Hiring for the Future Using Emotional Intelligence

Hiring for the Future Using Emotional Intelligence

One of the key driving factors behind every organization’s success is the people. People are the minds behind the operations to ensure business needs are met. Human capital is vital to each organization; in fact, they can either make or break the company. As one of the most important assets, it is crucial that companies hire and retain top talent. 

Hiring for the Future Using Emotional Intelligence

 

Current trends in human resources show that the workplace is shifting to a digital approach, with working remotely on the rise. This changing work environment affects both current and future employees. For instance, most interviews now take place virtually. Furthermore, newly hired employees will have to adapt to remote working situations and complete their training and onboarding processes online as well. As they have not worked in the office before, they may feel intimidated and unaware of the company’s culture and workplace norms. 

Another trend on the rise in the human resources industry is the hunt for soft skills.  Organizations are now not only looking for applicants who possess technical skills, but also soft skills such as creativity and emotional intelligence. According to The Future of Jobs Report by the World Economic Forum, emotional intelligence is one of the top 10 skills required for the workforce in the future. Emotional intelligence is a guiding principle to improved decision making, stress management and relationship building. And is now recognized as an emerging yet crucial skill for candidates to have. 

As the unemployment rate falls, jobseekers are keen to find a new role. Along with the trends of a changing workforce, employers must adapt while finding a way to scout the best candidates. To aid you in your mission, we have compiled a guide on how to hire for the future! 

How to Gauge Emotional Intelligence in Interviews

 

As mentioned above, emotional intelligence is now one of the top skills to look out for.  Traditional structured interview questions are not going to find recruits with high levels of emotional intelligence, instead, ask a series of open-ended, non-leading, behavioral questions like this: 

1. How do you motivate your team members?

 

This question can showcase a candidate’s ability to work in a team and approach to interpersonal relationships. While it is important that the candidate is able to stay self-motivated, they will also be working with others. Does the candidate value teamwork? How will their work behaviour affect team morale? This question can also be insightful if the candidate is applying to a position where they will need to lead a team, either in the present or future. Upon reviewing their answers, think of how the candidates’ skills and behaviours will also impact your team’s relationships. 

2. Tell me about a time when something went wrong. How did you handle it? 

 

This question can display a candidate’s emotional resilience. When the going gets tough, how do they manage? Do they simply give up or are they resilient? Their answer can also give insight about their problem solving skills and attitudes towards conflict. Think about how their situation could apply in your company and how their response would uphold. Take note if they mention anything they would have done differently. This is significant as you want candidates who are able to reflect upon their mistakes and learn from them.

As these questions are more personal, the candidate may need to take extra time to think about their answers. The interviewer should strive to make the interview process comfortable and build a safe space to allow more personal answers. Lastly, it is crucial to turn on cameras for virtual interviews. Leaving cameras on not only allows the interviewer to view the candidate’s expressions and reactions, but mirrors the in-person interview experience we were previously familiar with. 

Hire for Culture-Fit, not Skills and Experience

Imagine that you have just conducted two interviews for an administrative assistant role and need to make a decision by the end of the day. Candidate A possesses over five years of experience in a similar role and is highly proficient in the project management tools and Microsoft Suite. The only problem with Candidate A? They showed a lack of interest in working for your company, citing the salary as the main source of their motivation. Teamwork was also not seen as relevant to them either. As for Candidate B, they have less than a year of experience and stated they are unfamiliar with the project management tools, but would be willing to learn. In addition, they expressed their interest in the company through explaining how the company core values aligned well with their own. Their motivation was the potential to grow with the company and to learn from team members. Now that you know their backgrounds, who do you hire? 

While it may seem like the logical answer to pick Candidate A based on their experience, Candidate A exhibits low interest in the company and culture. In contrast, Candidate B may lack a few skills but shows a keen interest in learning and growing with the company. As Candidate B is well aligned with the company’s core values and culture, they would be the better choice. 

A company’s culture is an integral part of your business.  It can affect nearly every aspect of a company – from recruitment to employee satisfaction – it’s the core need of a happy workforce.  Without a clearly defined corporate culture, employees can struggle to find value in their work and this can greatly affect your bottom line. To help find candidates who possess similar values and culture, make sure your job descriptions contain a short blurb that defines your core beliefs.  

