Using the remote worker management checklist in practice

In this follow-up podcast to the conversation with Chief Inspector Steve Kerridge, Dr Helen Fitzhugh speaks with Matt Blowers from NatWest. Where the previous conversation talked about the creation and police application of the UEA / PrOPEL Hub 'Checklist for the Pro-active Management of Remote Workers', this follow-up sees Matt describe how he has used the checklist with his team in practice and what benefits he sees from using evidence-based resources on workplace wellbeing.   

This podcast is part of a toolkit of free, evidence-informed workplace wellbeing resources provided by the Workplace Wellbeing Research Team based at the University of East Anglia, in the UK. You can find the checklist to read and download at: Checklist offers pro-active approach to managing hybrid workers - evolveworkplacewellbeing.org

Transcript

00:00:00:00 - 00:00:38:04

Helen Fitzhugh

Welcome to the Evolve Workplace Wellbeing Podcast. This podcast is part of the toolkit of free evidence-informed workplace wellbeing resources provided by the Workplace Wellbeing Research Team, based at the University of East Anglia in the UK. You can find the resources on www.evolveworkplacewellbeing.org  The contents of the toolkit draw upon cutting edge multi-disciplinary research on workplace wellbeing, including insider insights and case studies.

Helen Fitzhugh

We want to help you take evidence informed action to help your business evolve and thrive. Every six weeks, a member of our team will introduce you to a new piece of research and to someone whose life experience puts a human face on that same research topic. 

Hi, I’m Dr Helen Fitzhugh and for this podcast I'm speaking to Matt Blowers from NatWest about his experience of putting research insights into practice.

00:01:06:19 - 00:01:33:20

Helen Fitzhugh

On the last podcast, we spoke to Chief Inspector Steve Kerridge of Cambridge Constabulary about how we came to create a proactive checklist for managing remote workers. In this podcast, we'll be talking to Matt about how that checklist has gone out into the world and influenced practice. I ran a couple of sessions on workplace wellbeing matching during the PrOPEL Hub project, which you can find out more about at www.propelhub.org 

Helen Fitzhugh

And he's here to say how interacting with research Insight has moved his thinking forward. Matt Hello. Thank you for joining us. Could you tell us a little bit about yourself? 

Matt Blowers

Hi, Helen. Yes, we're really pleased to do that. So, yeah, as I said, my name is Matt Blowers. I’ve worked in financial services for over 20 years, for a bit more than that.

00:01:56:07 - 00:02:27:18

Matt Blowers

I currently work at NatWest and that's part of a big banking group, which also includes Royal Bank of Scotland, Ulster Bank in Ireland. And I've been lucky enough over those 20 years to move around lots of different parts of the bank and it feels like I've had several careers under one employer. I currently run or work within the customer insight team for NatWest, and that's all about listening, learning and acting on customer feedback from their experiences with the bank.

00:02:27:20 - 00:02:51:11

Matt Blowers

And that might be particular interactions, journeys they've been through or relationships they have with members of staff.

Helen Fitzhugh

Great, thank you. And we met during this Propel Hub time when I was giving lots of workshops on employee wellbeing and how to improve it. Also, we were talking about a proactive checklist for managing remote workers, and that's formed some of the work we did with you.

00:02:51:11 - 00:03:23:24

Helen Fitzhugh

So, I was wondering if you could tell me a little bit about your experience of those workshops that we did. 

Matt Blowers

Yeah, absolutely. So, the thing that really attracted me to the remote work checklist when I first came across it and the first where you see one of the Norwich financial industry groip hybrid workshops. And the thing that really attracts me to it is that we have a quite a big team and geographically very diverse.

00:03:23:24 - 00:03:58:03

Matt Blowers

So we work with people – well my direct reports are spread over Edinburgh, London, Manchester, me in Norwich and people, and we also work with people all over the world. And so when we began to think about, well, how do we adapt to the pandemic, how do we adapt to remote working? Initially the focus is all on how do we get people the right kit, the comfortable chairs, the Chrome books, the monitors, the headsets so that they're safe and comfortable at work.

00:03:58:07 - 00:04:40:17

Matt Blowers

But then as you get further and further into it, once the logistics are in place and people are safe and comfortable at work, begin to realize how the additional challenges that hybrid working brings with it over the longer term, and I think in particular relationships with colleagues and feeling connected with them is really, really important. And then even longer term than that, thinking about your career progression and how do you feel like your work is valued, including visibility and in recognition for that and starting to see people move on to a hybrid work environment where the mechanisms for how you get on and work are somewhat different to what you're used to.

00:04:40:17 - 00:05:04:04

Matt Blowers

It's not about getting face time with the boss anymore, and there's a lot more to it than that.

Helen Fitzhugh

So Matt, how did you use the checklist in your organization? 

Matt Blowers

We have a staff opinion survey which runs twice a year in April and September. And as I heard you talk through the checklist for the first time, it really made me think, how do we make this work ourselves?

