WORKPLACE COLLABORATION
E: EMOTIONS, ENERGY AND EXPECTATIONS
THE ARROW THAT FUELS OR DEPLETES
As with many of the letters in CHARACTER, CHANGED and now LEADERSHIP, the “E” represents three interlocking elements to your leadership style: Emotions, Energy and Expectations. They interact with and influence one other, both in a positive and in a negative manner. To manage them all, not treat them as separate entities (because they really are not), you will need to understand the ‘why’ behind each of them.
EMOTIONS Think of your emotions as raw data. By themselves, they have no meaning — they are neither ‘good’ nor ‘bad’. The significance in emotions is the interpretation and understanding of the deep-seated purpose of them. For instance, one of your team members is stubborn: you (as their director) have a positional power to demand action, and most likely others will comply with that demand. One sign of a genuine leader is the ability to assess the emotion and subsequent action/s and explore the reasoning behind the emotions. One of your team members resists tackling a new project and takes their time completing their current task (stubbornness). Could it be that they lack confidence in the new task and don’t want to look foolish or appear incompetent? You have the symptom and with a little investigation, you have the reason behind the symptom. This is
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the perfect time to address the reason (in a private conversation) using your own emotional skills: self-emotional awareness and control, awareness of (and empathy for) the other person’s emotions, acknowledging those emotions (it is irrelevant whether you disagree with what they are feeling or not) as real to that person, and moving forward in a more objective manner. Until you work with them to dissipate those emotions, you will be unable to move from that current position.
ENERGY It takes energy to do anything — to walk, to talk, to exercise, to push and to pull are obvious ways to exert energy. It also takes energy to problem solve and act professionally in uncomfortable situations. The energy comes from mentally working through the problem or to hide defensive emotions when your rational brain advises it (respectively). Your energy level is finite, that is you do not have a boundless or endless supply of it. As your energy dwindles, it becomes more difficult for you to retain your professional demeanor. Your body works to conserve your remaining energy, because it does not know when that energy will be replaced; i.e., when you will sit down, release the mental anguish or solve the problem. Think of fatigue and sleep — it’s the same concept. Replace ‘fatigue’ with ‘stress’ and ‘exhaustion’ with
‘burnout’ and you now have a picture of the energy it takes to feed your emotions. If left unchecked, stress can morph into burnout. Your cognitive abilities will decline (you may not even notice it) and that affects your conflict resolution and problem- solving thinking strategies. Your sense of fairness becomes skewed, your patience dissipates, your irritability increases and your attention to detail can become non-existent. Don’t expect that cup of coffee or can of soda to provide the mental clarity that you need. What you need is more authentic and real energy.
EXPECTATIONS
Unclear or unstated expectations can be a tremendous waste of positive energy and a strong promoter of negative energy. When you are not clear on what is expected from you (think of the last time you felt as if you were driving without knowing where you were going or were unsure of the ‘right answer’), you open yourself up for a variety of disappointment sources. How much energy did you expend expressing frustration, perhaps anger, resignation (to not knowing) and eventually apathy? You may have even procrastinated on starting the task, not knowing what the outcome needs to be. Think also of the time and energy you’ve wasted trying to figure out what the result or final product should look like. It adds up to quite a bit, doesn’t it?
BY DR. SHARI FRISINGER
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