The Softening of Formality

My friend Gabe Krenza (a brilliant human working at the intersection of leadership development, biomimicry, and wilderness exploration) has observed that our virtual working and connecting has led to a “softening of formality.”

The backdrop of our video-calls is where we spend our non-work hours...where we live our lives. We’re wearing more relaxed clothes, the interruptions by pets and kids are accepted and quickly normalizing, and video-call platforms like Zoom are distributing our faces onto a screen without any concern for hierarchy or role.

Gabe points out that on a video-call it’s as likely that the newest intern is front-and-center while the CEO’s face is a small tile in one corner of the screen. For those who believe that work needs to be a setting where humans can show up as fully themselves, this crisis will hopefully accelerate a more humanized and less formal approach to work.