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How To Keep Political Distractions Out Of The Workplace

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Unfortunately, political awareness and anxiety are at an all-time high. As much as we would like to ignore politics and focus on getting work done, it’s likely that these discussions are going to creep into the workplace. 

So this begs the question – what can you do as a leader to prevent these inevitable discussions from derailing productivity and team cohesion?

Be Proactive. 

Even if this hasn’t become a problem in your workplace, you need to stay ahead of it. You need to create and implement a strategy for how to keep the peace in your workplace.

All too often, we see leaders take a passive approach and hope that everything will be OK.

Here’s the thing, everything can be OK but that doesn’t happen by accident. As a leader in your organization, you need to be intentional about creating a strategy that ensures everyone on your team maintains the requisite level of professional decorum for productivity in the workplace.

Acknowledge The Reality And Clearly State Your Goal.

You can’t pretend that the difficult political realities don’t exist.

They do.

You have to address it somehow and here’s how you can do it. Include the following in your messaging to your team: 

  1. Acknowledge what happened succinctly and in a non-partisan manner. 
  2. Clearly articulate your hope and expectations for the team. 
  3. Draw a line between what is happening out there and what is happening in here. 
  4. Reaffirm your commitment to the mission and purpose of the organization
  5. Make sure that everybody is still bought-in to what you’re trying to accomplish.

This is all about maintaining focus. People need to stay focused on the goal at hand for the organization and they need your help to do it. 

Model The Behavior You Want To See.

Leadership isn’t just what you say, it’s what you do.

Embody courage, strength, and focus. It will be easier for your team to follow when they have a leader that they can mimic. 

Here are the main behaviors you want to model to your team:

Inclusive and Respectful Communication

Your team will have varying opinions and thoughts about what happened. Remaining inclusive, respectful, and mindful of these differences is the key. 

When you make sure you are including everyone you can in company conversations, you are minimizing the chance of coworkers feeling left out. When emotions are high from divisive topics (like politics), it’s easy for someone to become defensive if they do feel left out. 

Inclusivity will make your team feel safe. 

Respectful communication is also critical. Being respectful shows that you accept somebody for who they are, even when they're different from you or you don't agree with them. Respect in any relationship builds feelings of trust, safety, and wellbeing.

Mission Focused Action

A company’s mission is designed to be a home ground that all stakeholders can revisit in uncertain times. Revisit your company’s mission and make sure your actions are aligned with it. Let the mission fuel and guide your actions. 

Remind your team of this mission and even ask the question “what is one action you can do today to live out our mission?” This will help your team focus on bettering the company, instead of discussing divisive political positions.

Empathy and Compassion

The recent events can bring about feelings of sadness and anger. Having the ability to understand that your coworkers might not be feeling like their cheery selves will save you from appearing communicatively tone-deaf. 

Again, the key is understanding that things aren’t OK. So, instead of pretending like everything is normal, it’s important to show even more compassion, empathy, and understanding than normal. 

Takeaways

Political distractions in the workplace will almost certainly come about one way or another. It’s important to know how to handle them instead of avoiding them and hoping they’ll go away. 

Going the extra mile to help out a coworker with a project, telling them you appreciate them, or even just a simple smile can go a long way in these emotional times.  

If they trust you, they will follow your lead.

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