Hi Everyone
I’m Vicki-Anne from Creative Recruiters
This week I’ve been speaking to in-house Creative Services Managers and Studio Managers, asking them two questions.
Firstly, what is their greatest concern as a CSM right now.
And, what are they ideally hoping for?
The answers, perhaps unsurprisingly, were very similar.
The most consistent concern was about connectivity and visibility given that their teams were now all off-site. There are a variety of ways that CSMs are tackling this, from the introduction of video conferencing, the most popular being Zoom, Skype and Teams to the introduction of Friday night team drinks over Zoom to special guest speakers over Zoom.
One client had a unique solution though. He said that he had implemented a team WIP meeting via Skype at 9:00am every day and then the team leaves the Skype on throughout the day. Everyone puts themselves on mute, but when you want to speak to someone you simply just start talking by saying “Hey VA, can you help me with ……”.
The person unmutes themselves and responds. It’s no different to calling out there name in the office. He said this way, not only does everyone feel connected to the team and the business, they also continue to learn from each other as they would have in the office environment.
When I then asked the CSM’s what they were hoping for, again the answers were really similar.
Most were hoping for their teams to continue to adapt and embrace this way of remote working as our new normal, secondly that they remain productive but at the same time find a better balance as many were finding it hard to turn off and, most importantly that they can keep them employed.
I think everyone collectively breathed a sigh of relief when JobKeeper was extended but I can hear an air of caution of course remains.
I hope sharing some of this information has been helpful and I’ll continue to speak to as many business leaders as I can and come back to you with any gold nuggets I learn along the way.
In the meantime, thanks so much for listening and keep well.