the strategy circle

Tag: leadership

  • Managing your mental and emotional resilience is your number one leadership priority

    Managing your mental and emotional resilience is your number one leadership priority

    Many people who are drawn to leadership roles, or who are entrepreneurial in nature, tend to be very responsible. This is a wonderful trait and creates a great deal of value in all aspects of one’s life. 

    However, there can be a dark side to being responsible for ‘everything’. I often see this with leaders, they feel they have to take care of EVERYTHING. This is not humanly possible and can cause real stress and discomfort as your business or organization grows and there is more and more to take care of. It is often when we are overwhelmed and stressed that our personal issues tend to bleed into our work and we become less productive and can actually cause problems in our teams. 

    The personal and the professional 

    There is a very misleading illusion that our personal and professional lives are not connected. The more responsibility you take on as a leader, the less true that assumption is. Stress and overwhelm will tend to take us to our least useful behaviours. I have noticed that very stressed leaders can either become chaotic or over-controlling (any number of behaviors can play out here) none of which are useful in a team or organisation that wants to perform well. The leader of an organisation can often discharge stress into the team in unconscious ways. It’s 100% human and most people do it until they learn not to do it, because it’s really not useful or helpful. The cost of stressed leadership behaviour can be legion. Losing good team members, creating a toxic environment where people don’t feel safe, reducing trust (I wrote at length about that here) and impacting many different aspects of a business. Mostly culture and morale. Becoming uncontained as a leader due to exhaustion and stress is very dangerous to the health of an  organisation and the health of the leader.

    Responsibility and Pushing yourself

    I have noticed that sometimes leaders can get into a mode where due to their own responsibility bias, they can push themselves too hard. Yes, this is part of the drive and success right? And it has a shadow, because it can push you into the red and beyond your SUSTAINABLE capacity. I have witnessed leaders burn themselves out, and then take years to recover. This is very expensive! And exhausting!

    Pushing others 

    Yes, but pushing others is part of being a leader. Yes and no. When the pushing is unconscious, fear based and born from overwhelm it really does not create anything of value in a team. Pushing that is created with good process, checks and balances and the healthy oversight of a resourced leader can produce amazing results. And the main difference? The mental health and emotional resilience of the leader (or leadership team) as well as the quality of the processes and the shared maps of understanding that have been created in an organisation. I have seen teams burnt out and many years of building and value creation lost to unconscious pushing.

    The cost and damage of burnout  

    Let’s be clear, everyone, and all teams at some stages in an organisation’s life need to go into the red for a while.

    And most people can sustain a couple of weeks, and maybe even a couple of months of pushing hard. And then they have to rest, and if they dont…

    One of the casualties of exhaustion and overwhelm that goes on for too long, is that people start making really poor decisions. Shortcuts are taken, communication is compromised. Client relationships can start to show cracks, internal relationships can become brittle and testy. People start getting sick more often, things get more and more behind and tempers flare. All of these are warning signs to slow down, take some perspective and regroup. But what tired leaders tend to do, is just push harder, themselves and everyone else. Again, what makes the most difference in this situation is when a leader is resourced and emotionally resilient and can support their team to make the best of the situation, as opposed to actively making the situation worse. 

    Your number one leadership priority

    If you are the leader in your space, then you have to make sure that you are well, resilient and can make good decisions on behalf of your team and organisation.

    This looks like:

    1. Get enough rest – figure out what real, rejuvenating rest looks like for you. Daily, weekly, monthly, annually. This could be a run, a swim, enough sleep, quarterly long weekends away in the mountains with your family or friends. A decent holiday at least once a year. There are many ways that you can achieve this, but put it in your schedule like your life depends on it.  
    1. Do your personal work – As a leader, doing your personal work is critical, know yourself, be aware of your triggers and patterns. Understand how you operate. There are tools, books, courses, so many ways to learn about yourself, and by doing so, learning about others. This is a key leadership skill. Make sure you are dealing with yourself so that you do not play out unconscious destructive patterns in your organization. “If you don’t heal what hurt you you will bleed on people who didn’t cut you” – Unknown
    1. Get support – support looks different for different people, what I will say is that you need someone, or a number of people in different roles who are listening to you,soundboarding your thinking, assisting you to manage your stress, and taking care of your wellbeing. Create structures of support. This could look like a monthly therapy session, a coaching relationship, a group of peers who have your back, a friend you can really talk to or a personal trainer who keeps you in shape. Pick your medicine, but make sure that you are keeping your mind clear and untangled, and when it gets tangled, you have a way to deal with it. 
    1. Make time in your schedule – to do what you know nourishes or feeds you, whatever it is that keeps you sane. Sane keeps you and your team from burning out. Take the time, no one is going to hand it to you, you have to be very proactive about this. 

    If you do this, if you make this investment,  it will pay you back in time saved, relationships retained, drama avoided, conflict side stepped, energy managed and health preserved. Totally worth it.

    If this resonated with you and you would like to find out more, or be supported with this, you are welcome to contact me on mignon@thestrategycircle.co.za

  • Making business progress when work slows down

    Making business progress when work slows down

    Every business hits moments when normal work grinds to a halt – whether it’s system outages like WiFi or power cuts, waiting on approvals, seasonal slowdowns or unexpected disruptions. While these pauses can feel frustrating, they also offer something most business owners struggle to find: uninterrupted time to step back and work on the business, not just in it. Used well, these slower periods can become some of the most valuable strategy time you’ll get all year.

