Sustaining leadership – the top 3 practices that get you through when times are tough
Ethical and sustainable leadership is something we spend a lot of time thinking and talking about at – both at JHA Consulting and Humans at Work. It is core to how we develop, maintain and refresh our systems, our workforces, our resources and our ways of working.
But key to achieving anything, is the ability to stay true to your purpose, and to stick with it without harming yourself in the process.
Look at the profusion of articles, programmes, podcasts all focusing on resilience, burnout and recovery. Resilience for the right reasons in the right context is undeniably a wonderful trait to have…but it can flip you over into burnout incredibly quickly, perhaps without you even noticing it! And once you’re burnt out, in my personal experience, you have a hard road to get back your sense of purpose with passion.
Losing your sense of passion, your conviction, your care about the purpose you once had, is like grief – you feel the vacuum where once was drive, you long for the excitement to talk and think about the niche which, in part, defined who you were. Similar feelings of sadness and anger are there too…albeit deadened by the burnout!
(Each individual will have different experiences with burnout – these are mine and those of people I’ve worked and shared tales with.)
So, we also need to think about sustaining leadership – the kind of leadership practice that focuses on:
Understanding the who
Defining your own parameters
Regenerating your thinking
Let’s take these one-by-one:
1. Who am I, who are you?
Organisations are collections of individuals, working together ideally for a common purpose and in complementary ways. Industries, professional bodies, governments, international collectives – all the same. What is common? The people.
It’s very easy to focus on the what we are doing or the how we are doing it – and leaders spend an inordinate amount of time trying to both understand those things, to quantify and set performance metrics for them, and then to monitor them. I would argue that people doing the work generally know the what and the how – and they’re the experts at it. What leaders need to understand is who are those people – what makes them come to work, what will matter to them, how can you lead in a way that makes the most difference to their experience and why.
This involves curiosity, care, vulnerability…and listening – listening to who they are, but also who you are to them.
You may be surprised by the expectations of people around you about yourself – but understanding that can help you be a better and more effective leader.
By showing your human side, by opening up to hear different or new things, you invite people you work with to share their human side. And by really listening to what they say about who they are and what their ‘why’ is, you can start to understand what is common and what is different.
It’s tempting to say that it’s the common that creates relationships – but really it’s the informal, unspoken agreement to work together, regardless of the differences, that shows the commitment to the relationship. And from differences spark innovation!
2. what are my guiderails?
In any situation, humans tend to quickly assess the opportunities and dangers, adapt if they can, and run if not. It’s a primal urge for when we faced the physical danger of being eaten…which often feels quite similar to the present – the emotional danger of being ‘eaten alive’ by ferocious bosses, customers or colleagues!
Understanding how you react, what you care about, where your boundaries are – that enables you to use your own frame of reference to situations and determine whether they are ‘safe’ or not.
What you are willing and able to do or experience will be different to the person next to you. The boundaries and parameters you have set for yourself will be specific to you.
And determining those requires you to understand who you are – what are you like? What are your strengths, when and why do you feel vulnerable? And importantly, how do you maintain your sense of value, your self-esteem, your self-worth? Understanding how to protect your feelings of value, regardless of the situation you find yourself in, is how you define your guiderails.
For each person, the guiderails are different. For example, I might say that working with people who respect the same things that I do (difference, ethics, humanness) helps me to protect my personal integrity, which is a key guiderail for me. And, maintaining my core focus on safety for my family – which includes me having time and headspace/heartspace to engage with them and be present – is another key guiderail.
And being able to describe your guiderails – the things the safeguard your purpose and wellbeing – is a key part of sharing and being vulnerable with the people you are trying to build relationships with.
3. Regenerating your thinking
Maintaining passion for your purpose means feeding your thinking, testing and exploring different and new ways of perceiving it, and challenging your assumptions.
Your purpose is only a goal, is only a stretch target that you have a hope of reaching, if it’s still relevant and fit for the current and future.
We often fall into 2 sorts of traps when it comes to purpose:
We can’t or don’t articulate our purpose to others
We don’t challenge the timeframes for our purpose
If we can’t articulate our purpose (or we choose not to) we are both closing ourselves off from people being able to understand who we are, and we’re consciously or unconsciously hiding from potential challenge or opportunity. Sharing who we are and why we are driven is an act of openness and vulnerability – it’s a step into the unknown, opening up in a way that makes us feel uncomfortable.
The benefits of doing it though are – creating that shared sense of belonging (they will respect you for your courage in sharing, they could follow-through on your role modelling by sharing their purpose) – and you might find that there are opportunities to create exponential value through the joining of forces (others may have similar or complementary purposes, or by some challenge you might refine your purpose).
If we try and ensure our purpose is longer-term (what commonly is termed more strategic), we create the conditions whereby we are a) more likely to create something of real and lasting value and b) more able to adapt to changing conditions and situations without losing our general sense of direction.
Think about it like this – if you need to get to a hospital that is 3 blocks away, with one main street to get to it, you’re extremely likely to put your eggs in one basket, take that one route regardless of whether you end up in a traffic jam and delay getting there, or if you only pass by the same buildings and stores with no diversity to help pass the time or get you ready for what you might find at the hospital.
However, what if the hospital is an hour away, with a variety of options from main routes to side streets, a highway and local roads. If the traffic is bad or there are roadworks on the first route you try, you have multiple options to try to get there as soon as you can. Similarly, you might end up seeing a variety of different neighbourhoods, schools, countryside – that enable you to get some perspective and shore up your defences before you get to the hospital.
And it may take you the same amount of time to get there in both cases!
Recap – 3 practices for sustaining leadership:
The who – Sharing our purpose, and having other people celebrate, challenge and add to it, and listening to their own stories – creates a sense of knowing who we are, where we connect with each other and where we differ.
Parameters – Connecting deeply to your passion reinforces your sense of self-esteem and self-worth. Which in turn empowers you to stick to your guiderails, whatever the situation or context, thereby keeping you safe.
Regeneration – Opening up about ourselves and our purpose allows for more resilience, deeper thinking and regular refreshment of your purpose. This enables you to feel a stronger sense of connection and passion for it. Which means you’re more likely to achieve it, however long it takes and whatever barriers you find.
This is sustaining leadership. It sustains you (feeds you, protects you), and it sustains those around you. And it enables you and the people you interact with to practice resilience, resist burnout, protect their integrity and self-worth.