An Investment for the Future 

If your newly hired employee does not share the same values as the company’s, they are likely a short-term solution. Remember, you can always train for skills, but you cannot train for attitude and personality!  

Employees need to be treated as a long-term investment for your company, especially since human capital is the driving force behind turning visions into reality. As the workforce changes, be a step ahead by guaranteeing a smooth hiring process through leveraging emotional intelligence and selecting applicants who will contribute to your corporate culture. 

If you are interested in fostering a strong corporate culture, check out our workshop, Cultivating a Positive Corporate Culture. We also offer a Virtual Retreat, which provides a unique opportunity to build culture and bond teams on a deeper level through understanding how emotions impact workplace behaviours and relationships. You can also visit our previous blog post, Emotional Intelligence Interview Questions, for more examples of interview questions that can gauge a candidate’s emotional intelligence. 

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Bridging the Gap Using Emotional Intelligence

Bridging the Gap Using Emotional Intelligence

Everyone is facing similar challenges that 2020 has brought on, but they are all handling it differently. Each generation is in a different emotional position, and leaders need to acknowledge each individual struggle equally. However, despite the generational gap in handling obstacles, it is possible to all come together over a commonality: everyone wants to feel cared about. 

By bridging these gaps in the workplace through emotional expression, connection, and awareness, people will feel more cared for and more inclined to offer a helping hand to their peers, no matter their generation. Organizations need to take advantage of all their peoples’ strengths and weaknesses and come together as a team to leverage each other’s talents with the new direction the workforce is headed in.

Bridging the Gap with Emotional Intelligence

 

The main generations we see in today’s workplace are Baby Boomers, Generation X, Millennials, and now Generation Z. This eclectic generational mix in the workforce will undeniably lead to conflicts and misunderstandings. A one-size-fits-all culture is one of the past, and organizations need to learn to take into account the different personalities, needs, skills, and challenges each individual can face, while delivering leadership in the same manner to everyone – respectfully. 

Each generation typically has their own working style. In general, Baby Boomers are often considered the workaholic generation, Generation Xers want flexibility and autonomy, Millennials want to make an impact and have a purpose, and Gen Zers prefer self-directed and independent learning. Despite these different work expectations, all employees have three core human needs: to survive, belong, and become. Just like Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, once people surpass the need for food and water, they are looking to be accepted for who they are, and succeed at becoming their best selves. 

Emotionally intelligent leaders make sure their people aren’t worried about the food and water needs, and take the money worries off the table. When you pay an employee what they think they are worth, they will rise to that. They focus on contributing to something greater than themselves. Emotionally intelligent leaders create a sense of community and connection for their staff. They appreciate their efforts and talents, and provide them work that fulfills them and helps them realize their full potential.

Bringing Strengths to the Table

 

Leveraging a team’s strengths is essential in bridging the gap between the generations, especially amidst a world-wide shift in the workforce. With the new challenges 2020 has brought on, some generations are more resilient to change than others. Emotional Resiliency indicates how much hardship you can deal with without experiencing stress. In other words, people with high “emotional resilience” are better able to roll with the punches and lead happy healthy lives despite the inevitable hardships and challenges they may be facing.

Generation Z is now entering the workforce, and are facing a lot of instability and uncertainty head-on. With Gen Zer’s need for stability, they are most likely not managing the stressors that come with the current work environment. However, Gen Xers and Baby Boomers have experienced many booms and busts of the economy and value optimism and rebellion in times of despair. In fact, a University of British Columbia study found older generations to be less stressed and threatened by the pandemic and experienced better emotional well-being than other generations. Instead of leaving Generation Z in the dust, this provides a teaching opportunity for the older generation to step up to the plate and support Gen Zers in developing a sense of grit and resilience. 

Although younger generations may not be as strong in stress management, they make up for it in their tech-savviness and entrepreneurial spirit. Older generations can learn from Gen Zers and their tech knowledge, reaching out for support during this huge shift to remote work. Gen Zers also prefer independent learning, so the shift to a virtual environment has given them the opportunity to work in a self-directed manner. However, Baby-Boomers prefer face to face collaboration and are missing social interaction. If both generations can work together to create a virtual work environment that allows for self-directed work, an engaging and collaborative face-to-face experience, there will be less resentment between the communication preferences.

