Steve Shillingford DeepSee.ai.
Getty
I don’t think I need to summarize the events of the past two years to explain how or why operational resilience has come to the top of every business leader’s list for 2023. Hmm. Fueling headlines and fears for every business, community and family around the world. For some time you will feel the effects of these events.
As bad news unfolds, executives must act quickly to insulate their organizations from its impact, transforming business models, rethinking supply locations, digitizing operations to increase agility, Improved resilience. In 2021, the “Grand Resignation” has elevated Employee Experience (EX) to its rightful place on the list of priorities alongside Customer Experience (CX), posing another challenge for them.
Desperate to retain fugitive talent, leaders improved the work environment (or eliminated the need for it altogether), provided additional education and training, and offered health benefits (gym memberships and wellness programs). app subscriptions) and a focus on work-life balance (e.g. hybrid WFH). Mental Health Day).
Some will argue that these necessary transitions will take a long time, and most will agree that operational resilience has improved significantly. So why aren’t we feeling better? .
With the new year just around the corner and the notion of “next year will be easier” (because 2021 and 2022 proved otherwise), it is time to focus on our best as leaders, contributors and humans. The trick is to sit back and accept what comes. However, operational resilience is only part of the necessary safety net.
Emotional resilience is far more important, but rarely discussed in the workplace.
Optimism and Emotional Resilience
I remember a conversation I had with a board member at my first startup. That was in 2010, and he was struggling in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis. Things looked bleak and I felt like I was walking blind with no real options.I was overwhelmed personally, professionally and emotionally. I started crying. I couldn’t help it. It felt awful. The officer got up, walked around the table and hugged me.
“It’s hard,” he said. “This is a long series of decisions that rests on your shoulders and must be made with only 5% of the information. We care about people and we see opportunities so we can keep moving forward.”
I learned a lot from that exchange. I’ve learned that it’s okay to show that you’re human, and that by doing so, you can encourage others to respond in a human way.As Laurel Donnellan wrote forbes Beginning this fall, compassionate leadership drives positive change by inspiring and influencing people, empowering them to inspire and influence others. That’s what the officer did for me that day.
That interaction also taught me that emotional resilience is bolstered by down-to-earth optimism. Verified by 20 years of research. Special Forces instructor; survivor of illness, abuse and trauma; in their book Resilience: The Science of Overcoming Life’s Biggest Challengesthey identify the 10 most common traits among resilient elites.
But that’s not the kind of optimism that has to do with the situation or the state of the world. .
Instead, we don’t have to wear rose-tinted glasses or live in denial to stay resilient. We can’t control the world, but we can control our reactions to it. We have to be very intentional about that reaction, both externally and in the privacy of our thoughts. Viktor E. Frankl is often credited with saying: That space has the power to choose our reactions. Our response is our growth and freedom. “
Realistic optimism is a deep-rooted belief in oneself despite everything happening thereYou don’t have to know how to get over anything. All that matters is that you know you will.
This is something every startup founder learns quickly. It is the refining fire of the first plunge of the J-Curve. You make mistakes, gain negative knowledge, scratch and scratch and run away or punch out.
Emotional resilience will help ensure you don’t do the latter—unless the time really comes.
How to Build Emotional Resilience
It didn’t take me long to find my way out of that first startup disillusionment valley. Were there any additional difficulties? of course. But I kept going because I believed in what we were building, even if no one else did. Eventually everyone else saw it too.
This is another lesson in emotional resilience. As we age, we become more familiar with the laws of impermanence, for better or worse. As writer Rainer Maria Rilke wrote in her poem, “Go to the limits of your aspirations”, “Let everything happen to you: beauty and horror. It’s not final.”
All that matters is that you keep showing up to do your job. When you inevitably hit a wall, take a breather, make the tough decision, and move on. With emotional resilience, even if you fail, it’s not that hard to get depressed.
To develop emotional resilience at home and at work, try the following:
1. Be optimistic. Especially when it comes to yourself and others.
2. Remember nothing is permanent. there is nothing.
3. Learn how to control what you can do and control your reaction to everything else.
4. Act with sincerity and consideration. Support those who can as often as possible.
We may not be able to control what happens in the world, but it is in the one-on-one interactions in life that we often have the greatest impact. Developing emotional resilience isn’t always productive or efficient in the moment, but trust me, it always pays off in the end.
The Forbes Technology Council is an invitation-only community for world-class CIOs, CTOs and technology executives. am i eligible?
