I don’t know about you, but I had a rough week last week.
While we’ve all been dealing with the mental, physical, and financial impacts of isolation and separation, team members are now more anxiously-than-ever looking to us for answers.
And as we begin to sense a few breaks in the pandemic’s oppressive cloud cover, our perspectives and decisions as leaders, and how we communicate them, are more critical than ever.
It’s time to get personal
And it’s time to get [very] real.
For example- how do we not only keep team members safe, but help them feel safe, as they come back into contact with others?
How can we gage the impacts of quarantine upon the mindsets of individual team members while helping them positively rebound as we all adapt to a “new normal”?
And- what the heck is our “new normal” even going to look like?
Those we lead need us to keep our eyes upward and our focus onward. They need us to keep moving forward. No matter what.
This is a fundamental yoke of leadership.
And all the while, you and I are [also] human- facing the same worries and confusions as those we serve.
I certainly have my doubts, my concerns, my 3:15 AM tossing through a mental cesspool of ‘what if’s’.
Yet I know, when I get up for the day, as a leader- I must be ‘on’.
As leaders, we must be confident, energetic, and reassuring.
We must at least appear to have a plan for moving forward.
Any of this ‘hitting home’?
It reminds me of one of my two favorite songs from the Broadway blockbuster- Hamilton…
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These are the worst of times.
These are the best of times.
Amid my worst moments over the past few weeks, I’ve been blessed to have had some of my best conversations with leaders I greatly admire.
And beyond genuine concern and desire for keeping people safe, they’ve shared two predominant feelings…
First- amazement and appreciation for how team members have pulled together throughout the pandemic.
Second (just like we keep seeing on TV)- stronger-than-ever awareness that, in spite of the separation, we truly are “in this together”.
You know- it’s EASY to lead in the good times.
This, however, is a test.
A really tough one.
But remember- you and I have chosen to lead.
And when times are toughest, our leadership is needed most.
As you craft ‘what comes next’ for your team, it can be easy to feel you’re the only one who understands ‘the room where it happens’- that you’re the only one who knows how ‘the sausage is made’!
And it can feel like you’re in that room all alone.
But you’re not.
It’s not going to be easy, but nothing worthwhile ever is.
We truly are in this together.
Know someone else who might benefit from hearing this?
Why not forward it along?
And by the way- How can I help?
Until next time my friend,
Tim Autrey
CEO / Founder PPI
[TA1]Link to: https://amzn.to/3eRmwqi
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