Performance Psychology to Effectively Manage Your Remote Team
Performance psychology was originally practiced in fields that required optimal physical
performance for success, such as athletics, wilderness survival, and military special forces. It
became a very widely practice in the former, sports, and performance psychology is utilized
regularly at every level of competitive athletics, nowadays.
Another place it is being utilized is the office setting. As many of these office settings have been
forced by the hand of COVID-19 to move remotely, remote teams are also trying (and often
succeeding) to continue utilizing performance psychology to help their teams perform at optimal
levels. There is some evidence to indicate that certain aspects of performance psychology, like
increasing attention span, help even more in relation to a remote team.
Here are some ways performance psychology can help both you, as a manager, and your
colleagues in your remote work setting.
New Pressures
Being in a remote setting certainly has its advantages for many. Office spaces often have a lot of
distractions, both internally such as cubicle-mates, and externally like traffic issues that can
result in lost work time. Though remote work avoids these distractions, it adds a lot, too.
Cubicle-mates can be roommates, and traffic can be a movie on in the background. With that,
there is an added level of trust that comes with being a remote employee, and a focus of
performance psychology is blocking outside distractions to be able to focus on the task at hand.
This can relate as much to a manager in a new setting as it can an employee, having the same
responsibilities, but less chances to “keep an eye” on things.
Enhanced Performance
As the name would suggest, increased performance is also a key focus of performance
psychology. Mental strategies similar to those that help deal with the new pressures mentioned
above, as well as a few others, that were developed to help athletes can have the same effects on
performance in the remote workplace.
Visualization of accomplishing goals is an activity that can actually be more effective in a
remote setting, as it can be completed as a “group,” with all members in the comfort of their own
homes, where mediation and visualization are generally the most successful. Relaxation is also a
big part of the enhanced performance metric of psychology, and is also easier for most to find at
home than in a shared space.
Exercise
It should be no surprise that exercise is another key element of sport and performance
psychology, but it, too, is important for anyone looking to improve their mentality as it relates to
completing tasks. Setting up a remote team exercise program that, at least, sets up your team for
success with exercise, and, at most, involves interactive sessions, helps build adrenaline, relieve
stress, and improve performance in the remote workplace.
Positive Mind
Physical health and mental health push each other, and often improve hand-in-hand. With that in
mind, keeping a positive, healthy mind also improves physical performance. The exercise
mentioned above helps build a positive mind, as does mental stimulation, improved diets, and
limits on unhealthy things like alcohol and tobacco.
A work-life balance is also important, and though feeling good about work can result in a better
home life, the opposite is just as true. Taking care of your life is paramount for succeeding in the
workplace, and it’s always a good call, in the long run, to let an employer know if you need a
mental health day to get things in order.
As a manager, you should be sure your team knows this!
Repetition
As the new normal simply becomes the normal, it’s easy to brush practices like these aside and
allow yourself and your team to get a little too comfortable. To be successful, performance
psychology needs to be practiced on an ongoing basis.