I think all good leaders deal with guilt on occasion in their leadership and life walk. It shows that they have at least a decent moral compass, and while carrying guilt certainly is not fun and can impede your long-term effectiveness if it lingers, working through guilt can be a positive leadership exercise.
Guilt from all directions
Guilt can come from all directions in your life. Friends, family, co-workers and even you yourself can be an area that you feel guilt around. Guilt, at its core, is a feeling of sadness or unhappiness. You feel sad about how you treated or interacted with someone. Maybe you are unhappy with yourself for not connecting with someone close to you for a long time. Some common areas for guilt to manifest are around
Prioritizing between work/academic life and your personal life
Saying something or acting in a way that is hurtful to others
A feeling of letting someone down
Acting in a way that is contrary to your moral compass
Failing to meet your own high standards
Moving past the guilt
Think about the times that you felt guilty and later resolved the situation. It’s likely that you felt a proverbial burden lift from your shoulders. The result is that you positively impacted your own well-being and likely had at least a slightly positive impact on someone else’s well-being too. Here are some steps to take to help you begin to move past your guilt.
1. Think about the origin of the guilt that you are feeling. Where is it coming from? Could it be from making a choice in competing priorities or somewhere else? Is the guilt based on reality or a story that you are telling yourself?
2. Hindsight can impact how you feel guilt based on information that you learned after the situation. Acknowledge that at the time, you made what you thought was the best decision or option.
3. Take ownership of how the decision or situation impacted others. Determine what you have ownership and control over to take action.
4. Connect with team members, family, or friends and sincerely apologize. This is a critical conversation as approaching the other party with authenticity and empathy can go a long way in the right direction while coming in confrontation or defensive will only set you back further.
5. Sometimes the other person will refuse to forgive you. This gives them quite a bit of power in the dynamic of the relationship….if you let it. Be ok with their position. You can only control how you act and react and have no control over the other person’s stance.
6. No matter how it turns out, be proud that you took steps in seeking reconciliation and that you learned from the situation.
Avoiding guilt should not be the goal
When I started to get back on track with my personal health, I began taking mindful cooldown exercises after a workout. At the end of one of those sessions, the instructor had us sit down and quiet our thoughts. He then had us think about the things that were occupying too much time in our minds that day. Once we did, we then mentally acknowledged it and then let the thought go.
It really stuck with me, as I thought about those situations that were taking up too much real estate in my head at the time. I pictured it almost like a train station. The thought comes pulling into the station, you wave at it, and then off it goes. It was a powerful exercise for me to gain awareness of just how much certain interactions and thoughts were holding me back.
The point is not to bother trying to avoid guilt. It’s inevitable. Instead recognize it in yourself, acknowledge it and move on. Guilt can actually be a good place to visit as you grow as a leader and person. It allows you to keep yourself accountable and learn from mistakes and circumstances. Living in guilt, on the other hand, is not healthy and can end up destroying your effectiveness as a leader and significantly impact your quality of life.
Most leaders are harder on themselves than others. Think through the topic or situation that involves the guilt that you carry. If someone else was in the same circumstance would you judge them the same way? Remember that it’s ok to feel guilt and learn from it but in order to be your most effective you have to learn from it, put the work in to resolve it to the best of your ability, and then let go of the rest.
I can honestly say that I have been blessed with some amazing friendships over the years. My closest friends have been there to celebrate the great times and to support me during the hardest times of my life.
Great friendships always bring out the best in you and the other person. They are the funniest, generous, and caring, in their own way, with those friends that they are closest with. Here are some tips to fuel great relationships.
Time
The first step could be the most powerful and likely the largest hurdle to any friendship; time. Friendship takes time and for many adults, time can be in short supply, especially without good time management skills.
In order to build a friendship that lasts, it takes a time investment. One study estimates that it takes 40-60 hours with someone to turn that person from an acquaintance to a casual friend. Invest a total of 80-100 hours to elevate the casual friendship into something else.
The time gate is also the reason you find many of your friendships where you spend lots of time anyway like, work, school, church, and extracurricular activities. Sometimes that time investment is over a long period of time, think about someone you may see during your extracurricular activity (softball, soccer, volunteer, etc) vs someone that you became fast friends with because of life circumstances.
If you want impactful friendships and relationships it will take some kind of time investment on your part.
Situational Awareness
Typically as you get older, your social circles begin to settle and tighten. Routines aren’t a bad thing and you are actually being exposed to more future friendships than you may realize.
Fueling new friendships takes paying attention to your environment and discovering new friendships in unexpected ways. It’s now a normal occurrence to hear stories of people becoming friends in online games and becoming best friends in real life. Look in the online forums that you frequent. Who have you bumped into while on your errands and out and about in your town? Perhaps there is someone in a different department at work that you find interesting. There are lots of places that are in your normal routines for that next friend.
Neha is a great example of that for me. We initially met a few years ago as we volunteered at the Atlanta Chapter of the Association for Talent Development. At first, that time investment was slow, but it sped up as we got to know each other more and discovered several shared interests. Now she’s celebrating a year and a half as our podcast co-host.