Here are some tips on how to bridge the gap and leverage strengths within different generations:

1. Mentor Opportunities

 

Pairing up younger workers with more seasoned employees in a mentoring format could form a mutually beneficial relationship. Younger workers could share their knowledge of technology and the different opportunities for collaboration in a remote work environment. Whereas, more experienced employees could share their knowledge on stress management, and how they are navigating through all the new challenges the pandemic has brought into the workplace. By connecting different generations, it increases cooperation and leverages the different skill sets to solve problems quickly and effectively.

2. Conflict Management

 

Leaders need to create a process for conflict management and address it immediately. With the large age gaps within workplaces, there are bound to be misunderstandings. It is important to address conflict head-on and act as a mediator, letting each employee voice their side of the story. It is important to acknowledge both sides and come up with a strategy to leverage both generational perspectives and avoid the recurrence of the same issue.

3. Hire Positive Workers

Leaders can train any skill to new hires, but it is near impossible to change their negative attitude. It is important that leaders in charge of the hiring process, like HR departments, identify and profile the behavior of a positive worker, which can be done through EQ Assessments. Recruiting positive workers will bring a level of energy to the team to increase productivity and optimism into the culture – which is needed now more than ever!

Focus on What Matters

 

Accommodating the needs of multiple generations can pose a difficult task, so it is helpful for leaders to focus on what is constant in the workplace. Core values can act as an anchor amidst a storm. Make sure there is a reason people have chosen to become a part of the team and culture, generations aside. 

Focus on the positive commonalities of the workplace culture prior to the global pandemic, and otherworldly divides. If the team was doing weekly lunches together, then bring that to the table virtually. If the organization values connection, collaboration, and communication, then leaders need to find a way to continuously support these values despite the changing conditions. 

A team comes together to achieve a common goal, despite their differences. It is important to emulate the same culture throughout all generations, to bring them on the same page beyond their personality differences. When a team is working together on a common goal and has fostered a culture of support, care, and empathy, they will naturally leverage each other’s strengths and come together in the end.

To learn more about how to bridge the gap between generations, check out our Using EI to Lead Multigenerational Workers Keynote or our Leading a Multigenerational Workforce Workshop. Look out for our next blog on managing the future workforce – Hiring for the Future Using Emotional Intelligence!

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How to Lead Through Change with Emotional Intelligence

How to Lead Through Change with Emotional Intelligence

Never has it been more important to engage with your staff in ways that work for them. In these times of uncertainty and change, Emotional Intelligence – the ability to connect with people on an emotional level – is crucial to maintaining strong and resilient teams. 

With all of the economic hardships facing the world, collaboration challenges working in remote teams, not to mention increased worker worries and anxieties, organizations are forced to lead differently through these unprecedented times.  Strong leaders realize the impact emotions have on making decisions, communicating effectively with others, and coping with stress and unfamiliar situations.

Even before COVID-19, the World Economic Forum had ranked Emotional Intelligence as one of the top ten skills required to succeed.  The Future of Jobs Report showed that Emotional intelligence, leadership and social influence, and service orientation are also set to see a particular increase in demand by 2022 relative to today’s current prominence.  

Now, months into the new normal, EI has become the top skill required to succeed post-pandemic. The companies who survive will be those who understand the importance of emotional intelligence and recruit and develop teams who excel at using this crucial skill in their work.

In fact, when tested alongside 33 other workplace skills, emotional intelligence was the strongest predictor of performance, explaining 58% of success in all types of jobs. Therefore, investing in emotional intelligence training in the workplace will improve employee morale, emotional well-being, as well as productivity.

Check out our newest video to learn how to use Emotional Intelligence to lead your team through change effectively!

 

Video Transcription

 

Today’s leaders need a completely new skillset.

You are managing the most complex workforce in history. It’s made up of people from multiple generations, across different ethnicities, religions, genders, sexual orientations and cultural backgrounds.

The work environment has also drastically shifted, thanks to a combination of technology and the aftermath of COVID 19. We no longer have to be in the same country as our colleagues, never mind the same office! And today’s employees are less willing to spend their lives commuting to crowded offices and are demanding options for remote work and virtual teams.