00:05:04:06 - 00:05:41:05

Matt Blowers

And so from talking to you, I think one of the things that I've been most keen to do is to take the checklist and start to kind of expand our thinking a bit as a team in terms of what does wellbeing really mean. So we've tended to think about it in terms of logistics. So now have we got the right structure to work at home and when we do a Zoom meeting in the office, are people remembering to sort of involve people both physically and geographically in the location and in the Zoom call as well?

00:05:41:07 - 00:06:04:21

Matt Blowers

And I think what the checklist does is it takes that thinking to the next level. And so what we've done is kind of adapted it a bit for our purposes, just to include some more sort of bank specific terminology and that sort of thing, and use that in quarterly reviews and it sort of led to some really good rich conversations with people.

00:06:04:23 - 00:06:26:01

Helen Fitzhugh

That's really great. So you’ve taken the opportunity to adapt a little bit, incorporated it into this kind of review process as you go along, which is something we actually recommend in our Evolve workplace wellbeing Guide as well that you continue to have that sense of reviewing, having conversation. So I'm really glad it's working for you. So has it been useful? What changes have come from it?

00:06:26:01 - 00:07:02:19

Matt Blowers

Just, you know, one of the conversations I always remember with you is around that…. So we are encouraged to come into the office on Wednesday as part of hybrid working. I remember talking to you about this whole concept of is it wasted Wednesday? Am I turning up and not getting a whole lot of work done because I'm catching up with people and having sort of conversations around wellbeing.

00:07:02:21 - 00:07:34:15

Matt Blowers

And as we went through, and I remember you saying to me, spending time, you know, spending time with people face to face in the office, there's research that shows that's an investment, not not, not, spending time, you're investing time. And, that you know, it makes things like having difficult conversations or getting favours with people, you know, a bit of give and take over the long run, a lot, a lot easier.

00:07:34:17 - 00:08:01:12

Matt Blowers

And so that sort of additional diversity of thinking has made… and I've been able to share that with the rest of the team. And it really helps. You know, I think sometimes people feel particularly over the panic pandemic, the whole bank was sort of run by people working at kitchen tables and then transition back to hybrid working has been a bit, I think, like most organizations, has been a little bit of friction around it occasionally.

00:08:01:12 - 00:08:22:19

Matt Blowers

Sometimes by some people, as they get used to a new way of working. And I think just being able to share that sort of thinking and research and say, actually, you know, there's there's a lot of benefits to this if you just kind of put your mindset in the right place has really helped. 

Helen Fitzhugh

So, you're thinking about how you use your time wisely now after the pandemic

00:08:22:19 - 00:08:53:07

which bits can be remote, which you still need face to face. 

Matt Blowers

Yeah, I, I think that's I think that's a really good way to put it. I think it's also supplemented by some sort of centrally driven wellbeing initiatives by the bank as well. So we're about to launch the Go 23 challenge is all about setting up small teams and competing challenges based on exercise.

00:08:53:09 - 00:09:22:22

Matt Blowers

And I think in most cases things like this are just wear a fitbit and do a step count, but in this case takes it a lot further so people can do things like cycling, golf, football and yoga, all sorts of different things that count towards it. So I think where you've got something like an organization like NatWest, with the resources and the commitment to wellbeing staff, but it's also got that supplemented by local initiatives.

00:09:22:24 - 00:09:47:14

Matt Blowers

Working with people like you and your team to sort of understand a bit more about the latest thinking, bringing that all together can be really powerful. And so I think it's really helped us keep staff turnover low and engagement really high, which in a competitive environment, when it can be sometimes be a challenge to get hold of and keep the right staff is really, really useful.

00:09:47:16 - 00:10:23:19

Helen Fitzhugh

Yeah. And you're not just saying that are you, because you've got proof in your quarterly survey that you've been keeping engagement high [both laugh]. I've seen the graphs, yeah. So is that something that you found useful: having the data to hand to tell people about why you're doing it? 

Matt Blowers

So I've always been a great believer in what gets measured, gets managed, and so the great thing around having a six monthly staff opinion survey is you can see over time how people's opinions and perceptions change.

00:10:23:21 - 00:10:54:11

Matt Blowers

And we have managed to keep our scores, thematic scores for things like wellbeing and engagement strong over a prolonged period of time, despite some of the challenges that that people face and some of the tumultuous industry events that I talked about earlier on, which are which are kind of major for people.

Helen Fitzhugh

So has a checklist been useful to you in any other ways?

00:10:54:13 - 00:11:20:22

Matt Blowers

It has. So one of the things we found through the Staff opinion survey and through the conversations that we had on the checklist is that staff are beginning to feel that they were losing the connection with each other. And so some of the work that we were then able to put in place was things like larger meetings where we get the whole of the marketing team together.

