Category: Articles

A while back, Joseph Hall, a health reporter with the Toronto Star, wrote a fascinating article about how employees are making their bosses sick. He quoted a study from the journal of Social Science and Medicine, published by U of T sociologist Scott Schieman, explaining why people with more authority in the workplace do not tend to get more physical and psychological benefits along with their increased income and power.

In fact, people in authority positions were found to have greater levels of physical and mental health problems, including headaches, backaches, psychological anxiety and distress. Schieman explains that this is due to “being exposed to more interpersonal conflict in the workplace, problems with other people, directing other people’s work, incompetent workers, and bringing work home with them more often than others who don’t have authority”.

The finding that people in authority seem to have some greater health issues may come as a surprise to people, especially those who feel like their incompetent managers are making them sick. Perhaps this will generate some sympathy for people in authority positions. Apparently it’s not always so great to have more responsibility even if it comes with more money and power. Of course it’s debatable just how much power people in management positions necessarily have. After all, the term “middle management” doesn’t have many positive associations.

It’s hard to separate the health impact of taking work home from dealing with unhappy and unproductive employees, so it’s not exactly fair to say that employees are making managers or supervisors ill. And stress is not generated externally, but originates from a person’s perception, so one can’t make a cause and effect between employee behaviour, taking work home, and health, but the study does open the door to an interesting question: How can people in leadership, managerial, or supervisory positions benefit from their position and not have it negatively affect their well being?

Here are some tips that might help, starting with the more obvious:

1) Learn how to effectively deal with conflict and how to effectively communicate. If much of the downside of being in authority is about dealing with challenging people and with conflict, then leaders and managers need to take thorough training in conflict resolution and effective communication. Both involve very specific skills that do not come naturally. (Tip: Communication includes learning how to listen.)

2) Hire the right people. That’s obvious, but taking the time to hire people with values and skills aligned with your mission is not going to happen through over reliance on personality measures. You need to know how to ask the right questions that will reveal the real person behind the resume.

3) Trust your people. Once you’ve hired them, resist the desire to over control them. Give them autonomy along with your supervision. Set clear outcomes and then allow them to do their job. Let their creativity shine and acknowledge them when they succeed. There’s no point in hiring people if you still feel their work is all on your shoulders.

4) People who stay healthy often have the ability to enjoy the moment and reflect on successes. If you rush from one responsibility to another without being able to celebrate the difference you’re making and the success you have, you are a top candidate for burn-out. Not only that, but people will feel stressed out around you. They’ll likely feel that nothing is ever good enough for you, and that’s hardly going to inspire great effort from the people you’re managing. Do stop and smell the roses.

5) Think of why you have this position of authority and what benefit it can bring you and others other than more money. You’re in a position of influence. You can use your position to make other people’s lives more meaningful and enjoyable. Focus on that as much as any other aspect of your job and what you’re supposed to produce. Enjoy the moments you have with people and your responsibilities won’t seem so onerous.

6) Tons has been written about work/life balance and much of it has been crap. Life is not something that starts after work or leaves off before work. All that idea does is set up conflict between work and play and family and leisure. Nothing is ever totally balanced, and though you need to try to make time for as much of what’s important to you as you can, you don’t stop living at work. Your interactions with people, the productivity that you are part of, the impact you can make on the lives of others, all that is part of living. Yes, sometimes you will need to bring work home, but make sure you bring “home” to work as well!

7) Try not to take yourself too seriously. Life really would carry on without you, and your organization would likely survive. As a person in authority you do have additional responsibilities, but that doesn’t quite make you God just yet. If you can’t imagine taking some time off, try imagining being hit by a bus. You’d definitely have to take time off then and while you were in the hospital the sun would still shine and your people would still show up at work (hopefully after visiting you). Why wait for a bus to hit you in order for you to get a grip?

8) Be playful. Yes, at work when it’s appropriate. There’s nothing like humour to ease tension, maintain perspective, and inspire creativity. Crack a joke now and then. Be a bit goofy. Your employees will love you for it, especially when combined with a more serious side when necessary.

9) Remember this very simple rule: You can only do what you can do. Nothing can change that. No matter what the expectations of others may be, no matter how serious the circumstance might be, nothing can change the fact that you, like every other human, are limited by your capacity. There’s a great exercise I do with “Type A” people and people who are burned out to demonstrate this. All you need are a big bag of jelly beans. Now try to count as many of them as you can in one minute. Count them again and again. You’ll find that you may improve in speed but at some point you’ll reach a ceiling. Try passing through that ceiling and all you’ll do is lose accuracy and begin to miscount the jelly beans. You just can’t physically do more, no matter how much you try or how many more jelly beans some one else may want you to count. (If you really want to recreate work, have someone half way through change what you’re supposed to count or add more beans, or change the amount of time you’re given). I like this exercise and variations of it because you get to eat jelly beans when you’re done.

