Hi! All
We are facing confidence crisis in our country. Here is an article on managing stress, which is more about managing your emotions and responses to situations around you.
Hope you find it relevant and useful.
Chirag Gandhi…
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Six Ways to Manage Leadership Stress
Especially in this treacherous economy, these principles, from
maintaining perspective to welcoming feedback, will help keep stress
from turning toxic
Effective leaders know that stress can be a good thing. It keeps you
focused. It makes you competitive. It prompts action. If you're
walking into a big client meeting or giving an important speech and
you aren't at least a little anxious about it, you aren't going to do
a good job.
But stress can also turn toxic, especially in the brutal economic
environment we're in. Long hours, layoffs, and fear of what may be
around the corner take a real toll. In more than 40 years of service
in the military, higher education, and nonprofits, I've found that
managing leadership stress comes down to a handful of critical
elements: maintaining perspective, exercising, opening up, welcoming
feedback, streamlining, and recharging. In trying to lead through
this treacherous economy, I'm relying on those principles now more
than ever.
Managing stress starts with keeping your challenges in perspective.
No matter how stressed you feel, there's always people in a tougher
situation-and they're probably handling it a lot more gracefully than
you are. Recently, I gave a talk to my organization about cutting
budgets, potential layoffs, and digging even deeper for revenues.
It's the same difficult conversation going on in companies all over
the world. The whole undertaking was stressful, so I went to a nearby
YMCA for a lunchtime workout afterward to unwind.
One of the staff members at the Y has serious problems with her
vision. A woman exercising next to me also was physically disabled.
Both were working hard and exuding good cheer. My job-related stress
will fade in time. They're dealing with challenges that will never go
away. But their attitude was far more positive and inspiring than
mine that afternoon, and it was a privilege to encounter them.
Potent Weapon
That brings us to a second critical aspect of dealing with stress:
staying fit. If you want to sustain your success as a leader over the
long term, exercise is crucial. In fact, our research at the Center
for Creative Leadership proves it. In working with executives from
around the world, we've found those who exercise regularly are rated
significantly higher on leadership effectiveness by their bosses,
peers, and direct reports than men and women who exercised only
sporadically or not at all.
Exercise can be a potent weapon against stress. It helps keep your
emotions in check, relaxes you, and boosts your energy. It can be
difficult to work exercise into a busy schedule. But if you're not
doing it already, find a way to carve out some time on your calendar.
Your colleagues-and your family-will thank you.
Stress is also induced by bottling up too much inside. In difficult
times, leaders often feel they need to keep information to themselves
or make all the important calls alone. There's a simple solution:
Open up. True, being transparent makes you vulnerable. But it also
makes you authentic-and people are more likely to follow you as a
result. The more you unburden yourself, the better you'll feel. The
more your colleagues know about what's going on, whether it's good or
bad, the better they'll feel.
Feedback Makes You Smarter
During my days as a U.S. Navy pilot, I always wanted to know every
possible piece of intelligence before I went out on a mission. I
didn't want my bosses holding back because they thought I wouldn't be
able to handle something they said. Likewise, before I sent men and
women into harm's way, I tried to share everything with them. They
were putting their lives and careers on the line. Why be anything but
forthcoming with them?
Opening up also requires another-and sometimes more difficult-step:
welcoming feedback and criticism. The better your sense of your
strengths and weaknesses, the less stressed you'll be. The more ideas
and opportunities you consider, the more empowered you'll feel. But
this peace of mind comes with a catch: You need to ask people to be
honest with you, and you need to recognize you won't always like what
they say. Letting your men and women push back makes you smarter. It
also reduces their stress because they know they have your ear.
A fifth tip: Streamline your life. That means getting organized and
ordering your priorities professionally and personally. How often
have we added needless stress to our lives by waiting too long to
prep for a meeting or not sharing important information with
colleagues quickly enough? Often this happens because we're
distracted by competing-and frequently less important-tasks.
'Stop Doing' Lists
In Good to Great (one of my favorite books), Jim Collins puts it this
way: "Most of us lead busy but undisciplined lives. We have ever-
expanding 'to do' lists, trying to build momentum by doing, doing,
doing-and doing more. And it rarely works. Those who built the good-
to-great companies, however, made as much use of 'stop doing' lists
as 'to do' lists."
My advice? Pick a single, unproductive thing that's wasting your time
and stop doing it today. Eliminate something else tomorrow. You'll be
trimming away stress at the same time.
Finally, take time to recharge. In leadership positions, you tend to
work a lot of long days. Be careful not to overdo it. A fanatical
devotion to work will make you unproductive in the long run. As my
CCL colleagues Vidula Bal, Michael Campbell, and Sharon McDowell-
Larsen remind us in their book Managing Leadership Stress, practicing
the art of recovery helps you accomplish more in less time.
Professional athletes know that pushing themselves at 100% all of the
time does not yield gains in performance over the long term. It just
burns them out. So spend time with family and loved ones. Read a
book. Trade jokes with a friend. Take a short vacation. Your
organization won't fall apart in your absence-and you'll be better
prepared to tackle the big challenges.
Best Regards,
chirag gandhi
project manager
mudra
sun point
nr parimal garden ellisbridge
ahmedabad 380 006
m +91 9376109333
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