Report: The Virtues of Virtual – A philosophy of how dispersed organisations succeed.
Whatever else is true about going virtual, one thing can be said with reasonable confidence: virtual working means navigating new landscapes, and new landscapes make people behave in strange ways. With the trappings of the traditional office disrupted, previously well-adjusted bosses may revert to micro-management, confident colleagues can become people-pleasers, and the well-organised among us are liable to go into overdrive.
How do we work well together, when we’re not together?
The insight shared in this report found its spark in the philosophy of Aristotle, that ancient Greek master of ideas. Specifically, we have found Aristotle’s approach to the ‘good life’ to provide an incredibly helpful lens through which to see organisational success in the virtual context more clearly. Aristotle’s guidance on how to live well boiled down to trading extreme reactions for balanced, thoughtful responses. In his words, “virtue is the golden mean between two vices, the one of excess and the other of deficiency”. Put simply: if you want to live well, practice living in the balance between extremes.
How do we work well together, when we’re not together?
Today, as organisations grapple with virtual working, it is understandable for them to react in ways that are, to Aristotle’s point, either excessive or deficient. In this report, we’ve tried to explain those understandable (but less than ideal) ways of working with a good dose of empathy, but shine a light on the more balanced approaches we’ve found some organisations taking. Those balanced approaches are what we call the virtues of virtual. To our modern ears, ‘virtues’ might sound moralistic. But for Aristotle, and for us, virtues are less about toeing the line and more about reaching our full potential.
Throughout this report, we have identified 5 virtues of virtual. They are: Democracy, Accountability, Clarity, Collegiality, and Understanding. Each virtue is introduced in the context of a major area of organisational life that is commonly beset by overreactions and underreactions to virtual work. For example, we unpack the virtue of accountability in response to learnings that emerge from the excessive and deficient reactions that ‘leadership and management’ often portray when moving to remote ways of working. Each virtue is presented in a particular context, but each one can provide value throughout organisations more broadly.
For Aristotle, virtues are context sensitive. The same goes for the virtues we’ve identified. To help you and your organisation get the most out of this report, each section ends with 3 questions that you and your team can use as you digest what a given virtue means in your particular context.
As we researched best practice in virtual organisations, we met some brilliant people, many of whom you will meet throughout the report. You’ll find moments to pause from the main report and digest alternative perspectives from international human rights lawyer Susie Alegre, as well as our friends at Nexthink and Henley Business School. Throughout we’ll share perspectives from the following interviewees we were lucky enough to speak with for this report: Bruce Daisley (ex-Twitter VP and author of Eat, Sleep, Work Repeat), Michelle Davies (People VP at Phrasee), Jon Barnes (founder, speaker, and author of Democracy Squared), and Samantha Clarke (happiness consultant, changemaker, and author of Love It or Leave It).
Lastly, we’d love to think with you about the virtues of virtual. If you’d like to have have a virtual coffee and digest what the report’s findings mean for you and your team, get in touch below.