10) Accept the limits of what you can control. Few things bring on more stress than attempting to gain control over things that can’t be controlled. Yes, you can try to influence people. But ultimately the perspectives, motivations, expectations, feelings, and behaviours of others (be they people who you answer to or people who answer to you) are things you cannot ever be assured of being able to direct exactly the way you might wish. Try this exercise: Write down all the things you can control. Sorry to spoil the surprise, but all you’ll be able to write down are internal to you. Your thoughts, your feelings, your behaviours, your choices, are all that you can hope to control. Everything is subject to the “Do the best you can” philosophy. Learning to let go of the need to control through coming to terms with and accepting how little you can control, is critical to well-being. Consider reading “The Serenity Prayer”.

Ideally you’ve worked hard to gain the authority you’ve been given. And yes, authority does tend to come with added responsibility, but how much pressure you allow that to generate, and how much it changes your mental and physical state is to a large extent up to you. Do the best you can, make a positive impact on others, and enjoy the responsibility and the position you have.

Theo Selles, M.Sc.

I was reviewing that old question about whether leaders are born or made, and I came across this leadership quote by Christian Nevell Bovee: “Six traits of effective leaders: 1. Make others feel important; 2. Promote a vision; 3. Follow the golden rule; 4. Admit mistakes; 5. Criticize others only in private; 6. Stay close to the action. Example has more followers than reason. We unconsciously imitate what pleases us, and approximate to the characters we most admire.”

I liked it a lot, especially the last bit about leading by example. My understanding is that it’s very hard to lead effectively from behind. You can have all kinds of charisma and gifts of persuasion, but if you don’t practice what you preach, your lack of integrity will preclude you from effectively leading.

I like the list of traits, though the use of the word “traits” goes against latest convention that leaders are more made than born. I suspect that there’s more hope and money to be found in the idea that leaders can be taught. Do you think people can learn the behaviours associated with those traits? There’s an article on my website called “Can people change?” if you’d like to explore this.

Here’s what I’ve come to believe about great leaders from my research and consulting work: Great leaders help us feel the feelings we want and help us avoid the feelings we don’t want. It’s that simple. We want leaders to help us feel feelings like security, belonging, pride, joy, happiness, stimulation, hope, excitement, contentment, satisfaction, accomplishment, and we need them to help us avoid feelings like fear, hunger, anger, isolation, loneliness, sadness, frustration, confusion, and shame. We’ll follow people like puppy dogs if they help us avoid what we don’t want and give us what we do want.

One could make the argument that people can effectively lead through generating fear, but that motivator has a very short shelf life. People do not like fear and will go to great lengths to avoid it. It’s not wise for a leader to be associated with that emotion for too long. Positive messages generate longer and deeper loyalty than do negative ones. Fear worked well for a while for the latest Bush administration, but hope won out in the end.

In addition to having integrity, here’s what makes up the leaders who inspire following, as well as what they need for themselves to last.

1) A natural desire to step forward. I know, I know, this doesn’t fit with the “leaders can be made” movement, but I strongly believe that there is something hardwired within great leaders that eventually compels them to step forward and take charge, or at least show the way. Whether that’s learned early on or is an outcome of genetics, or a combination of both, great leaders seem to rise to the foreground because they just can’t sit back and indefinitely follow.

2) Cognitive Intelligence (reasoning and problem solving) and the ability to exercise this during crisis. Great leaders are bright, and they know how to assess situations. They have a knack for identifying themes and patterns, and they tend to keep their heads while “under fire.” They are flexible thinkers, being able to reflect on their own thoughts, challenge their own perceptions, and adapt their thinking to the situation at hand.

3) There is more than one type of intelligence and just as important as possessing cognitive problem solving ability is having Emotional Intelligence. Great leaders have the ability to touch people. They help people have the feelings they want. They make people feel important, understood, valued, and cared for. They do this by being able to directly and clearly communicate, both verbally and nonverbally, in such a way that they influence people and persuade, even compel, them to follow. “I know you and your lives will be better off if you follow me” is the message they send, and that’s what their followers believe.

4) Great leaders have imagination and vision. They are able to see what could be, not just what is or what has been. Of course having vision and all these other qualities only works long term if leaders generate positive concrete results and are able to fulfill their inspiring promises. Words can inspire, but only for so long. Results transform inspiration into lasting loyalty. Empty promises are a recipe for cynicism.

