Amplitude delivers personalized 1:1 coaching to 170+ managers with Kona. See how →
When it comes to remote management, soft skills can be more important than hard skills. We break down the key factors defining a manager's success.
One tool for pulse checks, team building, and coaching––in Slack. Free forever. No credit card required.
Try for FreeOr book a demo to learn more.
“People leave managers, not companies.” We hear this saying a lot during our interviews with remote managers to describe the consequence of bad leadership.
"Consequence" puts the problem lightly though. In a Udemy study, half of the employees interviewed said they quit because of poor management. This problem costs companies a fortune at scale. Gallup reported that a 100-person organization with an average salary of $50,000 could have turnover and replacement costs of approximately $660,000 to $2.6 million per year!
Poor management hurts more than the bottom line. Teammates who dislike their managers feel more disengaged, dissatisfied, and drained at work. They’re more likely to suffer from burnout and isolation in a remote setting. This lack of trust is infectious, spoiling the creativity and work ethic of the entire team. Unfortunately, by the time some managers notice this friction, it’s often too late.
The answer is emotional intelligence, and according to Harvard Business Review, it’s responsible for 90% of what sets high performers apart. Emotional intelligence (EQ) describes the capacity to understand and manage your own emotions and the emotions of those around you. Most importantly, high EQ allows a leader to handle relationships judiciously and empathetically.
According to interviews with 180+ remote managers, Over 75% of the biggest problems in remote work involve "softer" aspects of people management like relationship building and communication. Fast-scaling teams, gaps in virtual communication, and cultural barriers, make emotional intelligence more important than ever.
An individual’s EQ determines their effectiveness while managing a remote team. To illustrate this, we looked at how good and bad managers handle four key remote tasks:
Buffer’s State of Remote Work Report 2020 puts communication as one of the top struggles for remote teams. A lot can get lost when translating between Zoom, Slack, Jira, and more. Misinterpreted messages spark conflict. Lack of focus bloats Zoom meetings. Vague task specs delay sprints. At its worst, poor communication stalls productivity instead of enabling it.
Ineffective remote managers try to directly translate office communication to a remote setting. These managers often:
Meanwhile, effective remote communication creates freedom. Topic-specific channels and templates speed up everyday processes while taking the pressure off the sender. Concise meetings encourage alignment and team bonding. Detailed documentation crosses timezones and allows for asynchronous collaboration. The best managers turn team idea-sharing into worldwide telepathy.
Effective remote managers know that communication is a two-way channel. They use EQ to navigate this dynamic. These managers often:
Psychological safety is the most important element of team culture. According to our EQ report, psychological safety has direct links to remote engagement, productivity,and retention. We can understand this concept by looking at a team with poor trust. These teammates are disengaged because they fear they’ll look stupid for messing up. They may put on a hyper-productive facade, but they are suffering from burnout and refuse to speak up about their issues. Managers may encourage an open dialogue, but the team leans towards blind agreement and hides their mistakes out of embarrassment.
Ineffective managers can hurt their teams psychological safety without realizing it. These managers often:
In contrast, a safe team looks radically different. Their manager is vulnerable in conversations, and the team mimics this behavior by sharing concerns, bad days, and insecurities. Their manager encourages mistakes because they lead to learnings. As a result, teammates take risks in discussions and find creative solutions to blockers. The team trusts one another and they’re upfront about their needs.
Effective managers create this culture of trust. These managers often:
Building trust, whether it’s on a new or existing team, takes a lot of emotional labor. Anna Barber, Managing Director of Techstars LA, breaks down trust into four pillars: sincerity, reliability, competence, and care. The first two require alignment with one’s intentions and team needs. The last two, a commitment to honoring commitments and putting others first. Managers with high EQ understand the value of team trust.
.jpg)
Feedback is always a hot topic for manager tips and training. That’s because human beings naturally hate feedback. Feedback, without proper framing or self-awareness, can come off as an attack. For some of the teammates we interviewed, they actively dreaded conversations with their manager because downward feedback came off as patronizing, sporadic, and unfocused. Others felt trapped because they didn’t feel safe to give their manager critical feedback without risking their employment.
Ineffective managers turn feedback into a source of anxiety and friction for their team. These managers often:
When done properly, feedback should have the opposite effect on a team. It should create an attitude of learning and accountability, helping teammates improve and celebrate each other’s wins. Structured feedback helps teammates reach the full potential of their role, one of the main reasons employees stay. Additionally, upwards feedback gives teammates a say in the team’s direction.
Great managers use feedback as an opportunity for growth. These managers often:
Like much of emotional intelligence, giving and receiving feedback is a skill. The first step is self-awareness, specifically of one’s delivery and what warrants feedback. Then comes self-management of triggering behaviors and deliberate use of framing devices to create constructive conversations. Social awareness helps managers identify when to give feedback and how in relation to the recipient's preferred style. Great managers go out of their way to make feedback conversations open, constructive, and safe.
Many managers worked remotely for the first time when forced work-from-home came into effect in March 2020. They tried to adapt by translating in-office processes to virtual. Some things translated well, like meetings and conferences. Other concepts, such as measuring productivity as logged hours, put unnecessary pressure on teams. Companies went so far as to monitor webcams and track mouse activity. Done out of desperation, these tactics make for horrible remote management.
Ineffective managers struggle to balance control and trust in a remote environment. These managers will often:
Measuring productivity in hours overlooks remote work’s strengths. Without an office, individual contributors can work on their own schedules while still delivering results. This flexibility is especially important now, with a global pandemic, sudden home-schooling, and destructive natural disasters drawing everyone’s attention.
Effective remote managers adapt to this changing world and help their teammates thrive. They often:
Great leaders are flexible, they empathize with teammates and understand they cannot expect pre-COVID hours of work. They exercise forgiveness and understand. High EQ leaders are stewards of their team’s well-being, exercising social awareness of a teammate’s situation and priorities. These managers find win-win solutions that prioritize wellness and redefine productivity in a COVID context.
The biggest factor defining a manager's ability to connect with their team is emotional intelligence. By building this soft skill, managers can retain their talent and build teams that everyone wants to work for.
Like agile methodology and public speaking, emotional intelligence is a skill perfected over time. However, packed schedules and a lack of manager training often make building EQ the last priority. Factor in that 21.5% of the managers we interviewed had less than a year of management experience when COVID19 began, and it’s no wonder EQ encompasses remote work’s biggest challenges.
.png)
.png)
Corine is co-founder of Kona. They write regularly on emotional intelligence and people-first leadership. Their work has been featured by Fortune, Yahoo, TechCrunch, Entrepreneur, Harvard Business School, Forbes, and more. They've spoken at remote work conferences like GitLab Commit 2021 and advised Fortune 10 companies on remote strategy.
