The Essential Role of Leaders: Being Your Team's Lifeline

A few years ago, after a much-needed vacation, I decided to set aside some extra time for writing and research. During this period, my interactions with my coaching and training clients were limited to text and phone conversations. Back then, remote work was not as common as it is now, and this transition was quite a novel experience for me.

About 10 days into this remote working experiment, I noticed something unusual. I was beginning to feel a bit down. It wasn't a full-blown depression, but rather a subtle sense of decline in my overall mood. It felt like I was slowly sinking, and this puzzled me. After all, I had just returned from a relaxing vacation, and I had plenty of meaningful work ahead of me.

But, despite all these positive aspects, there it was—a distinct feeling of not having enough connections to sustain my love for my work.

A lifeline, as defined, is a rope or line used for life-saving, typically thrown to rescue someone in difficulties in water or used by sailors to secure themselves to a boat. Life can throw us into situations that give us a similar feeling of sinking or being stuck. When we lack support to anchor us, we can start to feel alone and hopeless.

From time to time, every one of us needs a lifeline of care and compassion from others.

Understanding Basic Human Psychology

It's widely recognized in the field of psychology that the feeling of isolation can be a key determinant for a wide range of human ailments, from depression to even premature death.

In fact, The Wall Street Journal reported that there are surprisingly few public health initiatives to combat loneliness, despite its status as a health risk "riskier to health and survival than cigarette smoking or obesity."

So, is loneliness a bigger health risk than smoking or being overweight?

If loneliness indeed poses a greater health risk than smoking or obesity, it becomes a matter that leaders should pay much closer attention to. Are there individuals within our sphere of influence who desperately need a lifeline?

The Impact on Leadership

In a revealing study published in October 2017 in the Journal of the American Geriatrics Society, researchers delved into the impacts and categories of social contact, or the lack thereof, that might predict clinical depression. Their findings were illuminating.

They studied over 11,000 people over the age of 50 and found that only face-to-face interaction forestalled depression in older adults. Phone calls made a difference for those with a history of mood disorders but not for others. Surprisingly, email and text messages had no impact at all.

The lifeline that people need, according to this study, is face-to-face interaction.

What Can Leaders Do to Be Part of the Solution?

As leaders, we hold a unique position of influence and responsibility. We can be intentional in providing the lifeline of care and compassion that others may desperately need. Here's how we can adapt a list of steps from Mayoclinic.org, designed to prevent depression, to leader-follower interactions:

• Become Attuned to Stress: Understand what stress looks like for those on your team. Learn to recognize early signs and be proactive in addressing them.

• Regular Team Meetings: Schedule regular meetings with your team members, ideally every 1-2 weeks, or as often as possible, taking appropriate COVID precautions. Prioritize these meetings to foster connections and open communication.

• Listen and Ask Questions: In your interactions with your team, spend most of your time listening and asking questions rather than immediately jumping into "solve mode." Your genuine interest in their well-being can serve as a lifeline of support.

• Face-to-Face Interaction: Whenever possible, meet with your team members in person. If not feasible, use video chat options like FaceTime or Zoom to maintain a more personal connection.

• Boost Confidence: Give your team members assurances that you believe in them and their capabilities. Building their self-esteem can be a powerful form of support.

• Learning from Mistakes: Foster a culture that encourages learning from mistakes. Let your team know that setbacks are part of the journey, and it's an opportunity for growth.

• Spot Check-Ins: During times of high stress, perform spot check-ins with your team members to ensure they are coping well and provide additional support if needed.

• Early Support: If a team member seems down or faces challenges, ask about it early. Your proactive approach can be the lifeline they require.

• Mini-Sabbaticals: Consider offering frequent mini-sabbaticals as a way to rejuvenate and recharge your team's spirit.

How often are you connecting with those you lead? How intentional are you in making connections? Who on your team appears to be struggling and could use the reassurance that you believe in them?

Your lifeline of care and compassion might be precisely what's needed to help your team reach its peak performance. In leadership, as in life, genuine connections and support can make all the difference.

Patience and Urgency - Part 2

Last week's blog post was formed from a question I received from one of our readers. If you missed the post, you can read Part 1 here. The main question was:

How Can We Have Patience and Urgency at the Same Time?

Growing up as an 8-year-old boy in Central Illinois, I loved baseball. But maybe even more than the game itself, I loved the Chicago Cubs. 

Ernie Banks at first base, Glen Beckert at second base, Ron Santo on third base, Don Kessinger at short stop, Jim Hickman in right field, Don Young in center field, Billie Williams in left field, and my favorite, Randy Hundley behind the plate. 

If it was a really great day, Fergeson Jenkins was on the mound as the pitcher. And Old Jack Brickhouse was quoting Ernie Banks, begging the teams to “play two games”.

I just love the Chicago Cubs! In those days the Cubs were on WGN TV and the games started at 1:05 pm. I could watch an entire game on TV and then go out and grab the guys and have enough daylight to play our own game. If we were lucky, we could get two in that day as well. I loved the Chicago Cubs so much, I dreamed of being one. Playing all kinds of organized baseball, the game as an 8-year-old came pretty easy to me and I loved it!

