Asking Better Questions for Our New Normal Work World
“Ask Better Questions” is the 2nd step of the Faremouth Method™. I think many of us these days are asking lots of questions about how COVID-19 will change the work world for employers, applicants and recruiters. I want to believe there is HOPE for us all to have a BETTER work world because of the Coronavirus. This crisis could lead to something better than what we had before. The age of generational differences and competition could come to an end and we might just inaugurate a new age of solidarity and connection. Maybe there has been a huge eruption of altruism and working together, doctors and nurses risking their lives on the front lines, neighbors collecting food, volunteers sewing masks, restaurant owners using some of the food on hand to cook to bring to the nearest shelter, etc.
Historians tells us that a crisis can be a turning point for societies. Just like how workers had to reinvent themselves after the Great Depression, this crisis, too, could lead to something better. As workers now we rather look at bridging our differences in the work place, as opposed to wanting to be looked at for our unique generational descriptions.
That famous saying by Mother Theresa really makes sense right now when she said,
“You know what I don’t know, I know what you don’t know, but together we can do great things.”
Our unique ability to work together and move from a critical to a more hopeful view of humanity is our true mission or goal. No matter who we are, our purpose and goals are really very much the same. Our focus is to make a contribution to our work world and allow us all to bring out the best in ourselves and each other.
I don’t think we will ever go back to the “normal” as we knew it, but rather to a “new normal” that will foster much more collaboration and team work.
That great speech by John F. Kennedy went something like this,
“Ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country.”
It will have to be the mindset of our candidates when they interview with prospective employers. The word “Company” will be substituted for “Country” and the coaching of your recruiter will sound something like this:
“Don’t go into the interview asking the employer what they can do for you. In our new work world, the employers will want to know WHAT YOU can do for them or the COMPANY.” All candidates in our new work world are going to have to GET RID OF ATTITUDE. We will have to shift our expectations of WHAT WE DESERVE to WHAT WE CAN CONTRIBUTE. A total selflessness is going to have to be the mindset of our candidates going forward. With 30 million people on unemployment it’s for sure going to be what we call “An Employer’s Market” and employers are going to have the “pick of the litter” as they say. What will also matter now will be strategy and how your skillset will contribute in a grand way to the bottom line of the company. That mindset of “Well boss, that wasn’t in the job description when I interviewed for this job,” is not going to serve the candidates of the future well in this new work world. We are going to see more team work and requirements to do more than what we were hired for in the jobs of the future.
A renewed sense of HOPE, A NEW NORMAL, and a BIG CHANGE IN THE ATTITUDES AND MINDSETS OF employees will be the three areas that we can look forward to in our new work world. This pandemic may have allowed us to implement more harmonious and productive efforts in our workplace that might be a move away from competition and greed and a move toward more positive interactions that will have win-win strategies for all going forward.
Out of crises comes opportunity. We all have the potential to turn this world crisis into a golden opportunity. As we change our mindsets from what we knew before and embrace that new caliber of the future, we can create a bigger better world not only in our workplace but in our personal relationships and families. We have already seen a much broader coming together and how it takes a team to work together to create strategies which benefit all. We can do this!
This is the time to develop new skills. Not necessarily the skills to help us do our job but also to develop new interpersonal skills and how we deal with others. We have an opportunity now to learn more about how to deal with conflict and challenge in our new workspaces. We may be going back into a workspace similar to where we had been but even that is now changed. We may find more division between us and a coworker in physical space. It is inherent that we will automatically fall into these new working patterns as we return to employment. It will be so important to develop strong teams in order to accomplish the job in front of us.
A new process for employment is being birthed for all parties concerned. Perhaps this is a time where the human element of recruiting, employing and finding employment can be best served by the recruiter’s detective skills sleuthing out the hidden talents of the potential employee and how those talents might match perfectly with a potential employer. There can be golden nuggets tucked away and disregarded unless the recruiter knows how to bridge that gap between the new company/employer and that potential new employee. That hidden talent/skill might be just the thing the employer needs as he creates his new company and builds a new team in this new work world. We are now moving to an even more digital world and environment.
Asking Better Questions that foster more humanistic tendencies in our new work world might be the questions we need to ask for this turning point to be a good one for all!
Mary Ann Faremouth has been a regular contributor to the USA Daily Post since April of 2020.