5) Not only can great leaders see what could be, but they have the courage to make decisions knowing full well that they cannot be sure of the outcome of their decisions before hand. They are also able to be honest about their mistakes, and genuinely do see them as learning opportunities. Great loyalty and learning can be generated when leaders acknowledge their humanity and own up to their mistakes, and model how to positively respond to them.

6) Great leaders excite people and they tend to have passion and charisma. People are attracted and drawn to them. Charisma can take many forms; soft spoken leaders can be charismatic just as well as loudly expressive ones. “Transformational” leaders seem to motivate growth and change in people around them just by the nature of their personality. They seem to personify the excitement and change they wish to create.

7) Within each great leader seems to burn the desire to make an impact. In some form or another, they need to put their stamp on the world around them. For good or bad, they must make a difference.

8) To remain effective over time, great leaders must display consistency, reliability, and stability. People need to know where they stand. This doesn’t mean that they must be predictable in their decisions; in fact, great leaders often do the unexpected. However, to be trusted, they must over time demonstrate behaviour compatible with their expressed values. There’s a world of difference between being unpredictable and being erratic. Followers of great leaders may expect the unexpected from their leader, but it still fits with their overall understanding of who their leader is and what their leader is all about.

9) To last, a great leader must have the ability to choose people who understand and can carry out his or her vision, and then be able to delegate to them. However, great leaders are careful not to surround themselves with sycophantic “yes men/women”. They encourage their people to challenge them and be unafraid to voice a contrasting opinion. Great leaders are able to change their minds after open-mindedly hearing those opinions.

10) To last, a great leader needs to be able to enjoy leadership and the fruits of it. A leader who can savour being able to make a difference, who can live in that moment, and not be controlled by his or her drive can avoid burnout. Equally important, they will be able to maintain the excitement and energy that helps inspire their followers.

Whether born or made, some people inspire others. They have those tangibles and intangibles that draw people to them and convince them that their lives would be better if they followed. Above all, they have integrity. Are you ready to be a great leader?

Theo Selles, M.Sc.

Let’s suppose someone has hurt you. Maybe your partner had an affair, or maybe you’ve been living with someone with an addiction and you’ve suffered from it. Maybe you were abused (sexually, physically, emotionally) by a member of your family or maybe you were betrayed by a coworker who lied about you. Maybe a friend or your son or daughter stole from you. Now let’s suppose that person still wants a relationship with you. They ask you for a second (third, fourth) chance and promise you things will be different. Let’s suppose you love them, forgive them, want to believe them, and decide to try to save the relationship. How can you ever trust them again?

Here is a simple trust formula: Proof + Time + Choice & Pressure = Trust.

The components of the formula can be broken down this way:

Proof: You need to know that things will indeed be different and not just because the person says so and has apologized. People can say anything to convince you and themselves, perhaps because they are afraid of losing you. That’s not proof. Chances are you’ve heard it all before.

Solid proof is based on three things: Evidence, Empathy, and Insight.

Evidence: You need evidence that things are different and will stay different. Is that person acting differently? Are they checking in more? Are they more open about their lives? Is their hurtful behaviour gone and is it replaced with healthy loving behaviour?

Empathy: Do you believe that the person who hurt you really understands how they have hurt you? Have they taken as much time as you need to listen to you and try to feel how you have felt? If they really do empathize, and your pain hurts them, then they are much less likely to hurt you again.

Insight: Does the person who hurt you understand what led to their hurtful behaviour? Have they taken full responsibility for it, and really soul searched (reading, going to counselling, talking openly to others) why they did what they did? If they can understand the root causes of it they are more likely to be able to change.

Time & Choice: You need to see proof over time to be able to trust again. It is true that trust is something that is earned. But, and this is really important, ultimately you will need to make a conscious choice to open yourself up to the possibility of being hurt again. Your relationship with the person who hurt you won’t sustain the pressure of it being proven every day for the rest of your time together. Never ending earning will exhaust the relationship. Ultimately, true trust is a choice.

Pressure: The more you are pressured to trust the less you will. If you’re the person who hurt someone, you need to resist the temptation to push them to “let go”, “forgive”, or “move on”. It may be true that you’ve changed. It may also be true that you’re tired of earning trust. But the best thing you can do is focus on evidence, empathy, and insight. If you do that, you have the best chance of saving the relationship, and creating a new and improved one based on what you both have gone through and learned.

A relationship isn’t worth having without trust. People often hurt each other and themselves in relationships. Sometimes it’s worth saving those relationships. Following the trust formula will guide you in healing from hurt and rebuilding trust.

For more assistance, call Theo Selles, M.Sc.
647-686-0116.
Straightforward solutions for complex problems.