs to be solved is how to shorten the “mental distance” in the midst of this “physical distance”.

So what exactly do you do? There are three key points.
1. Share values and build a relationship of trust
2. Share your vision thoroughly
3. Talk face to face on a regular basis

1. Share values and build a relationship of trust

In a nutshell, it is the process of thickening relationships. To counteract the negative effects of physical distance, we make the relationship thicker.

Specifically, you should share values, that is, the source of a person’s thinking. Why do you work, why are you in the company/project, what do you want to accomplish as an individual, what is important or not important in your work, what do you never want to do, etc. You should share your philosophies with each other.

I haven’t seen many people actually do this, but I think this process is the most important. I personally conduct 1-on-1 meetings of 30 minutes to an hour with key people in the organization or project, saying straightforwardly, “I want to talk about values, so give me some time”. Basically, I conduct this meeting face-to-face. This is because in addition to verbal communication, non-verbal information such as facial expressions, gestures, and so on have a lot of meaning when it comes to communicating values.

I think the most important thing is to respect each other’s values and to be interested in the differences. Professionals have so many different values, but all of them are meaningful and have deep philosophies. Knowing this, aside from stimulating my personal intellectual curiosity, has given me many new insights.

Through these conversations, I often find myself thinking how interesting and amazing they are, and while talking to them about how I think, I often find that a relationship of trust naturally develops. A relationship of trust is the foundation for shortening the distance between your minds and for smooth communication even without meeting face to face.

2. Share your vision thoroughly

This is the process of developing a thick relationship of trust. In order to communicate more effectively, we share a vision and build the relationship.

To do this, share the value you want to create as a vision of the future in a variety of words. Share your thoughts not only in simple words, but also with as many concrete examples and experiences as possible. What kind of value do you want to provide to users, what do you want to improve by doing so, what issues do you want to solve, why do you want to realize it, how will the world change if you realize it, etc. Express one vision in many different words so that the vision can be captured not only in language but also as an image. In this case, the conversation is a repetition of “I mean” and “for example”.

The important thing in doing so is to have both the user’s perspective and your own. The user’s point of view is just what it sounds like, it’s a matter of course. The other perspective, my own perspective, I think is especially important and I am always aware of it. In a word, do you really want to do it yourself? The reason why you need to have your own will is because, in the end, you have nothing else to rely on. Of course, in order to make sure that the vision is correct, we do research and try to know the users, but the vision that we want to realize is always something that seems impossible at first glance, and we don’t know the correctness of it until we succeed.

In such an uncertain situation, a strong will is essential to give energy to the vision. A strong will depends on whether you really want to do it. The simplest way to find out is whether you feel a strong value as a user. If you feel the value as a user, you can talk about your vision in your own words, and you can imbue it with your will. I think the fact that great value is often associated with “strong original experience” shows the importance of “one’s own perspective”.

It’s been sentences, but when sharing your vision, it’s important to include not only the objective viewpoint of the user, but also your subjective viewpoint and intention.

f the values and vision are deeply shared, teamwork will be smooth, even if there is a physical distance. If either of them is not shared, it will be very difficult to work together because the ideas will always be out of sync. If you feel that remote work is not working for you, I recommend that you try to share your values and vision thoroughly.

3. Talk about 1 and 2 face to face on a regular basis.

Methods 1 and 2 can bring you closer to each other all at once, but strangely enough, the longer you don’t see each other face to face, the more the distance between your minds gradually grows apart. It’s important to notice the natural separation, and hence the need to maintain it regularly (at least in my experience, there is no way to avoid this completely).

I think it is a good idea to have a Face to Face conversation every month if possible, at least every three months, or at worst every six months to share the vision again and discuss the recent situation. Once a relationship of trust has been established, even a five-minute conversation can bring the emotional distance back to the original state, but the smoothness of teamwork can vary greatly depending on whether or not this face-to-face conversation is held. I myself frequently move from one location to another in order to have face-to-face communication on a regular basis.

Meetings with a clear agenda are rather more efficient online, but it is recommended to conduct casual discussions without an agenda or chats that are not even about work face to face, especially to maintain trust.

What if we can’t meet face to face?

It would be nice if we could meet in person on a regular basis, but sometimes this is not possible. In such cases, online chatting is recommended. It can be a video conference, online chat, or any other method that suits your team. The important thing is to set a time and have a proper chat. For example, it is effective to cut off the online meeting 10 minutes before the meeting and use the remaining 10 minutes for chatting.

Regular chit-chat, even when it is online, has the effect of maintaining relationships. If you can’t meet in person, try conscious chatting.

In the end

I have written about the inevitability of embracing diverse work styles in professional teams, and that there are three key points to maximizing team strength with diverse work styles.

1. Share values and build a relationship of trust
2. Share your vision thoroughly
3. Talk face to face on a regular basis

It can be a little embarrassing at first (as it was for me) to discuss values and share visions with people you have never met before. However, I’ve never been told no when I’ve made such a suggestion, and the quality of teamwork afterwards dramatically increases when you actually talk about it seriously. In addition, the stress caused by the lack of face-to-face contact that tends to occur in remote work can be dramatically reduced. I think there are a lot of people who work remotely these days, and I hope this will be helpful for them.