This all makes your job of managing even more difficult.   Is your organization struggling with all of these changes?

The truth is that the way you were previously taught to manage employees doesn’t work in this modern world.

Tuning into emotions is the key to effectively managing today’s multigenerational, diverse and virtual workforce. Emotional Intelligence is the leadership superpower today’s managers need to boost productivity and employee engagement. 

Let’s face it; people are complicated. And our ever-changing workplaces make leading even more challenging. But one thing hasn’t changed. 

Every person, no matter their role, age, or background, wants three very important things in their workplace.

CONNECTION.

APPRECIATION.

and FULFILLMENT.

When people feel connected to their team, appreciated for their efforts, and fulfilled in their job, it improves how they feel and perform at work. 

Research has shown that Emotional Intelligence is the critical skill exceptional managers use to get the best results from their teams. Try this simple exercise: 

  • Ask one person on your team, “How do you want to be recognized for a job well done? “ 
  • Then, listen attentively to their responses 
  • At least twice over the next week, act on the feedback and show appreciation to them in the way they suggested. 
  • Notice what happens.

At EI Experience, we help you build a productive, profitable organization with happy, engaged employees that make a difference in the world. We teach you how to lead with emotional intelligence so that you naturally improve your communications, strengthen your relationships, make better decisions and cope with stress more effectively, building your employees’ confidence along the way. 

Effortlessly watch personality conflicts melt away and position your employees to work together to take on the challenges and opportunities that lie ahead. 

Emotional intelligence is quite simply, the magic ingredient for connecting authentically, communicating effectively and thriving collectively. Book a call or email us to find out how.

For more blogs on leading through change, check out our blogs How to Embrace Change with Emotional Intelligence, and Leading Effective Virtual Meetings.

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How to Engage Your Virtual Team Using Emotional Intelligence

How to Engage Your Virtual Team Using Emotional Intelligence

The year 2020 has thrown us all a massive curveball. COVID-19 has transformed the dynamics of how companies operate, offering more flexible work schedules, and understanding the benefits of remote work and the impact it can have on our productivity with more of our attention on completing tasks. As well, we have learned that having virtual teams helps us attract the best talent and build a team that brings a variety of backgrounds and perspectives together — which makes a company stronger.

Many people are stressed, tired, and overall feeling disconnected and disengaged, especially at work. According to a survey by the Society for Human Resource Management, 41% of employees feel burned out from their work, and 44% feel used-up at the end of the workday. Employers are struggling to maintain morale and keep their teams enthusiastic and committed from afar.

One of the biggest challenges has been connecting and communicating effectively with your virtual workforce. This isn’t an easy task for leaders to manage, especially those learning to use technology. Employers are struggling to keep employees engaged, with employee engagement at an all-time low, and 35 percent of employees are struggling with mental health issues, such as depression and anxiety. 

We have seen many tactics to keep employees engaged, like virtual happy hours, casual meetings, and regular Zoom check-in calls. Although nobody will complain about getting paid to have a glass of wine, leaders need to recognize that engagement is built on trust, not impromptu meetups.  

Building genuine connections and developing a positive work culture are vital elements in developing meaningful engagement. How does one connect authentically, communicate effectively, and thrive collectively? This is done by learning how to engage your virtual team using emotional intelligence.

How to Engage Your Virtual Team With Emotional Intelligence

 

Leaders recognize that they have to go above and beyond to engage teams using emotional intelligence. Fun activities and spontaneous team meetings are light and fun, but the deep root of engagement stems from emotional intelligence techniques. 

Every employee, virtual or not, wants to feel connected, appreciated, and fulfilled in their workplace. In our newest workshop, Leading Remote Teams with Emotional Intelligence outlines specific techniques to keep build trust and empathy within your teams with the ultimate goal in mind: employee engagement. 

All emotional intelligence competencies are essential; however, there are specific competencies you should emphasize with engagement. 

1. Emotional Self-Awareness

Emotional Self-Awareness is the ability to be aware of your emotions and triggers.

A leader needs to be aware of their own emotions and how the external environment impacts their mood; how a leader shows up to a meeting impacts how they communicate and connect with their teams. The better the leader is at identifying how they feel, the better they will put themselves in other people’s shoes.

