I LOVE MY TEAM’S AMYGDALA!
Let me explain why...
These are for sure some crazy times we are living in. I just spoke to my neighbor, Bill, who is almost 80 years old at the mailbox. “I have never witnessed anything like this in my life,” Bill told me.
Then I called my mom, who is 83, and asked her, “Mom have you ever experienced anything like this in your life?” “No, I do remember your Aunt Betty telling stories of when she was a baby (Aunt Betty would be 98 this year if she was still with us) of being quarantined with your Grandmother because she had developed a case of Scarlet Fever.”
So, unprecedented for sure. And full of emotion for all of us and the people we lead on our teams.
My daddy always told me there are 3 situations where I needed to be really careful when making decisions:
When I had been drinking.
When I was in a heightened emotional state.
After a significant loss.
I think the first one is self-explanatory, except on occasion I will get a call from a client who has said something or done something or punched something when too much alcohol was involved. I have witnessed first hand at least 5 people lose good careers over too much wine or whiskey at a company dinner.
Now, on the heightened emotional state, I am pretty sure this was a warning from my daddy about being with a girl. However, with the current state of affairs in our world, are we not in a heightened emotional state? Fear and panic have gripped our society.
I was listening to a podcast of Dave Ramsey the other day. For those of you who do not know Dave, he is famous for helping people get out of debt so they can lead generous and giving lives. A lady called in who was 67 years old, along with her 70 year old husband. They were frightened by the “crashing” of the stock market and sold everything they had invested. Please try to resist judging these souls. I am sure we all have opinions about if they should be in the market, or if they should have sold or not. Fine, you can have your opinion, but I was stunned by the emotion and lack of logical, rational thinking that had overcome them.
Fear and panic will cause all of us to do things we normally would not do.
Here is a short video where I explain, in very simple terms what happens in your brain when this is going on.
The final situation we leaders need to recognize are times of significant loss.
In my younger days I used to do some counseling type work at the church we went to. Often times we would be called to provide support to someone who had just experienced the loss of a spouse or loved one. In our training, we learned to listen to them and help them unpack their feelings. In addition, we were to encourage them to not make any significant decisions for about a year. People need time to grieve the loss and they need time to process what has happened to them. We tried to help them form a plan for moving forward day to day without making any big decisions that would be life-changing.
You may know some people who have experienced a significant loss right now. Many of us know people who just 3 short weeks ago had vibrant careers but are now being laid off or furloughed. With that in mind, I wanted to give you some ideas to help you connect with the emotional moments we are all experiencing.
3 Strategies To Love Your Teams Amygdala
Find ways to reduce or eliminate unneeded stressors. You may have someone who needs to go comfort a spouse who just lost a job very unexpectedly, and your policy doesn’t allow for something like this. It is time to put relationships and people ahead of policy. Or someone might be working from home and their internet speed isn’t high enough for quality HD video. This is not the time to call them out and create stress because of petty items.
Choose leadership strategies that engage the Neo-Cortex. Remember the Amygdala is the strategic inflection point if good, creative, and reflective thinking is occurring, or if the person is going to be in Fight/Flight/Freeze mode. Here are some ways to help engage the thinking part of the brain:
Tell Stories - Rather than give orders or lists for people to do, engage them in a story and remind them of how their task is helping the organization or the customer during times like this. Stories calm people down, help them think about the characters, and engages their personal creativity.
Be Optimistic - Optimism is not pollyannaish, it is being hopeful for the future. We all know this virus is going to be short-term. In 10 years we will look back and likely be critical of many things we did in the moment. Help your team have hope for the future. We are all going to ride on airplanes again, and stay in hotels, and go on vacation again. Sure, there might be some short-term adjustments for all of us, but the future is bright for your company. You are in a storm right now, but storms do not last forever.
Express Gratitude - At the beginning of every day let’s thank people for being on our team. And make it the last thing we do at night. Thank them for coming to work (even online). Tell them how important they are to the organization. How much you appreciate them. Gratitude that is real and heartfelt calms things down and helps people pull through tough times.
Give Them A Plan. A few years ago, my good friend and colleague, Dr. Tim Gardner, and I wrote a one-day training called: What You Know About Stress Is Killing You. (The title is meant to be cute and is not a typo). One of the most important things you can do as a leader right now is to sit down one on one (social distancing rules apply) and help them identify places they are stressed and to help them write a plan that would alleviate the stress. Once it is written down, they can cognitively focus on what to do. Sure, it might feel a little directive, and it is! If they are stressed and the amygdala is preventing clear thinking then a written plan to follow is just what the doctor would order.
It is my hope that these strategies might be useful to you. If you are a leader of leaders, why not sit down with your team and go over this list? Talk about how they can help their team perform under such trying and difficult times.
If I can help, please do no hesitate to call or write. If you think a workshop on emotional intelligence or stress would be helpful for your team, I would be happy to do this for you. We can do it online in a day or take an hour each day, whatever might work best for your team structure.
Best Hopes,
Scott