Technology is the double edged sword of HR – and we need to get better at mastering it
Do you feel like you’re constantly on screen? Hopping from one Zoom call to the next? Bogged down with endless Teams invites? It’s time to break free of the toxic meeting cycle. Remote work has led to a culture of being ‘switched on’ 24/7 – home and professional lives have blended causing overwork, anxiety, and extreme burnout.
Technology is very much the double edged sword of HR. On the one hand, it’s completely indispensable – and, let’s face it, we simply wouldn’t have gotten through the pandemic without it. However, there’s a price to pay for having the world at our fingertips. Being constantly contactable, feeling the urge to respond to emails in the dead of night, mindlessly doomscrolling through LinkedIn – it’s leading to a mental health crisis. One which HR leaders need to address – and quickly.
“Senior staff members must demonstrate a switch off from work,” organisational psychologist Sarah Zerella told HRD. “If employees are being contacted across a broad range of hours, it makes it harder to set boundaries and wrap up for the day. The uptake of virtual collaboration tools has resulted in an increase in expectation and accessibility.”
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A recent report from Cisco found that 81% of employees experience physical ailments at the end of each day after long video meetings. In order to combat that, their data threw out three high-level suggestions - adjustments to meeting culture including reducing back-to-back meetings (42%), five-minute buffer between meetings (33%), and meeting-free days (27%).
As HR leaders, while it’s necessary to keep momentum and productivity high – it simply cannot come at the cost of employee wellbeing. Try investing in tools which can help your workers plan meetings without overburdening themselves – and giving them some time for much-needed breaks.
“You shouldn’t blame yourself for developing a toxic relationship with meetings in remote work,” added Gilles Raymond, CEO of Letsmeet. “If just scheduling them drains all of your energy, the meeting prep and the actual meetings will always feel like exhausting work. Even if WFH opens many issues, the quality of life offered by this approach, the traction of companies that offer this mode, and the passive resistance faced by the one not offering this opportunity shows the power of the trend of remote work. It will take years, and it will be offered under specific conditions, but the trend is there and it is unstoppable.”
As leaders, we understand that sometimes you do end up working longer hours than normal – and that’s fine. However, when this ‘one off’ becomes the norm, prepare yourself for a wave of resignations -which is not something any of us need right now.
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“If contacting an employee outside of work hours is necessary, ensure the communication is clear enough that the staff member knows they aren’t obligated to respond immediately,” added Zerella. “Clear communication of expectations will leave no room for error and will set the example that flexible working doesn’t mean always [being] accessible.”
