”For Georgeta Dendrino, Managing Director of Interact, with a 22-year activity in training and consulting, the ingredients such as authenticity, trust, optimism and self-knowledge are found daily in the professional activity.
With experience in entrepreneurship, leadership, team development and strategic management, with an Executive Master in coaching and consulting at INSEAD Business School (France), Georgeta Dendrino is, since 2019, Global Mentoring Vice President of the Professional Women’s Network – the largest network of business for women and with 28 branches worldwide – and member of the board of the Association for Values in Education.
A first interview with Georgeta Dendrino about the values that hold together the teams and internal structures of a company, focusing on what helps us build long-term and authentically, can be read HERE.
At the beginning of 2021, we are pleased to offer you a new interview in which you will discover the essential means to face, professionally and personally, this new year in which challenges are complex and inevitable.
Q: One of the important trends in HR in the new year involves rethinking the interactions of employees in telework. Should companies turn to specialists to provide alternatives and solutions for the experience of employees working from home?
Georgeta Dendrino: Working from home has already become what is called the ‘new normal’. In 2020 we had all the mitigating circumstances: from one day to the next we had to work from home, to collaborate, to communicate virtually, to do our job responsibly, even if there was no one around to keep an eye on us . We did all of this having ups and downs. We were all in the same situation, so it was nine months of groping, learning, unlearning, frustrating, tired, stubborn, struggling and dancing to the new rules of the job.
This year, however, we need to become more ‘professional’, to be a kind of federal observer of our own activity, to change our means. I think it’s hard for managers to continue to do what they have to do, to manage their teams differently, to contain uncertainty, emotions, to make sure they have results, and at the same time to rise above and see like the referee, from above, everything, to come up with different solutions for a better work experience at home.
Managers also need support, ideas, implementation help, to be themselves content, supported. We all get better ideas, certain aspects are clarified when we talk to someone who helps us look at the bigger picture, as if we are no longer just actors in our own lives but also directors. A coach, a mentor, a trainer can sometimes bring great value.
Q: Beyond the companies and professionals that are in the “leadership coaching” portfolio, for many people who follow you, you are a source of inspiration, a professional who brings to the fore the good parts of every day. What does Georgeta Dendrino’s optimism look like in 2021 and how does it translate into the projects you have planned?
Georgeta Dendrino: Thanks for the appreciation, I’m glad it looks like this. I am a person with many doubts, with many inner turmoils. Like one of my teachers at Insead was always saying: “I’m not that young as to feel like I’m good at everything.”
Beyond the many thoughts that keep me awake at night, I would say that I have always had a dose of self-confidence. This confidence makes me optimistic about finding solutions.
Now, more than ever, I think it is necessary to have a high level of flexibility, of tolerance. To what? To anything. To other people, to uncertainty, to all the changes happening around us. Until last year we had personal and business objectives, we plan vacations, weekend getaways, meetings with friends, teambuilding, various sports; we had various landmarks between which our life unfolded. Those landmarks gave us the feeling of predictability, control. Now we have no landmarks; or not those. The need now is to be open, to accept what is coming, to put our imagination to work more. The landmarks were a kind of fence that protected us but, at the same time, limited us. It’s time let our minds free, to tolerate what’s coming at us, but knowing that we can’t control much other than ourselves. But even there you need indulgence, acceptance.
But these are done closely step by step, with a lot of patience.
This year I will focus on being more flexible, more tolerant, more alert. I’ve been on safari in South Africa a few times. I saw the predators there: they are alert, attentive to what is around, they scan the surroundings, they seem to be very calm, I imagine that they manage their energy very well, and when the moment is right, they act. That’s how I intend to be this year. I know, it sounds like a slogan, especially since ‘agility’ is a meme of recent years.
It’s not easy to reach, precisely because we are used to landmarks, to our way of doing things. We will always look for landmarks, of course. But it is good to be open to change.
Q: What are the major changes that entrepreneurs, freelancers and companies should make in the new year and how can a coaching system support them to get out of the crisis or to ensure that they are successful in 2021?
Georgeta Dendrino: There’s a lot to say here. If I think of entrepreneurs, I would say that part of what I said above applies to them. Being an entrepreneur in times of crisis means, from my perspective, a mental concern for business seven days a week, 24 hours a day.
It is a long and difficult period for everyone, with fears related to our health and that of our loved ones, to the financial health of the company, with uncertainties related to the macroeconomic situation. Entrepreneurs, managers must – and I intentionally use the word ‘must’ – to find sources of energy within themselves, to be self-motivated, to give energy, confidence to those they work with, clients, team members, to communicate a lot and clearly, even if sometimes they don’t feel like doing it, to behave like that toy called Hopa Mitica. It was a character toy that I put upside down and he stood up. The entrepreneur must be a kind of Hopa Mitica: he falls down and gets up, paraphrasing the saying. How many times? How many times do you have to, just like in the movie Groundhog Day: you start over, you make a mistake, you do something different, and you make a mistake again, and so on until things turn out the way you want.
Therefore, energy, enthusiasm, self-motivation, sharing energy and confidence with others, courage, perseverance, openness to try other ways of doing business, openness to learning – these are some of the skills needed for an entrepreneur and a manager. I would dare to say that many of these are needed for anyond who correctly assumes their own life, career, and does not live in the valley of eternal lamentation, in which they are not told’ and the are not given’, in which ‘hell is with others ‘.
A coach can help a lot in keeping us in balance. We all need landmarks, someone to give us perspectives, to contain us sometimes, in front of whom we can trust to open up and with whom to have sincere conversations. Sincerity is missing from many interactions, we are so much in a performance-oriented approach, to give well, not to disappoint, that we forget to be in harmony with who we are. In addition, we need different conversations, beyond the ones we have daily about KPIs, plans, strategies. Our being is more than that, it has many facets; unfortunately, we often forget that we are with as many shades as facet has a diamond, and we waste our time with one or two facets. People have many possibilities, they don’t really allow themselves to be exploited. One of my clients told me about a philosophy club, another about a book club, where she participates to populate her mind with other information, other sources of inspiration.
A coach can give you this inspiration, they can support you, they can help you find your energy, your enthusiasm, so you can support others yourself. The question is: Do you want to? Or do you have this opening?”