Early in my career, I had an opportunity to learn how steel is made. You might wonder how this connects to leadership and my low-carbon values, but bear with me. To forge steel, it must endure extreme temperatures repeatedly to become stronger and more resilient. However, if done incorrectly, the steel can become brittle. Similarly, leaders today face intense challenges. Their response determines whether they become rigid or adapt, learn from each experience, and develop resilience as a key leadership tool.
The pandemic woke us all up to the idea that one crisis can change our reality overnight. But possibly the more profound lesson is that all kinds of events could have far-reaching implications for the organizations we lead: economic downturns, wars, the rise of artificial intelligence, and electoral politics.
And then there are the major events that are specific to each individual organization, such as the loss of a key client or staff person, a staffing challenge, a legal issue, bad press, or a catastrophic mistake. A great way to approach our current reality is to think like “a futurist.” Futurist Amy Webb tackles this in her recent SXSW talk and a recent Harvard Business Review article.
Many leaders thrive in this environment because they do three things. First, they acknowledge the role their emotions are playing. The goal isn’t to ignore emotions, but to understand that they are fleeting. Dr. Rick Hanson likes to say that “your brain is like Velcro for negative experiences and Teflon for positive ones.” Susan David’s work on Emotional Agility is a fabulous resource, and I really enjoyed the conversation from Dr Lisa Damour on the Making of Inside Out 2.
Second, good leaders don’t just move on once a crisis is over. Instead, they reflect. What happened and why? Where does it leave us? What needs to change about our strategy in light of this experience? Are there new opportunities or challenges? And most importantly, leaders need to ask: What have I learned from this moment? What do I need to change moving forward as a result?
These types of questions are incredibly important to ask frequently, maybe even daily. To sit back and only review circumstances every year or quarter is a tremendous missed opportunity. In this era of social media, we are conditioned to move onto the next thing quickly, regular reflection can help balance this out.
And what does that reflection look like? It includes the questions above, as well as any others that lead to “sliding glass door moments”. Asking these questions is a skill, and the questions make you a better leader. Make it a regular practice.
The third element is to simply begin again, to restart with what you have learned, focused on the present moment, with an open mind.
Change is always coming, and grounded leaders have a process for how to learn from it. Of course, actions we take during a crisis are important. AND in between, we have to recognize that there is a choice in acting on a stimulus (internal or external). I can’t say it better than Dr. Viktor Frankl: “Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom.”
#ResilientLeader #ThinkLikeAFuturist #EmotionalAgility
I also want to give a shout out to all those amazing inventors working on lower emissions steel and the #climatetech community supporting them!
