Leadership: The impact it has or could have on Team Stress - Louise Bedeman, General Manager: Training, Learning & Performance
Leadership and Stress Management are popular and well researched topics. As a leader you’ve read numerous books, articles and attended formal training on both these subjects. The intention of this article is to create awareness of how closely related these topics are and to provide a practical solution to common issues.
Regardless of your title, be it Project Manager, Scrum Master, Team Leader or Manager, if you are co-ordinating work delivered by others, this is something you need to consider. Leadership and stress are intertwined and how we approach it, has a direct impact on our Teams’ performance and well-being.
Stress and anxiety are prevalent problems in the workplace. A third of employees say that their job negatively affects their mental health. And decades of scientific research shows that this impacts employee morale and their general well-being, result in reduced productivity. Organisations are more aware and supportive of mental well-being of their employees.
Yet as businesses we constantly rush to meet deadlines, battle to stay competitive and relevant in markets and need to deliver more with limited capacity. We may not notice that our teams are stressed and needs support. We continue to push the envelope, missing the vital signs until it is too late. Productivity suffers and highly skilled talented employees move on. This can become a costly liability for any business.
The fact is that stress could be affecting your team’s performance and general wellbeing more than you realise.As leaders we must take a proactive role in this regard.
Joanne Vitali, a certified career coach in the Philadelphia area says “It’s important for the team to not be stressed. Stress releases cortisol, which takes energy away from the prefrontal cortex, making you less able to reason and respond well. You are, in a nutshell, way less productive.”
What is the leader’s role is this?
As leaders we influence others daily, positively or negatively. The more senior the leader the greater the span of influence. What managers say or not say, do or not do and how they feel, has a direct influence on the team. This has a direct impact on the teams stress levels and productivity. We must remember all stress is not bad, but we need to know when the stress levels are unhealthy.
Unfortunately, many leaders are not aware of the power they have or the role they play in team stress. They may be overconfident in their leadership skills or simply unaware of this power. They may inadvertently contribute to increased anxiety levels. Leaders must become more aware of the impacts they have on the team and how it increases anxiety levels. Here are some behavioural patterns that indicates your team is overloaded and can’t cope:
- Lack of fun or laughter in the team
- Difficulty in concentrating or completing tasks.
- Increased irritability, frustration, and patience with other team members
- Difficulty making decisions or avoiding taking decisions
- Increases arguments and conflict that the team find hard to resolve
- Leaders must pay attention to how their leadership style and the way they communicate, impacts the team. Being aware of the signs, allows you to act before stress becomes a problem and to support your team to ensure they are happy, motivated and productive.
Six leadership behaviours that increases team stress:
Being the “creative, innovative boss”.
- Unpredictability and uncertainty in your leadership approach create fear and confusion, even if the change is well intended. In difficult and challenging times, teams want stability and predictability. Not knowing what to expect or what is going to happen next, adds an additional layer of anxiety. The team needs to know that you are stable and consistent in what you do. Provide continuous clear direction and expectations in advance and continue doing this during times of crisis. Communicate effectively andavoid last minutes changes or cancelations to reduce stress and better optimise time.
Negative communication – be it verbal or non-verbal.
- Be aware of words that has a negative connotation. Using words like shocking, disastrous and disappointing for example, creates fear. Don’t use euphemisms such as challenging or problematic either, as this raise suspicion and concern.
- We express ourselves with words, but we are not always cognisant of the non-verbal ques that we are expressing, be it gestures, facial expressions, volume or tone that we use. Unintentionally we are more likely to convey our emotions and moods. Refrain from displaying outright negativity and pessimism. Our mental state when conveying messages create further anxiety as teams are more likely to reflect how the message was shared. Leadership is not about you; it is about how you empower others. A calm composure provides the team with the needed stability to reduce stress.
Inability to control our own emotions.
- Emotional outbursts and behaviour, be it positive or negative impacts the team. They experience the roller coaster behaviour and anxiously try to anticipate what is going to happen next. As a leader it is expected that you have a certain level of competence to deal with stress. Your stress level will determine how the team deals with the situation. You should manage your impressions and emotions to create an environment that is calm and stable. If they think you cannot manage yourself, they won’t trust you to manage them.
Planning and setting goals in isolation.
- The lack of control over work assignments, and conflicting expectations are common work-related stressors. Keep people informed, they need to understand where the ship is heading. Ensure you communicate what you can, nobody likes surprises.
- Further to this, settings goals without including the person and enforcing unreasonable expectations, is a recipe for disaster. It creates high levels of stress for teams as they have no control or input to actions and deliverables. A collaborative planning approach ensures that you set reasonable and achievable targets and it becomes a motivator instead of a demotivator.
Stop micro-managing.
- Stay out of the detail, let team members decide how they are going to perform tasks. Feeling you have no control and constant interference when you are competent, create frustration and stress. Give your team clear guidance, agree on boundaries, and set expectations. Manage the outcome not the work. Managers making judgement calls on execution detail is stressful and demoralising.
Ignoring people’s emotions.
- During stressful times leaders are pressured by deadlines and tend to focus on the bottom line, ignoring the team’s emotions. This is a crucial mistake. Leaders must focus on the team around them and not on their own emotions. The key to success is empathy: You will only succeed if you are focused on the people around you, not on yourself.
- Leaders with a high EQ are better at understanding and influencing other people’s emotions, as well as controlling their own. As a leader you must be willing to work on your EQ to understand yourself and other people.
To conclude, Leaders must learn to identify the signs of stress. A drop in productivity, trouble focussing on tasks, missing deadlines, poor decision making, and avoiding responsibilities are all symptoms. To perform at their best, a team needs to feel safe and trusted in their work environment. For this to happen, leaders need to exercise empathy and compassion and address the source of an issue, not just react to the outcome.
Always try to improve your leadership qualities and stay abreast of management trends so you can continue to bring out the best in your team.Dale Carnegie said, “When dealing with people, remember you are not dealing with creatures of logic, but creatures of emotion.”
A happy team is a productive team!