    1. Working on and not in the business

    I participate actively in several business networks, and I’ve noticed that time to work on the business instead of just in it seems to be the holy grail many of my entrepreneur peers are trying to find time to seek.

    Look at the Eisenhower Decision Matrix.

    Savvy business people know that finding the time to work in that “Important but not urgent” quadrant, what my team refers to as “Quadrant II time”, is essential if you don’t want to be stuck on that hamster wheel, repeating problems and going nowhere.

    Quadrant II is where we take time to zoom in and focus on careful in-depth analysis, or zoom out and take time to look at the big picture. It is where we take the time to plan, develop or improve systems, and build business relationships.

    However, the dog that barks the loudest tends to get the most attention, and so the “Urgent and important” tasks in Quadrant I tend to draw us away from that valuable Quadrant II time. The reason Quadrant I can be so seductive is that the work is exactly what it says on the label – urgent and important. If something is on fire, it must be put out.

    The problem is if you don’t spend time planning and building systems that prevent fire, those fires will just keep on happening, leaving you blackened and singed and choking for air on a regular basis.

    Also, it is possible to fall into the trap of overestimating the importance of certain tasks and pushing them into the “do” category, when in fact they should be in the “delegate” category.

    Business bible The E-Myth by Michael E. Gerber talks about, in a nutshell, how the majority of small businesses fail. They do so because Business Owner Bob fails to realise that – as the founder of new company Bob’s Widgets – his new job is not making widgets anymore, but to run a company that makes widgets.

    The Advanced E-Myth by the same author breaks down the disciplines of running a business into “The 7 centers of management attention”:

    If you are at a loss as to what planning to do, pick whichever of those you feel is your weakest area and start with that.

    Here is a handy worksheet from e-myth.com you can print out and refer to if you need it.

    2. Make your staff part of the business strategy process

    “That’s all fine for me,” you might be saying to yourself, “But what do I do with all those staff out there laughing raucously or spinning in their chairs?”

    I say take them with you into Quadrant II.

    A lack of employee engagement can drain the life out of a company, harming your ability to retain talent, and poisoning the well for those that stay, killing motivation and productivity.

    More than free snacks and even more than high pay, studies show that modern employees want to feel appreciated and included. They want to know where the company is going and to know that their and the company’s values align.

    Including your staff in strategic planning sessions means that they will feel respected and invested in the outcomes, and more likely to cooperate with implementing the changes uncovered during the process.

    Ever heard the saying “Culture eats strategy for breakfast” by Peter Drucker? It doesn’t mean what I originally thought it did; that culture is more powerful than strategy. It means that any attempt to carry out a strategy that isn’t accepted by the culture will be dead in its tracks.

    Make sure innovation and openness to new ideas is part of your culture by including staff in strategy workshops. Plan these for when you’re expecting slower than normal workdays.

    No names mentioned but I have heard other employers say things to the tune of, “There is no point including these idiots in strategy workshops – they have nothing to add.”

    Before we continue, I’d like to say the assumption is likely wrong. The key thing about diversity – and we are all diverse from each other in some way – is that it means a wider variety of experiences to draw from. Everyone in your team has something to add, and the onus is on business owners to create an environment in which staff are encouraged and empowered to put forward their ideas.

    You might even choose to go further and create a culture where it is more uncomfortable to be seen to have nothing to add in strategy and ideation sessions than it is to step up, although this needs to be done with consideration so that you don’t terrify the introverts into leaving, and with enough structure that the extroverts don’t hog the microphone.

    3. Staff training staff

    When the lights go out, have a system for choosing someone to lead the training session.

    This takes some of the burden of training off management and will also make the employees feel appreciated for their knowledge.

    You want to set people up to succeed though, so consider providing guidelines and recommendations to assist those who might not be natural presenters.

    If you don’t want to do it this way and feel there are some knowledge gaps you or other directors or managers can fill in, use the time as official training slots hosted by yourself or management.

    4. Talk to each other

    I majored in both English Literature and Computer Science in university. On the one hand, you had individuals who enjoyed engaging in thoughtful and sometimes heated debate, and on the other you had those who would use instant messaging to talk to the person directly next to them. No prizes for guessing which were the English and which were the Comp Sci majors.

    My guess is that most workplaces will have a mix of members who behave like either group, and communication between them might not always go as smoothly as it could.

    My guess is also that you either currently have or will have cliques in your office, which can be very harmful. In two of the bigger companies I’ve worked in, I’ve observed what might even be described by the dramatically inclined as clique-vs-clique, and sometimes clique-vs-company warfare.

    If effort isn’t made to integrate those that don’t usually talk, at the very least you’re in for some chilly vibes. Consider addressing or pre-empting this by using unexpected pauses for some relationship building exercises.

    You might create a roster of discussion pairs with some recommended “getting to know you” questions just to get the ball rolling.

    If you work in a bigger company, it might well be possible that there are staff members who aren’t clear on what everyone actually does, so simply getting people to share information on what they do on a daily basis could help build relationships and educate staff on how the business actually works, which is something you shouldn’t assume they already know.

    On the external relationships front, you might see if you can schedule any face to face or phone catchups with clients or suppliers, when technology or logistical disruptions limit your options.

    To conclude, I can’t deny that unexpected downtime might throw a spanner in the works.  Follow these tips, however, and you’ll have some methods to brighten the future of your business while the lights are out.