Future-Ready Leadership: Strategies to Equip Your Workforce for Lasting Success
This moment in history presents one of our most significant contradictions; while we're enjoying an unprecedented golden age of technological advancement, we are simultaneously witnessing a global deterioration in mental health that's significantly influencing people's work lives.
The most pronounced effect is seen in organizational profitability. For example, in a company of 10,000 with an average salary of $50,000, the cost of disengagement is $60.3 million annually.
If profitability hasn't been impacted within your organization yet, it could be soon. Gallup’s State of the Workplace: 2024 Report shows that a quarter of leaders feel burned out often or always, and two-thirds feel it at least sometimes. What’s mind-blowing is that 61% of Gen Z and younger Millennials (born in 1989 and later) experience the highest amount of stress—significantly higher than other generations at this age.
While high amounts of chronic stress increase the risk of psychiatric and medical conditions and are characteristics of burnout, too little workplace stress contributes to workplace lethargy and lack of motivation, called rustout, burnout’s alter ego. Both opposite arcs of the pendulum swing doom for employers.
Both lead to disengagement, poor employee productivity, and potential loss of employees from the workplace, leaving an employer with another seat to fill, which adds to the workload and workplace stress. Alternatively, when an employer chooses not to backfill a role, this also adds to the workload and stress of the remaining employees, intensifying the strain on the workplace.
So, what’s the answer?
Before we get there, know this -
Moderately stressful events stimulate growth.
There’s a misconception that all stress is bad. However, research shows that certain types of stress can benefit health. Under the right conditions, moderately stressful events can build resilience and lead to growth.
The key for employers is to find the sweet spot of “good stress,” and that’s developed by building -
Resilience
Resilience is the ability to recover from a stressful encounter, and it varies from person to person. The Hogan Personality Inventory measures resilience as someone’s ability to adjust. The higher someone’s ability to adjust, the better they can bounce back from stressful situations and the higher their resiliency.
That might make one wonder why employers don’t hire people with high adjustment. Well, it would seem that even adjustment has its downsides. People with high adjustment don’t recognize or react to threats early enough. The answer isn’t to hire all highly resilient employees but rather to equip them with ways to integrate growth amid stressful encounters. It's easier said than done due to what’s known as the resilience cycle.
The Resilience Cycle
The resilience cycle is a “product of complex interactions among multiple biological, psychological, and environmental factors that play a key role in an individual’s response to a stressful event,” according to a publication in The Journal of Neuropsychiatry and Clinical Neurosciences. (Ord, 2020) The resilience cycle starts with the conditions prior to the stressful event or the initial conditions followed by the stressful event. Following the stressful event is an integration period or an adjustment phase, leading to the outcome or final state, i.e., the new normal.
Human Growth & Integration ™
The integration period is when stress is modulated or integrated. Without this or with poor integration, chronic stress conditions can ensue with physical or psychological impairment, some of which we see today in the global deterioration in mental health. (Lu, 2021) Human Growth & Integration™ is the process of integrating all human aspects throughout the maturing stages of life (Erikson, 1950). It is essential and also unique to each person.
Human growth rests on integrating all human aspects throughout the maturing stages of life (Erikson, 1950). The solution to the ensuing workplace disengagement and poor profitability involves continuing to teach how to integrate human growth, a complex by-product of multiple interactions and factors as unique as each individual.
While this may sound complicated and overwhelming, it's essential to understand that mental health and wellness are complex issues that are often left to trusted professionals.
At Trust and Leadership Coaching (TLC), we have fine-tuned programs embedded with a Human Growth & Integration™ curriculum, tools, and assessments because our mission to help humanity thrive is personal.
Our approach involves:
Teaching leaders how to spot and heal chronic stress and burnout in themselves and others using our neuroscience-backed assessment, Total Brain. This assessment provides a comprehensive understanding of an individual's brain health, including stress levels, resilience, and potential for burnout, enabling leaders to take proactive measures to maintain their mental well-being and that of their team.
Giving leaders the system to find and train the next generation of leaders so they can diminish the new manager transition period. This period, which often involves a steep learning curve and adjustment for new managers, can lead to decreased productivity and morale. Our system provides the tools and training to shorten this transition period, quickly leading to high-performing new managers.
Coaching leaders to elicit high performance with the habits to create a calm nervous system. By integrating techniques such as mindfulness, emotional intelligence, and stress management, leaders can learn to foster an environment where high performance thrives. This involves training in effective communication, active listening, and constructive feedback, which are essential in building trust and encouraging open dialogue among team members.
Practicing the power of integration to create a more resilient, productive, and efficient workplace. Incorporating integration into the learning environment and coaching plans helps leaders effectively learn and model workplace integration behaviors, building trust while creating a culture where resiliency, productivity, and efficiency soar.
While these are our standard approaches at TLC, we often customize our services when we partner with organizations to give them the support they need most.