Picture this…
Steph is team leader who joined your business after five years elsewhere. When you interviewed her she said that initially she’d loved her previous job but across the last year the business had not been great at communicating, made a load of rash decisions that impacted her team and everyone else and no one seemed to be listening to staff, who said work was making them ill. Her list of complaints, you suspected, could have gone on but she was clearly cautious and not wanting to say too much in an interview.
Given her skills and experience, she joined your organisation, enthusiastic about life again but within three months, she’s unhappy again. She’s complaining about communication, leadership decision making, wellbeing, new processes and technology that she finds frustrating, other teams that refuse to collaborate and of course about the people in her team who aren’t happy either and cause her nothing but grief. Not everyone, every day, but always someone not happy, resigning, off sick or raising a complaint. It’s an unhappy rollercoaster she’s on.
In your one-to-ones with Steph, it’s clear she wants to get on and succeed but lacks the tools to handle the constant change of people, processes tech etc. She prefers stability and clarity, and in a world, economy, business environment of endless change, she’s merely surviving, not thriving. This struggle is exhausting for both her and those around her, including you.
Thriving vs surviving
So, that’s the sorry tale of Steph who you may recognise from somewhere in your own workplace, but returning to the real world, it has caused me personally immense stress and anxiety in recent years to be with or work with so many who are not thriving, but merely surviving. Surviving each day as it comes must be such a tough and frustrating way to live your life and one that I guess often leads to anxiety, depression, agoraphobia, and the like. I also recognise that sometimes we have to live one day at a time, even one hour at a time in the most extreme circumstances, but that’s simply not sustainable long term.
What we need to thrive
A great book called Raising a Kid Who Can (Catherine McCarthy, Heather Tedesco and Jennifer Weaver) suggests that in order to thrive we need the following:
- Rest, recreation, and routine
- The ability to pay attention when needed and self-control
- Tolerance for difficult feelings
- Tools to accept and manage anxiety
- Psychological flexibility
- Independence
- Self-motivation
- Compassion and gratitude
- Resilience
- People around us who can support with all these things
The book is about raising children but almost everything relates to adults too and as an HR Professional and Trainer, I’ve spent the past few years trying to better understand all of this to support our clients with grievances, disciplinaries, conflict, disengagement etc and to support delegates in my training sessions who want to feel empowered and better informed. Running a leadership programme too, I’m continually reminded of the power of ‘can do’ versus ‘can’t do’, ‘won’t do’, or even ‘don’t want to do’, when it comes to the mindset of the manager and leader.
Are you up for a little self assessment?
How about a little self-assessment to see where you are at when it comes to being able to thrive rather than just survive? Assess yourself giving a score out of 10 for each. If you score full marks for each, you’ll get a total of 100 points. Score 50 and over and you’re doing well. Score 50 and under and it may be time for you to consider which of the 10 things you might focus on this year for some personal development. Most should be self-explanatory but some may not so I’ve included a few pointers below…
Rest, recreation and routine
This is about getting enough good quality sleep, getting enough fun stuff in your life (play time) and having enough routines in your life as routines are important for good mental wellbeing.
I suggest you give each of these things a mark out of 10 and then divide by 3 to get an average score. I would be very interested to know whether it is the ‘play/fun time’ score that is surprisingly low for many of us.
Paying attention
This is about being present in the moment, you might recognise this as ‘mindfulness’. Do you enjoy being in the moment? Do you take time to look at the stars in the night sky, do you stop to admire the frost on your car or just see a scraping/de-icing job that needs doing, do you enjoy the incredible scenery around you, or pause to enjoy the lights and noise of city dwelling even? Do you stop to notice all the lovely things your colleagues and friends are doing or are you too busy rushing by?
Tolerance for difficult feelings
A delegate recently said to me ‘but Helen are you really saying that stepping out of my comfort zone into discomfort is good for me? All my life I’ve been told that feeling uncomfortable is bad for my mental wellbeing’. Yes – we all need to get out of our comfort zones on a regular basis in order to build up our tolerance for difficult feelings. Being swaddled might make us feel cosy today, but it sure isn’t developing us as adults! I would go so far as to suggest that stepping out of comfort zones is in fact good for mental wellbeing, staying in them diminishes wellbeing over the long term.
