How Are You REALLY Feeling As A Leader Right Now?

Being an effective leader in any season is tough, but in today's environment it can be downright stifling. According to Carey Nieuwhof, there are several reasons why leading today is so difficult. They include:

• The crisis [pandemic] has moved from acute to chronic.

• Leaders face a fresh set of challenges like supply chain interruptions, inflation, and the Great Resignation.

• The criticism never stops.

• There's no solution in sight-to anything.

• An unstable pace has caught up with you.

With all this pressure, the question becomes, "Should a leader acknowledge their frustrations, fears, or sense of uncertainty about the future?" Don't teams want a leader who doesn't show their emotions and seems to have it all together in these tough times?

The answer would seem to be "No." Research has found that false positivity actually reduces the well-being of both team members and failing to be transparent can lead to a lack of trust with the leader. Conversely, sharing negative emotions has been shown to increase empathy and actually boost morale.

❓ So how can a leader best share their deeper emotions with team members, and avoid losing the respect of their team or appearing weak? Furthermore, is there a way a leader can develop a culture where conversations about emotions are normalized? Here are seven suggestions:

1) Identify the feelings (especially the negative ones) you are experiencing as a leader.

You can't effectively share your emotions with others until you recognize them yourself. Set aside time to write about your feelings or talk them through with a trusted friend or family member. Sharpening your thoughts will prevent a rambling discourse as you talk with your team members.

2) Track your emotions.

Like a time log, choose various points during the day where you will stop and identify the predominant emotion you are experiencing at that moment. As you look back over the week, you will be able to identify your key emotions and what circumstances or situations are bringing them to you.

3) Go first when talking about your emotions.

With the clarity of the first two exercises, start building in time with your team where emotions are discussed. Maybe it's the first few minutes of a regularly scheduled meeting (or the last ones). Set the tone by talking about the challenges of the current season, and share one emotion that you are experiencing as a result of it. Invite others to offer their thoughts by saying, "I'd love to hear how this current season is making you feel.”

4) Model healthy coping with negative emotions.

Talk about what you did to work through the emotions you were experiencing, whether that was a conversation with a friend, taking time to reframe a negative experience in a more positive way, or taking a day off to rest and recharge. It's an opportunity for you to show them how they can be better prepared when they face similar negative emotions.

5) Stop fixing problems and start listening to the person.

When you listen at a deeper level, you will notice that there is always an emotion being expressed in a conversation. Seek to name the emotion, "You sound really frustrated" or "I can see you are really happy about this" and then follow up with the statement, "Tell me more about that."

Acknowledging their emotions will go a long way in increasing the belief that you really do care about them as a person. As Brene Brown is quoted as saying, “Leaders must either invest a reasonable amount of time attending to fears and feelings or squander an unreasonable amount of time trying to manage ineffective and unproductive behavior.”

6) Work to make a healthy discussion about emotions a part of the culture.

Your one-on-one meetings can include a "check in" with how they are feeling about things or simply asking, "How are you REALLY doing?" when the first time you asked they responded with "Fine."

7) Understand what "oversharing" looks like.

A frequent comment I get when coaching leaders to share more of what they are feeling is, "I don't want to share too much. I'm not comfortable being so vulnerable." In her article, No, I'm Not Fine, Samantha Raye Ayoub gives us a way to avoid oversharing. She writes: "If what you’re about to share with your team is an attempt to gain sympathy or get a particular reaction then you’re likely oversharing. But if you’re trying to lead your team through a tough change or project while admitting you don’t have all the answers and encouraging your team to share ideas and talk it through, you’re leading with vulnerability."

Many years ago I heard someone say, "People bring their mind AND heart to work. You have to address both as a leader." While normalizing conversations about feelings might seem a bit "touchy-feely" for some people, research has shown that emotions actually drive a number of the key priorities of a leader including job performance, turnover, and customer satisfaction.

So, would you say that your team REALLY knows how you are feeling as a leader, or is there some work to do?