Let Your Past Struggles Be Your Strength Today

Let Your Past Struggles Be Your Strength Today

by | Mar 23, 2020 | COVID-19, Personal Leadership, Resilience

It’s the start of another week in the midst of COVID-19. I suspect it will feel different, but that doesn’t mean it will be any easier.

This might sound counter-intuitive, but I’d like to ask you to start by doing something difficult.

I ‘d like you to reflect on one of the hardest events in your life (outside of the current situation), where the outcome wasn’t what you wanted.

Knowing what you know now, and accepting that you can’t change the outcome, what would have helped you better cope with that situation?

Now, write down how can you apply that wisdom today.

In 2016, my mother died from breast cancer. When her cancer came back, it rapidly spread throughout her body. I spent the first couple of weeks obsessively trying to figure out how long she would live.

I felt that if I had this answer, I could make the best decisions around her comfort and treatment, when to notify family and friends, how much time I would need to take off work etc.

I believed that I could handle everything, if I just knew when my mothers death was coming.

I’ll give you one guess what my learning was?

I can’t predict, control, or force the future to unfold as I would like, not matter how hard I try.

I needed to increase my uncertainty tolerance and move on not knowing.

I needed to learn to make decisions on incomplete information.

I had to accept some decisions were right and some were wrong.

I had to learn to trust that I was doing my very best, with the resources I had in my most difficult moment.

I did get there, but I was overwhelmed, heartbroken and mentally, emotionally and physically drained by the time I got there.

Today, with my entire business future uncertain, I have experienced the same emotions. The good news is, I went through that phase much more quickly this time. I am more comfortable sitting with uncertainty and trusting myself.

Don’t get me wrong, I want answers about when the pandemic will end, I want certainty in what the world will look like, and I’d love to know I am making the right decisions at the moment…but I feel like I’ve been training for this.

I suspect you have as well!

These Three Mindsets Will Help You Thrive During Change

These Three Mindsets Will Help You Thrive During Change

by | Mar 15, 2020 | COVID-19, Culture, Leadership Vitality, Management, Managing Pressure, Personal Leadership, Stress, Teamwork

How to handle COVID-19 working from home.

With all of the uncertainty everyone is facing, there are three guarantees that you should expect :

1. Everything will take longer. Conferencing everyone in, trying to call into a customer service center, or waiting in line at the grocery store, expect everything to take longer.

2. Emotions will be running high. Everyone is facing uncertainty, but each person’s circumstances are different. It serves us to remember that as empathy is often the first causality in stressful situations. Even if you can’t see emotions, they are there and will influence people’s effectiveness and productivity, hence point number one.

3. Your colleagues, employees, and direct reports are TRUSTWORTHY. Please don’t make people earn your trust – start by giving it. Even if you can’t see them at their desk, even if they don’t respond immediately to your email, assume that points one and two are contributing to any delays, not that they are slacking off, untrustworthy, and lacking commitment.

It’s natural when dealing with sudden change and uncertainty for our brain to look for shortcuts via assumptions and expectations.

Shift these positively to strengthen relationships and help people be at their best.

We owe that to one another.