The necessary ‘tools’ to manage anxiety
I won’t talk about this here, as there has never been a time when there have been so many resources and tools freely available to employees, otherwise check out the myriad of charities and websites offering support and information on this topic. There’s also an interesting video by Mel Robbins on turning anxiety into excitement.
Psychological flexibility
Let me ask you to consider how open you are to change? How easily you adapt? How you approach and adjust to difficulties? Someone recently asked me how to get other people to agree with them – the topic raised related to losing weight, with them wanting the other person to get why it was important. My response was ‘how much effort do you currently put into understanding their current position on this subject before you try to convince them over to your position? You are effectively just stamping your foot and wanting them to ‘get it’. By doing this though you are being just as intransigent as they are, neither side giving an inch. But if you can work through the process of understanding their viewpoint and then resolve to genuinely and openly learn about different viewpoints, you stand a better chance of understanding the approach required to get them to buy into whatever it is you want them to buy into.
Independence
This is our ability to be self-sufficient. To not rely on others to sort us out, look after us, fight our battles, tidy up after us and so on. Be careful not to score yourself too high on independence if the minute something doesn’t go right you either call out for help (IT, HR, colleagues, your manager, facilities etc) or you seek to point the finger of blame then wait for someone else to fix it. Being independent means having the skills to stand on or own two feet, deal with our own difficulties and be accountable for what we do and don’t do. I’m not suggesting you do everyone else’s job, only that you are self-sufficient and able to solve your own problems when you need to.
Self-motivation
Again think carefully about your score here. Score high if you have a great can-do attitude that others praise you for, if you have what we might call ‘get up and go’. If you don’t wait for others to point you in the right direction but you find the right direction and set off whether others are by your side or not. Score low if you have a tendency to give up easily, to stand back when there’s a barrier in your way, to wait for others to guide or support you, to wait for others to do the heavy lifting.
Compassion and gratitude
Look around you. Who deserves your compassion? Do you take the time to share your compassion with them or are you too busy? And who deserves your gratitude? Do you stop to say thank you, to acknowledge what others have done, do you go out of your way to express your gratitude or just do it when an easy opportunity presents? Score according to your actions and conscious thinking, not in line with how you would like it to be.
Resilience
How ‘bouncy’ are you? 😊 Do you get straight back up when the world knocks you down? What setbacks have you had and what did you do to fight back? Score yourself 10 here if your colleagues know you as someone who keeps going no matter what. Give yourself a lower score if you struggle to get back up or get going again or to bounce back from something challenging. Are you a fighter or are you defeated? Are you glass half full or half empty?
People around you who can support you
It’s well established that people with fewer social connections find it harder to be resilient, to adapt, to have good emotional wellbeing and so on. We’re not talking here about thousands of followers on X or endless likes on whatever platform you are on, but genuine people who are there for you and who can have your back when things are tough. Social intelligence is about forming and maintaining relationships. Some of us excel at forming them but aren’t so great at maintaining them which is what is essential for support.
Assessment outcome and actions
So how did the self- assessment go? What’s your score?
Ultimately, we’re all responsible for our own development so having done this self-assessment which of the 10 will you choose to focus your development on this year in order to better positioned to thrive?
I’m going to choose to add in more fun time and perhaps, less exciting but just as important for me, work on my routines too!
How Jaluch can help
Want some fun team building? We have lots of ideas for both face-to-face and remote team building. Ask us and we can build something fun together. What better way to build social connections?
Want to listen to an interesting talk on Adaptability? Check out Natalie Fratto 3 ways to measure your adaptability or otherwise why not try out our Adaptability eLearning as a first step in either developing your own or managing the adaptability of others (two versions available).
Want to develop some soft skills that really enhance your understanding of management, leadership and people? Check out our open courses.
Want to check out how much you know about emotional intelligence? We’ve created a game for you to play!
For any team or people managers interested in some serious and long lasting self-development, please do email us to see if you might qualify for our leadership programme.
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Disclaimer: The information contained within this article is for general guidance only and represents our understanding of employment and associated law and employee relations issues as at the date of publication. Jaluch Limited, or any of its directors or employees, cannot be held responsible for any action or inaction taken in reliance upon the contents. Specific advice should be sought on all individual matters.
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