2. Emotional Expression

Emotional Expression is the ability to express how you are feeling constructively. 

A leader needs to be able to express themselves and share how they feel. Using more emotive language like” I want, I feel, I hope” will lead you to be seen as more of an inspirational leader who can share a compelling vision. If your team is inspired, they will be more engaged.

3. Interpersonal Relationships

Interpersonal Relationships is the ability to build and nurture mutually satisfying relationships.

A leader needs to build connections and have good social skills to build trust, gain buy-in and leverage the resources you need to reach your teams’ goals. Your ability to form healthy relationships in your team is essential, immensely to help weather difficult times. 

4. Empathy

Empathy is the ability to appreciate and understand how another person feels.

A leader needs to build strong interpersonal relationships, and having high empathy makes a leader approachable and allows your team to feel safe and share their thoughts and ideas. This connection can take your organization to new heights. Leading with empathy enables a leader to grasp what another is feeling, even if it is much different from what they feel. 

5. Reality Testing

Reality Testing is the ability to be mindful, present and attuned to a moment or situation; to see things objectively.

A leader who has a high level of reality testing is seen as grounded, objective and in touch with the work environment. They do not let their subjective personal views and experiences cloud their judgment. This is incredibly important when it comes to engagement and employee experience, as employees feel seen, heard, and respected for where they are, not just where you want them to be.

6. Flexibility

Flexibility is the ability to adapt and cope well with change or the unfamiliar.

A leader who has high flexibility can modify their thoughts, emotions, and behaviours in response to change. These kinds of leaders embrace change and view it as a springboard for progress in the organization. They can accommodate and approach communication and learning from different perspectives and tactics and offer their team alternatives or innovative approaches to work. 

The Return on Investment of Engagement

 

With the continuous level of engagement falling, employees need more support in remote work environments. Not only is engagement falling, but the return on investment (ROI) within your organization is declining. Even if you aren’t familiar with emotional intelligence as a leader, you should be aware of the impact of ignoring it. 

A 2017 study by the Engagement Institute uncovers that disengagement can cost U.S. companies between $450- 550 billion a year. By acknowledging your employees’ emotions and acting on them effectively, you can keep a healthy culture and stay financially competitive. The motivation is clear: engage your virtual team using emotional intelligence or face the consequences of going even further into financial turmoil.

3 Tips to Engage Through Emotional Intelligence

 

By diving deep into your virtual team’s emotional needs and being aware of your feelings, you will be able to maintain a high level of engagement and have a more happy team. 

In our latest blog, Communicating Together Apart, we outlined the importance of effectively connecting with your employees and working together. There are some small yet powerful moves leaders can make to build a more engaged virtual team.

1. Personalize Recognition

Even though you see your team on one screen, you need to recognize each team member’s individual needs and motivations. Remote work has made it easy to identify the introverts and extroverts in your virtual meetings. Leaders need to accommodate their meetings to benefit both types of team members, allowing the introverts to speak, and the extroverts to sit back and listen. A productive team meeting fosters an opportunity to connect with participants, offers direction and purpose while creating space for others to step up and share their knowledge.

The lack of face-to-face communication can make us forget to put the time and effort into employee recognition. It’s not as easy to give a simple thank-you because so much is getting done without us under the same roof. Therefore, leaders need to find effective ways to make sure we do not miss this critical step. Leaders need to give recognition regularly, but they also need to do it the right way. Calling someone out for a job well done in front of the entire team may fulfill some employees, but embarrass others. 

In the book The Five Languages of Appreciation in the Workplace, Gary Chapman outlines five different ways to show authentic appreciation and encouragement to employees, co-workers, and leaders. It’s a must-read, and it contains a free access code for taking the online Motivating By Appreciation (MBA) Inventory, where it identifies a person’s preferred languages of appreciation.  

2. Set Work Boundaries

Just because you are working all hours of the day doesn’t mean that your virtual team’s expectations should be the same. Remote workers are balancing homeschooling, personal and partner stressors, and maybe even financial setbacks. As a leader, you need to respect your employee’s boundaries and try your best to avoid adding more stress. 