Don’t limit your situational awareness to just new connections. Look around at some people who perhaps have entered your circle of influence for a little while now. What connection may be good to take to the next level?
Action
Time and awareness hold little value if you don’t take action to advance the friendship. Action does take a dose of courage. You need to be willing to step out of your comfort zone at times to put yourself out there for the other person. The beginning stages of a strong friendship can seem a bit like dating. You see something in a person and you may need to step out to make a connection to get things started.
Not all action is created equal at the beginning of a friendship. Some may just easily happen with a little extra effort. I’ve made lots of friends by being paired up with people in both military and civilian training environments. The action hurdle is lowered when you are together morning, noon, and night.
Outside of time, action may be the hardest part of keeping a strong friendship going. Friendship can be work. It takes thought, intentionality, and effort. All that effort may seem hard or discouraging, but remember the joy and connectedness that you, and the other person, experience as a result.
Friendships won’t grow without action, and that’s ok for a large population that you encounter. Nurture those relationships that you want to have in your personal and professional life. The benefits of friendships include:
A stronger sense of purpose and belonging
Reduced stress and increased happiness
Higher self-confidence and self-worth
Support systems during challenging times
Guardrails during major life choices
Bonus Tip – Reconnection
Perhaps you’ve had strong relationships in the past and for whatever reason, you both drifted away. This is a natural part of life and is a natural conclusion for some friendships as the dynamics between the two change. Other times there is an opportunity to reignite those friendships.
A years-long pandemic certainly impacted many relationships across the world. I was not immune to this and found many of my friends that I used to spend my time with were not as close anymore, because of the isolation caused by the heights of COVID-19. I would encourage you to not give up on those relationships if you feel like there is still value in the friendship. Reinvest some time, and take action to re-engage.
Next week, we’ll continue to look at the ways to fuel your friendships by talking through grace, imagination, and cadence.
Have you thought to yourself or said to someone else, “I just need to get out and do something?” I know I do at times! Micro-adventures are a great way to get away, reset, let go of some stress, and learn a little along the way.
While there is a lot of value in those big getaways and moments you’ve saved up for or have been working or training towards, micro-adventures are a great way to keep the benefits of going out and discovering new things a part of your regular schedule.
Small impact on your wallet
One of the great advantages of micro-adventures is that they can have a very minimal impact on your wallet. Sometimes we get hung up in creating these epic, memories-of-a-lifetime, adventures. Don’t get me wrong those are great and have their place as well. I’ll always remember my time going hang-gliding over the Appalachian mountains or scuba diving in the Georgia Aquarium, but we shouldn’t rely on those big tent pole moments and have boring lives in between.
Look for new adventures in your surrounding city that can be a good getaway for you and friends/family members. A few places to look to get you started may include:
Local parks, nature areas, and reserves
Walking trails
Low costs adventures like letterboxing and geocaching
Check your local community calendars for events
Visit area museums and historic places
One of the reasons that my wife and I fell in love with the city of Atlanta, is that we are regularly going on adventures to that explore the city’s culture. Some of my favorite adventures that we’ve been on this past year include a record store crawl, hitting all the major stores and many lesser known stores in a day. We visited a major outdoor art festival and purchased some local art. We’ve also attended many musical events. Our goal is to see a show at every established music venue in the city.
Get creative and find some new ways to go on a micro-adventure.
A great way to relieve stress
No doubt that your work/school life and personal life stack up. Sometimes stress builds up because of a large work project or deadlines and other times stress can build up due to drama or other factors in your personal life. What’s worse is when those seasons from both aspects of your life collide at the same time!
Micro-adventures are a great outlet to get out of your normal routine and give yourself some much-deserved stress relief. The key to helping these small adventures have an impact is in how you approach them. I typically leave all the junk that I am dealing with back at the proverbial door or parking lot. if you choose to bring your baggage with you, you’ll certainly not be as engaged or have as much fun on your outing and the stress relief benefit could very well go out the window.
Be mindful to be fully engaged in your adventure. Fully take in this new experience that you have gifted yourself with. Remember that you can always pick up the baggage once you are done, (or not) but it’s your choice whether it goes with you on not.
Micro-adventures can be a great learning opportunity
Sometimes intentional, and other times by happenstance, it seems like I’m always learning something new on my own micro-adventures. On a recent hike up a local mountain with my cub scout group (Which only cost me $5 to do), we had so many learning moments. My wife has a plant identifier app on her where we learned that grapes grew at the top of the mountain. We learned from our scouts what they had been doing over the recent school break and once we descended, we lucked out and got to experience a war re-enactment. The kids got a chance to ask questions about the time and how the area was different at the time of the battle.
I’ve heard people share great stories in record shops, learned about the history of the community in museums and festivals, and got a better understanding of my city during the many racing events that I’ve done.
Be on the lookout for those teachable moments as you go on your own adventures. Some will be obvious based on the experience that you choose, while others will be much more subtle. What looks interesting around you? Who looks interesting to you? Take your time and soak up the environment around you. There are likely many learning opportunities all around you just waiting to be noticed.
