Team Resiliency Through a Pandemic
Summary
Leading a team during the pandemic may seem impossible given it’s likely the most stressful time of your team’s lives. Recently, I lead our team through a design sprint where we explored improving unemployment benefit access in the middle of the pandemic, which required us to shift how we work. In this talk, I’ll share how we reimagined collaboration, communication, and processes to reduce the stress load while maintaining forward momentum. Together as leaders, we’ll explore how to ethically lead our teams while keeping their resiliency in mind and bring these learnings into the post COVID work life.
Key Insights
-
•
Resilience differs from survival by aiming to maintain steady energy rather than exhausting oneself to get through crises.
-
•
Using the battery metaphor helps teams visualize fluctuating emotional and mental energy levels and the need to recharge.
-
•
Clear, co-created communication norms reduce remote work stress from excessive or duplicative digital messaging.
-
•
Regular check-ins and check-outs that share headspace, heartspace, and needs foster psychological safety and trust.
-
•
Allowing flexibility such as video-off meetings respects emotional bandwidth and prevents burnout.
-
•
Leaders need to understand individual signals of stress, which can vary widely, to provide appropriate support.
-
•
Talking openly about mental health, racial justice, and personal challenges at work creates inclusion and resilience.
-
•
Resilience practices must evolve as external conditions change; what worked pre-pandemic may not suffice now.
-
•
Nurturing a team's resilience includes fostering autonomy, shared decision-making, and prioritizing wellbeing over productivity.
-
•
Leaders must consciously cultivate their own resilience to sustainably lead and support their teams through ongoing stress.
Notable Quotes
"Resilience is being able to maintain self needs and effectiveness at moments of change, tough demands, and adversity."
"Survival can feel like a roller coaster with big energy spikes and drops, often leaving us completely depleted."
"When the pandemic hit, those in the resilient 'yellow' zone had enough reserve to readjust and come back."
"People were taking vacation days just to homeschool or take care of a loved one."
"Creating space to name what we’re experiencing without guilt allowed us to unload some of that emotional weight."
"We co-designed our environment and expectations around what we needed as a team during these times."
"On days with many user interviews, the team wanted internal meetings video off to take a break from 'smiling all day.'"
"Check-outs and reflections normalized pausing and being honest about what we don’t know."
"Mental health, systems of oppression, and racial justice should have been normal conversations at work all along."
"The whole give yourself an oxygen mask before helping others metaphor is very true here."
Or choose a question:
More Videos
"Senior employees should hold difficult conversations questioning processes that may be harmful to others."
Laine Riley ProkayHow DesignOps can Drive Inclusive Career Ladders for All
September 30, 2021
"Songs become methodologies—the way you identify who is at the door is through the song they sing."
Victor UdoewaBeyond Methods and Diversity: The Roots of Inclusion
March 26, 2024
"With great power comes great responsibility — that's our foundational context in exploring AI and ML."
Husani OakleyTheme Three Intro
June 6, 2023
"Without attribution you can’t get funding, and if it’s not funded, it’s not a priority."
Jess GrecoCreating a Basis for Change: Scaling Design Maturity
June 8, 2022
"Workshops are not just about input, but about diverging and converging to make decisions together."
Shipra KayanMake your research synthesis speedy and more collaborative using a canvas
January 24, 2025
"We prefer candidates who might not have traditional design vocabulary but can think about problems from first principles."
Prayag Narula Abhinav KrishnaDialing for Research: How to Reach the Unreachable
March 10, 2022
"Getting accessibility integrated into all company processes is essential because accessibility is a culture change."
Sam ProulxUnderstanding Screen Readers on Mobile: How And Why to Learn from Native Users
June 6, 2023
"Design takes on a new role as governance practitioner, overseeing branding, content, and accessibility."
Amy EvansHow to Create Change
September 25, 2024
"Amazon Echo is the first technology my artist wife really loves because it's genuinely useful and gets smarter over time."
Greg PetroffEverything is About to Change: Software as Material
June 8, 2016
