Courage Coach: How to Build Human Connections in a Rapidly Growing Team

Welcome to Courage Coach, where expert columnist Karin Hurt answers readers' tough leadership challenges with practical tools and techniques you can use right away. Have a question for her? Drop her a line!

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Dear Courage Coach,

I've always felt good about my ability to build real human connection with every member of my team. Without meaning to sound braggy, I think it's my superpower as a leader. But here's the thing: I recently got promoted, and now I have hundreds of people on my team.

There's absolutely no way I can build a deep human connection with everyone. Let's be real, I can't even remember everyone's name at this point, let alone what their kids do for fun, or that they just got a new puppy. How can I scale authentic human connection?

Signed,

Wishing for More

Dear Wishing for More,

First, it sounds like you're doing great! I'm glad to see that your superpower of investing in deep human connection has served you well and that you're being recognized with a promotion. With great power comes ... a terrible memory for names? As your team size grows, what matters more than remembering that Bob from accounting just named his new goldfish "Sushi," is building an organization that invests in deep human connection. It's time to scale your superpower and build an infrastructure for relationships to thrive.

3 Ways to Build Better Human Connection as Your Team Size Grows

Start by identifying your most important relationships and continue to use your superpower as before. Next, invest in building human-centered leadership capacity in others. This doesn't come naturally for everyone. Help the managers on your team to not only understand "why" you believe human connection is so important — teach them how to do it well. And, build structured opportunities to help your team connect with one another.

1. Invest Deeply and Strategically in Key Relationships

If you have hundreds of people on your team, there's no way you can build deep, personal relationships with all of them. But you can invest in a dozen or so well. I'd start by nurturing the great relationships you already have. There's a reason Gallup’s employee engagement survey asks whether you have a "best friend at work." With your big new job, you'll need support and a network of people (e.g. mentors, sponsors, peers) you can trust and ask for help.

Next up, invest deeply in the humans on your two most important teams, the team you're a part of, and the team you lead. And of course, invest in your relationship with your manager. As you work to scale human connection, one of the best things you can do is to show people how it’s done.It’s fascinating how many people screw this up. They get promoted to a manager of managers, and neglect spending time with their direct reports and peers — because they’re so focused on all the other aspects of their big new job.

If you want your managers to be great human-centered leaders, be sure they know how much you care about them and that you have their best interests at heart.

2. Teach Your Team the Art of Great Human Connection

Here's a quirky fact: people who excel at human connection often scratch their heads at the idea of teaching it. "Why teach something so ... human?" they ask. To them, it should come as naturally as binge-watching a new Netflix series.

But not all of us were born with the "connect-with-humans" app pre-installed. To ensure your new organization is more 'Stranger Things' squad than 'Game of Thrones' rivalry, ensure every manager has the tools and skills to do this well.

For those who are a bit more "to-do" and less "how-do-you-do?" help them see human connection as an important task on their “to do” list.

Take, for instance, “Jennifer,” a manager I once helped to understand the importance of connecting with each member of her team. Jennifer was so task-focused that I think she might've tried to schedule her own sneezes. She often forgot to connect with her team unless it was about work.

My solution? A pocketful of pennies. I asked her to start her day with five pennies in her right-hand pocket. Each time she had a genuine chat about something other than tasks (maybe about that new Netflix series?), she'd shift a penny to the left pocket. The goal? Empty that right pocket by day's end.

3. Create Deliberate Opportunities for Your Team to Connect With One Another

Another way for you to scale your human-centered leadership is to build an infrastructure for connection. One of the most obvious ways to do this is by requiring every manager to truly connect with every member of their team each week. But don't just require this, train them and give them tools for great one-on-ones meetings.

Same thing for mid-year and end-of-year reviews. Don't just require them. Teach your team how to do them well and follow through to ensure they’ve having the impact you desire.

And of course, find structured ways to bring people together. Use that time to connect at a human level and to collaborate to solve problems and share ideas. All-hands meetings, town halls and other skip-level meetings are great opportunities to foster deeper trust and connection, not just with you, but among all members of your team. Be sure these meetings are interactive — give people opportunities to collaborate and share their ideas.

Of course, how you show up at any given moment matters. Even if you don't remember Sushi's name on your next visit, you can be genuinely interested in every member of your team, and sharing a bit about yourself in return. Human connection is like the other tasks you're learning to delegate. Trust that others can do this well too as your team grows.

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