Comment: Maintaining efficiency in times of remote working and COVID-19 - What are the most important leadership skills for Leaders to succeed?

Insights from the perspective of an Executive Head-hunter in Romania

In our profession we speak daily with senior management, our clients, and candidates. Of course, COVID and its implications are still a hot topic: what are the considerations, the plans, and the required changes for coming out of this situation even stronger.

We decided to put the learnings on a wider base and were sending out a questionnaire, to over 300 CEOs, Managing Directors and Human Resources Managers, making a full study from the results:

Maintaining motivation and engagement - for 2/3 of our clients this is paramount! How can this be realised?

“Inspiring trust” – trust is built by being dependable (do what you say you will), friendly and approachable, showing support, balancing the need for results with the feeling and circumstances of the team, being respectful and open and transparent communication!

“Offering direction and guidelines” and “Leading by objectives” are mentioned by one third of our clients too. Both are crucial to ensure that teams are all on the same page so to speak, understand the strategy and objectives and deliver results. It is clear that one important element is missing in the current circumstances - short and/or often even informal meetings around coffee machines where teammates find alignment.

This leads to another important factor – people working from home are missing their sense of belonging from a business perspective; their identification with the company.

One’s spirits are often lifted by feeling that one is part of a successful team. Therefore, “Maintaining a positive team spirit up while working remotely” is seen as one of the key factors for efficiency too.

Coaching can also be considered as key element in keeping team spirit high. Unfortunately, not many leaders are trained in how best to coach team members. This activity is even further complicated with the requirement to conduct coaching remotely. TRANSEARCH Romania has a strong Coaching Practice; we have 2 of the most experienced coaches in Romania – contact us to find out more!

Dr. Johannes Burghold, Managing Partner TRANSEARCH Romania Executive Search and Regional VP Eastern Europe.

The complete study can be downloaded from