Civility in the Hybrid Workplace

BE THE CIVILITY “GLUE”

During the past two years, the old work routines we took for granted have been profoundly disrupted and probably are gone forever. We’ve had to adjust to working with others in a mixture of settings: always in person, remote, or a hybrid of the two.

Even before COVID-19, we were struggling to be civil with one another. Research findings reported in Civility in America 2019: Solutions for Tomorrow that 93% of Americans identified incivility as a problem, while 68% classified it as a significant problem. So how can we collectively do better?

WHAT IS CIVILITY?

Civility is the act of showing regard for others by being polite. For example, you show civility when speaking kindly to someone who has hurt your feelings, or by holding the door for someone else. It’s about being mindful of not just yourself but everyone around you. Civility means behaving in a manner that shows care for others. When we’re not civil with one another, whether we agree or not, bad things can happen.

Incivility doesn’t depend on the setting. It looks the same in a remote, in-person, or hybrid environment. Subtle slights. Outright interruptions. Belittling comments. Common discourtesies. Even complete disregard. This can lead to lower self-esteem, higher stress, and decreased job and life satisfaction. Remote interactions can make the problem seem invisible.

BOOSTING YOUR CIVILITY SKILLS

SO HOW CAN IMAGE MANAGEMENT TOOLS SUPPORT YOUR EFFORTS TO BE CIVIL IN TODAY’S WORKPLACE?

BE ENGAGED – Participate and show respect while attending meetings virtually. Plan ahead, even if it means getting out of bed a few minutes early to put your appearance together. Don’t multitask during meetings, whether on camera or in person. Tending to email on your phone or surfing the Internet while someone is presenting is just plain rude. Listen and respond with verbal and nonverbal communication cues to send the message that you are actively listening.

USE YOUR VOICE – Be sure to

address colleagues respectfully. Don’t use profane language and maintain a professional tone. Add pauses where periods and commas would fall during written communication. Also, don’t speak over others; if appropriate, raise your hand to show that you wish to talk.

APPEAR PRESENT – Be social

and work to maintain and grow work relationships and friendships: combat negativity and poor behavior with sincerity, positivity, and tact. Positive news about family, accomplishments, and achievements staves negativity and nurtures relationships. Short chats at the coffee pot might be gone, so look for other ways to accomplish the same social/bonding effects.

MAINTAIN YOUR VISUAL IMAGE –

Whether client-facing or not, your role should still support your team, your clients, and your company’s brand. Respect starts with being respectful to yourself. Define a workday appearance in dress and grooming that best represents what you want to achieve. For example, choose a comfortable sweater vs. a favorite sweatshirt. When on camera, participate from a space of minimal distraction, seated at a table/desk with the focal point on your face to your upper chest. Avoid broadcasting your ceiling, a view up your nose, or showcasing the room you’re sitting in.

To maintain civility, practice polite behavior. Be respectful of others, show empathy, and extend kindness to them. Consider your own behaviors and their impact on others and your reputation. Build your self-awareness and gauge your behaviors in the workplace, wherever that is in your current life. Even if rudeness continues to grow around you, you can be mindful of your behaviors and lead the charge to fight that trend and instill respect.

Kelly Duggan

Kelly is an Image Consultant specializing in executive and personal image development, etiquette & communication skills. She is a certified member of the Association of Image Consultants International. Contact Kelly at: www.kellyduggan.com.

Burnout Series

Do you feel like you’ve hit a wall at least once since the COVID-19 pandemic? Like you don’t laugh as much as you used to? Or hold chronic tension in your body?

THESE ARE ALL WARNING SIGNS OF BURNOUT. AND YOU ARE NOT ALONE.

Burnout is at an all-time high, with over 89% of working Americans experiencing it in the last year.

Burnout can look like any number of things: including anxiety, difficulty concentrating, pessimism, feeling stiff and achy, a general “blah” feeling, and increased difficulty managing diabetes because of its physical, mental, and emotional components. After all, what affects the body affects the mind. And vice-versa. Yet, we tend to assign more importance to our physical health than our mental/emotional health. But they are the same.

It may seem like we’re practically back to business as usual, but our bodies tell another story. Our nervous systems have become overwhelmed by stress over the last few years, and if left unaddressed, it can cause many physical, mental, or emotional issues.

First, let’s explore what causes it—longenduring stress.

Burnout has gotten much attention since the pandemic started, but chances are, stuck stress had been accumulating in our bodies for years, if not decades. And many of our nervous systems have gotten stuck with our stress response system, the sympathetic branch of our autonomic nervous system, in the “ON” position. Under acute conditions, stress serves a protective function. It sharpens our attention and mobilizes our bodies to cope with what it perceives as a threatening situation. When it evolved, this looked like a predator hunting us or the hunger we felt while foraging or hunting for our next meal.

Stress comes and goes, allowing our bodies to return to baseline where we feel mentally positive, have vital energy, can digest and assimilate our nutrients and eliminate toxins quickly; healing, regeneration, and reproduction all function well, and we feel strong and capable.

When the stress becomes chronic and unrelenting, like in the last several years, our nervous systems become overwhelmed, and as a result, most of the functions of our bodies become compromised. To maximize your body’s efficiency in this state, your other organ systems get de-prioritized, meaning your digestion slows down, immune functioning shifts—either to underperforming—making us more susceptible to illness or overperforming—potentially causing or exacerbating allergies, asthma, or autoimmune diseases. Growth, tissue repair, reproductive functioning, and learning new material move to the back burner. Your entire body and mind change in response to the perceived threat.

Let’s look at a few changes our bodies make in response to unrelenting stress.

So, let’s talk about what happens to your mind & body during long-enduring stress.

When the body endures long-term stress, it renders us insulin resistant to keep enough glucose circulating in the bloodstream to fuel our brain or activate the fight-or-flight response.

Despite only being 3% of our body weight, our brains consume 20% of our glucose, with no means of storing it for later. The additional glucose circulating through our blood raises our risk of developing Type 2 Diabetes, and managing diabetes becomes more complex.

Cortisol, one of the main stress hormones, can convert protein into glycogen (a cousin of glucose) to store fat as energy for later, usually around our abdomen. This happens because if we can’t find food or are afraid of