Then, as I got a little older, something began to change. The pitchers could throw the ball at different speeds. As a batter, as long as the ball came to me straight and fast, I could hit it a mile. But then, as the pitchers got older they learned not only how to throw the ball at different speeds, they could make it curve as well. If the speed was slightly different, it threw off my timing and the ball became very hard to hit.

I know I am not alone out there. I can only imagine how many of you had similar dreams. My dreams of playing for the Chicago Cubs ended when I just couldn’t hit the dreaded curveball.

The curveball in Baseball is known as an off-speed pitch. It has two primary features: it is thrown at a slower speed and it moves off a straight line. This means that the hitter has to be patient in order to be able to make contact with the ball. As a batter, if you can be patient and wait for the ball to get to the plate, and you can see it move, then that ball becomes easy to hit. The problem is that it really isn't so easy!

Patience

As I grew older, the pitchers gained more skill and the baseball kept moving at different speeds and on different lines, so I started to strike out more and more.  The more I would strike out, the harder I would swing at the ball and the more impatient I became. I was so frustrated, I would swing the bat at where I thought the ball would be only to whiff and hear the umpire call “strike three!” 

I just didn’t have the skill as a young player to be patient and wait for the slower speed pitch. In my brain, the ball should have been coming at a faster speed and I found it really hard to just wait for it.  If I could have been more patient at the plate, maybe, just maybe I could have worn those blue pinstripes of my beloved Chicago Cubs. 

Patience, according to Merriam Webster “is an ability to wait without becoming annoyed or upset”. For me, it is being able to suspend your personal need for satisfaction and action. For leaders, patience is all about being able to slow down those fast-paced exchanges with others in order to facilitate higher-quality interactions and better decision-making. 

It seems like the faster things go, or the more urgently we feel the pressure, the more we want to execute NOW! Just like trying to hit a curveball, trying hard or succumbing to the feeling of urgency doesn't help us hit it. What leaders need is an ability to slow their world down. 

As the pressure in the organization builds, as the requests from senior management become stronger and more frequent, most people will feel this urgency and just want to do something. If we are doing something, we feel good. It doesn’t matter if it is the right thing, at least we are trying.  It is a bit like me trying to hit the curveball. At least I went down swinging. didn’t hit the ball. But at least I did something. I wasn’t successful, but I tried.

I think the key is to be aware of what the pressure or speed of the change is doing to you and not become annoyed or upset. Once frustration starts to set in, now we are putting additional pressure on ourselves, and our ability to perform is drastically reduced.

3 Coaching Strategies for Being Patient

Patience is not racing ahead in one’s thought processes while missing the nuanced, but important information that others are trying to share. Sure you want organizational change. Yes, you need it now! But putting so much pressure on yourself could cause you to miss critical things that others need to provide input on. Here are 3 things I work on with my coaching clients when patience is a desired virtue:

1. Write a plan. It is amazing to me how many leaders do not want to sit down and write out a simple plan. A plan that includes people, times, dates, and objectives.  Just writing out a simple timeline can help calm our minds down so that we can see the speed at which we need to move. Then, if we need to move faster, we all are working from the same plan.

2. Use STOP.  This is a model I use to help clients slow down and think. It needs to be implemented before you feel the pressure building. However, if you find your mind racing, it can be used then too. The strategies are simple, but the implementation isn’t always so easy. Like learning to hit a curveball though, with practice, this can be a valuable tool.

3. Gates. I use the analogy of being on a walk. Going from one place to another when all of a sudden something changes or you start to feel pressure. When you do,  think of the following 3 questions as “gates” you can walk through just to slow yourself down and give yourself some time:

• Gate 1: Ask yourself “Is It True?” What evidence is there that what you are experiencing is real? So many times, we put so much added pressure on ourselves that is unnecessary. If it is not true, then there is likely no reason to continue this mental exercise. Just stop at the first gate. If it is true, then proceed to Gate 2. 

• Gate 2: Ask yourself “Is It Necessary?” Many times, being a leader myself, something might be true, but I just don’t need it. For example, I might feel like I am being attacked, but is it really necessary for me to defend myself? Just because I feel it, doesn’t mean I need to act on it. If it is not necessary for you to act, then you can stop. You have talked yourself off the ledge and there is no reason to move on. If it is both true and necessary, proceed to Gate 3. 

• Gate 3: Ask yourself “Is it kind?”. Sure it might feel better for me to unload on someone, or make another department my scapegoat, but is it kind? Would I want someone to say the same thing about me? It might be true, it might be necessary, but if what I am about to say is hurtful or lacks compassion, then should I really walk through that gate? 

What all three of these strategies do is help you develop some patience in the face of urgency, tension, and complexity.  They are meant to help you slow down and think.  

Who knows, someday someone in your organization might throw you a curveball and you might just hit it out of the park!