In any situation, it is always best to keep your composure. I ran into a situation today where I felt myself welling up inside because of some outside pressures, and I resisted the urge to to lose my composure.
It was not easy but I was able to see that the problem that was presented was not the end of the world, things would work out, and I needed to remain calm in order to give the situation time to rectify itself. It did, it worked out and I did not lose my cool.This has taken a lot of practice, patience, trial, error and more to get this right. It is not easy. It is the art of cooling off your anxiety is an invaluable commodity in leadership. If you are in leadership, people look up to you. If you are rattled, they will be rattled. If you are mad, it will not help them be productive folks working hard on your behalf.
Manage your anxiety, do not spill it out over everyone you come into contact with. Have you met folks who are always having problems and sharing them with whoever might listen? It is ok to have problems, we all do, but it is not ok to spill out those problems to everyone you run across.
Maybe I am just rambling, but I hope I am getting the message across. Keep your composure while you are in leadership. Also have a support system in place to be able to blow off some of the pressure that builds up through relationships, exercise, and more. Pressure comes at all of us, are you going to be ready to deal with it when it does?
JVD
JVD,
As someone who deals with pressure daily at work (as a crisis manager), I validate what you’re saying. It’s imperative that leaders learn how to process the anxiety, stress, pressure that they are faced with. A couple of nuggets I use bringing up new leaders in crisis lead situations - 1) focus on the end goal or 2) what’s the next step you need to take?
I’ve found people respond to one of those two approaches in leading others through crisis.
The challenge for me? It’s not the first stressor or second but after they’ve been coming for a while. Or leaving the stress out of the subsequent interactions, like leaving the stress of work there and not taking it home with me in my attitude or mood!
Steve -
Good to see you on here. Great thouhts on -Focus on the end goal (your Futurist coming out) and what is the next step (your Strategic). In meeting you and reading you for a few years, I would want you around in crisis -
JVD
JVD, thanks for your affirmation. I love the way you can tie actions and thoughts back to the strengths. I need to learn to look for those strengths in others first, then choose the right instruction that fits their strength.
biotek ephedrine…
news…