There is nothing worse than receiving an email at 1 am or end of the day urgent requests, with little time to complete the task. It not only takes a toll on their productivity, but it also impacts how they feel about the job, and possibly how they perform on the task. 

With employees learning to work in new environments or conditions, there is pressure for employees to make sure they are staying on top of everything. Therefore, as leaders, you need to focus on not adding more angst to their already overloaded 40-hour workweek.

3. Create Flexibility

The 9-to-5 workday is now a time of the past, and remote teams need a more flexible schedule. Virtual work has forced employers to be open to flexible working arrangements. Nobody wants to be told HOW to do something, so allowing employees to do their work on their terms gives them a sense of freedom. This flexibility level also instills a sense of confidence in your employees that they know you trust them enough to get their work done and meet deadlines in the most productive way for them.   

In Daniel Pink’s book, Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us, he shares that motivation can be broken down into three aspects: MAP – Mastery, Autonomy, and Purpose.   Autonomy gives people the freedom to do their work in a way that works best for them.  

If you want an engaged workforce, you, as the employee, need to adapt that each person on your team has a different set of circumstances and put your trust in your people to direct you on how best to support their needs.  

To learn more about virtual team engagement using emotional intelligence, check out our Leading Remote Teams with Emotional Intelligence workshop, where you will learn how to connect authentically and engage effectively with your virtual teams. If you are interested in learning emotional intelligence at your own pace, we provide a deep dive into the 15 emotional intelligence competencies with our Online Courses.

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Leading in Times of Uncertainty

Leading in Times of Uncertainty

Leading in times of uncertainty is critical, especially during the global spread of a deadly virus and the current economic meltdown. How emotionally resilient are you in times of instability? On top of the burden of managing your own internal emotions around the pandemic and the unpredictability of the future, managing an entire team and their fluctuating feelings and varying needs can feel overwhelming for a leader. How well are you handling the unpredictability of COVID-19 and the pressures of leading a stressed-out and anxious team?

None of us know what is coming next or can control what the future may hold, and that uncertainty can be paralyzing. However, as leaders, we must buckle down, make decisions and move forward even in the face of ambiguity. The main question is, how?

Let’s be honest; no one can ever completely understand what the future has in store for you and your team, and what the aftermath of COVID-19 will have on your organization and the world economy.

The best way to manage ambiguity and have the courage to make decisions is to find ways to cope and try your best to lead your team through the uncertainty by using emotional intelligence. Emotional intelligence is the magic ingredient to lead in uncertain times. One of the critical components of emotional intelligence is learning how to make decisions when emotions are involved and teaching your people to do the same. As leaders, you need to give up the belief that a perfect solution will come to you if you wait long enough. Taking too long to make decisions until you have the complete information at your fingertips can be costly; therefore, leading in times of uncertainty requires leaders to take risks and act.

 

The following are four vital coping mechanisms to help you lead in times of uncertainty with grace and composure.

 

1. Lead with Core Values

 

Instead of formulating a contingency plan for every possible unknown, leaders should turn to the anchors of their business – the company’s core values and purpose. When the world is shaking, grab hold to the things that bring stability to your organization. Your corporate values are your guiding principles that dictate your behaviours and actions.  Roy Disney once said, “when your values are clear to you, making decisions become easier.”

Our values can serve as our internal GPS and steer us to live and lead each day, even amongst the murkiness. Columbia University professor, Paul Ingram, has studied the role of values within business organizations for many years and argues that values can serve as our internal control system.

A collective prioritization of values helps employees and teams work through the uncertainty. Once leaders can find solidarity within their organization through their core values and the company’s vision, their teams can come together and stand behind these guiding principles, which will make them stronger.

2. Focus on the Learning

 

Try not to only focus on the disruption COVID-19 has brought into our lives, and try to find the learning you are gaining from the crisis. What has the uncertainty about our future made you realize about yourself? How do you show up for your team or family in stressful times? How has your emotional state impacted how you lead and make decisions personally and professionally?

Take some time to reflect on the learning you have gained during the pandemic, and decide what you need to work on to be a better employee, leader, life partner, parent and human being.  The more you know yourself, the better you will be at adapting to life’s challenges healthily and successfully.