00:11:20:22 - 00:11:42:18

Matt Blowers

And I predominantly done face to face. So you get the opportunity for people to kind of build their networks and collaborate and talk openly. I mean, obviously there's a cost and an opportunity cost that comes with that. But I think it's and sort of about investing in giving people time to sort of rebuild, reinforce and reconnect with each other.

00:11:42:20 - 00:12:02:04

Matt Blowers

And we also had a smaller scale things like on a Friday afternoon, there's the opportunity for the whole team to just down tools for half an hour and just have a virtual coffee. And that's surprisingly popular. I didn't know how that was going to go down, but I think people really appreciate the opportunity to just relax and talk about something else.

00:12:02:04 - 00:12:39:23

Unknown

The one rule of Friday afternoon is you can always talk about anything else is fine, but not work. 

Helen Fitzhugh

So in general, what do you find are the benefits of doing more for employee wellbeing? Both having these kind of central initiatives at NatWest and also these local initiatives you've been talking about? 

Matt Blowers

Yeah, I think from a personal perspective, I've been leading in managing people for a very long time, and the thing that I really enjoy about my job the most is when you have those moments where you interact with someone and through that interaction, so be that watercooler conversation.

00:12:39:23 - 00:13:08:23

Matt Blowers

Bit of coaching, performance review, whatever it might be. They then go on to do something that they didn't think they could do before, and they just push their comfort zone, push their boundaries a little bit further. And to me that's like the best part of my job, hands down, no question. So from a personal point of view, I think how wellbeing links to productivity and productivity links to people achieving greater performance and therefore their own goals is absolutely brilliant.

00:13:08:23 - 00:13:45:22

Matt Blowers

And so I'm really, really pleased about that. But from an employment perspective, point of view, my team has got a very narrow, specialized skill set in customer research and it can be quite demanding and it can also be quite a narrow it's quite a narrow pool of people that you’re fishing in when you go out to recruit, it's critical to get it right in such a narrow and specialized team because recruiting people to replace those who leave through attrition and turnover is really, really challenging.

00:13:46:02 - 00:14:10:02

Matt Blowers

And it has been for a while and high rates of absence, again, the team is usually very busy and demand for what we do usually outstrips supply. So high rates of absence again can be really difficult for us to absorb. So I think from the kind of pure metric perspective, there's some real benefits from my point of view, right?

00:14:10:04 - 00:14:52:15

Helen Fitzhugh

Around wellbeing, what are some of the challenges that employers like you face? 

Matt Blowers

I think specifically for us financial wellbeing has been an area of concern for a while and I think that's in two different ways. So working in a customer research team, you do get a lot of exposure to some of the challenges that customers face around financial wellbeing and things like, for example, increases in frauds and scams, the difficulties that some customers face day to day.

00:14:52:17 - 00:15:18:15

Matt Blowers

And I think that can have an effect on people listening to customers talk about some of those challenges. I think in addition, in addition to the challenges the customers face, there’s obviously the challenges that staff face themselves. So there's really there's been some real adjustments for, them to make, too. So I think financial wellbeing has been, you know, in particular recently, it's been a major consideration from those two different perspectives.

00:15:18:17 - 00:15:43:05

Helen Fitzhugh

So that we've talked a little bit about the checklist for managing remote workers there and how it's been used in your organization and also about why you think it's important to look after employee wellbeing. But I wonder if there is a final message you'd like to give to those listening to the podcast about the importance of workplace wellbeing or using research?

00:15:43:07 - 00:16:17:00

Matt Blowers

I think the big paradigm shift for me in this piece of work has been recognizing that we don't have all the answers, but there's a tendency, particularly in a large, well-established, successful organization, to think that if you look internally, you can find the answers to all of your questions and challenges, and the reality is you might be able to find some answers, but they might not necessarily be all the answers or the best answers.

00:16:17:02 - 00:16:45:09

Matt Blowers

So it's well worth looking outside of your organization to look for alternatives, perspectives, ways of thinking, research that’s been delivered through methodologies you might never think, cause I mean, the fact that you can come up with a checklist that works for the police and the bank, I think is sort of vaguely astounding, slightly humbling and extremely useful. So yeah, I think that's one of the key things for me.

00:16:45:11 - 00:17:07:19

Helen Fitzhugh

Great. Thank you very much. I just want to say a big thank you for joining us. 

Matt Blowers

Well, thank you very much for having me. Really enjoyed it.

Helen Fitzhugh

If anybody would like to find out more about the checklists we've discussed here, please visit www.evolveworkplacewellbeing.org  And please join us in six weeks time for another podcast on our ongoing exploration of workplace wellbeing.

00:17:07:20 - 00:17:36:08

Helen Fitzhugh

This podcast was produced by the University of East Anglia with the support of UEA Broadcast House Norwich Business School, RAND Europe and all the members of the Workplace Wellbeing Research team. You can find out more about our team as a whole, our research and use our practical business focused resources at www.evolveworkplacewellbeing.org 

00:17:36:10 - 00:17:42:24

Helen Fitzhugh

Thank you for listening.