Besides, what can your company learn from the pandemic? How can you create new products and pivot your services to address the changes the epidemic has brought upon us? How can your organization better engage employees while they work remotely? How can you innovate how you design your products or deliver your services to meet people’s newly defined needs? There is always a lesson to learn amongst the most profound tragedies. British writer, C.S Lewis said it best, “You can’t go back and change the beginning, but you can start where you are and change the ending.” How can you learn and grow as a person and as an organization?

3. Mental Toughness and Emotional Resilience

 

Productivity is one of the many obstacles that come with dealing with uncertainty. Highly distracted or stressed people don’t and can’t innovate and change. As leaders, we must develop our staff to take risks, spur ingenuity, have autonomous thoughts, and innovate when change is upon us. The first step towards encouraging innovation inside your teams is to value knowledge and lead by example, seeing challenges as learning opportunities.

COVID-19 has undoubtedly been a challenge for the world, but as a leader, if you model the way and develop mental toughness, you can help people get through these challenging times.  Mental toughness is a term used in psychology to refer to the grit and strength that people possess to soldiers through struggles and success. It is having a positive mental attitude, coping skills, and the emotional resilience necessary to overcome life’s challenges.

Mentally tough leaders don’t let stress or distractions prevent them from continuing the march towards their vision, and make a habit of building up the people around them all of the time. Encourage your staff to always think of better ways as the world is continuously changing. Though crises and global shifts are unpredictable, we can learn to predict and manage how people respond emotionally. How? Check-in with your people regularly and coach them through their emotional barriers. The key here is to make sure your team feels cared for, acknowledged for the current challenges in their lives, and supported by you as their leader. When people feel a sense of connection to the company and appreciated for their efforts during these challenging times, it will improve how they feel and perform at work.

4. Foster a Positive Work Environment

When leading through uncertainty, one of your significant duties is fostering a positive work environment. Strong leadership that encourages open and honest communication is vital to creating a positive feeling in the workplace. Put yourself in your employees’ shoes. Remember that every employee has a different tolerance to ambiguity. Having empathy for those around you that don’t cope well with change or the unfamiliar is essential in leadership.

Giving them time and space to share how they are genuinely feeling will go a long way, making your employees feel understood, heard and seen. Demonstrating empathy doesn’t require you as a leader to have the answers. Just acknowledge and feel with them.  Empathy is feeling with, whereas sympathy is feeling for someone. As a leader, if you give your employees a platform to talk and share how they are coping with all of the changes, they will end up feeling more engaged and motivated to be part of the solution.

Your staff is in a place where stress and emotions are consuming not only their work life but also their personal life. Leaders need to practice self-management and stay focused and composed when times are difficult and try to create a positive work environment. If you lose your calm and controlled demeanour when situations turn challenging and chaotic, your team members may feel and internalize your energy. Inevitably, this could create a tense work environment and stressful situations that will make your job as a leader even more challenging to manage.

Preparing for Uncertainty

 

Even before the global pandemic, rapid technological change, growing economic interdependence, and mounting political instability had conspired to make the future increasingly murky. The reality is: there isn’t a direct solution to prepare for uncertainty. Uncertainty is all around us. But, once the pandemic hit, the ambiguity of our futures went into a tailspin. However, the good news is that leaders can use emotional intelligence to help lead during these challenging times.

Being aware of how you are feeling, and being attuned to your people’s feelings is critical. Then, use that emotional self-awareness and empathy as data to make sound strategic decisions. Focus on your core values and use those as anchors to guide your decision-making process and employees in the right direction. Creating an in-depth contingency plan may also prepare you for recurring inconveniences within your organization.

Determine what the pandemic can teach you about yourself as a leader and what your company can do better with the new and emerging needs and trends. Model the way and be emotionally resilient and mentally tough for your employees. They are watching how you respond during these challenging times. Offer them the time and space to vent and share how COVID-19 has impacted their personal and professional lives. When people feel cared for, it’s incredible what they can and will accomplish.

To learn more about building emotional resilience in your workplace or leading during these changing times, check out either of these workshops – Improving Emotional Resilience or Leading Through Change.  Also, please check out our three new special packages to help your team connect and cooperate, decompress and deliver, and sharpen and succeed, whether they are face-to-face or working remotely!

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