Micro-adventures can be that bright spot you have during those rough times, or something great to look forward to in the good times. Be intentional to set aside time to break out of your normal routine and explore your local area. You’ll be glad that you did and you may just pick up something along the way that makes you a better leader.
Living your personal values leads you to live an authentic life that you will enjoy and be proud of, but it certainly isn’t always easy. I’ve had to let some great professional opportunities, old friends, and other valuable things go because they didn’t, or no longer, aligned with my values.
Today we’ll all look at three areas to consider as you think about your own personal values and how you can leverage them to be a great leader in your own personal life journey.
Understand what your personal Values are
When you live out your values at home and in your community, you have a strong sense of those qualities, behaviors, and beliefs that are truly important to you. It’s not uncommon to have a lack of clarity in our own values. Perhaps you’ve never really thought about it, or perhaps they are very broad – think “respect, kind, friendly” If you think about corporate Values, the best are short and to the point but they cover a very specific position. (Instead of the general term Justice, they may have Embrace Accountability) That focus helps you create a strong moral compass to latch on to.
If you need assistance in narrowing down those behaviors and traits that are important to you do this exercise over a week. Take time to write down a few things that:
Made you feel good or gave you a sense of satisfaction
Made you sad or gave you pause or regret
What others did that you admired or inspired you
What others did that you would not want to emulate
Made you feel useful, impactful, or valuable
This list should naturally bubble up some themes for you of behaviors, traits, and aspects that you are drawn towards as well as those things that you don’t want to be associated with. Now take those themes a step further and think about the root of those behaviors. You likely just found some of your personal values. Write them out and don’t limit them to just a word or two if you need more. Mine are more statements that a single word that you’ll find in many organizations. Some of mine include:
Put others above yourself
Embrace accountability in what you commit to
Do what’s right for others even when it’s difficult
Leverage your Values in your decisions
Your personal values drive should drive a lot of your decision-making. They help you in deciding what kind of job to take, what company to work for, who you befriend, what kind of content you consume, and more. Your values influence the small decisions throughout the day, (Who you follow online, how you spend your breaks, etc) and the big ones (Your long-term companion, how and where you invest your money, etc) to really everything in between.
When you get to those decisions that don’t seem easy – maybe they are complex, or really large in impact – Take a moment to pause and ask yourself how they align with your Values. Is this a good match? Is this what I want to be associated with?
You can probably recall a circumstance where you felt remorse or regret because you made a choice that was not consistent with your values. Don’t beat yourself up too much about it, it happens to all of us. Instead, learn from it and keep moving forward.
Check in to ensure that those you associate with are still aligned
Similar to our show Can you turn into a bad boss? (EP 348) It’s rare to make up one morning and decide to ditch all of your morals suddenly. What can happen though is a slow drift away from your internal values until a person finds themselves aligned with things that they never thought that they would be. There are many ways that the groups, associations, and people that you know can pull you away from your values without you knowing until it’s too late.
Mob mentality – The act of neglecting a person’s own feelings, instincts, and logic to adopt the behavior and actions around them.
Political groups – Groups that change their agenda as time passes. You may have been aligned at some point, but like mob mentality, become loyal to the group so much so that it overrides your own individual sense of values.
Friends – People are always changing and life events only compound those changes. Are the friends that you associate yourself with still adding value to them or have they become toxic to your well-being?
What are you consuming? – The internet is an echo chamber of its own making with many apps and sites pushing and nudging your content based on what you take an initial interest in. Be aware of the technological tug that may be pulling you in a direction you don’t need to go in, or perhaps excluding the direction that you should be heading towards.
Do a check-in with yourself from time to time to ensure that the categories above and other areas of influence for you are still aligned. While it may be difficult, letting go of those things that draw you away from your values will be a worthwhile effort.
Lean into the Values as you lead yourself, your friends, and your family. You will feel a higher level of satisfaction and value in what you do day in and day out, and you’ll like be building lasting relations while making a difference in others as a result.
We’ve all felt the lasting impact of the last few years. A study confirmed it, we’ve gotten more stressed and feel a high level of anxiety these days.
In order to keep people engaged and have them stick around, it’s important for you as a leader to be mindful of your team’s stress levels and well-being. While serious treatment for mental health concerns needs to stay with the professionals, there are actions that you can take to help support and care for your team.
Keep a high-touch communication cadence
The saying “Out of sight, out of mind” is certainly true. Think about your personal goals, desires, and best intentions. Without intentionality to keep them in front of you, they end up falling to the wayside and become missed opportunities and disappointments. That’s one of the reasons we recommend whiteboards, apps, and/or smaller physical capture points to catalog your goals, both short and long-term.
Think of your employees in the same way, if they are working remotely or in a different location, they are in danger of being left behind and feeling disconnected from their work and from those that they work with.
I’ve always been a fan of weekly one-on-ones, even when I led remote teams across a large geographical area, I kept a cadence of check-ins with my direct reports. The pandemic pushed me to change my communication style in order to meet changing needs. I no longer have scheduled one-on-ones, but put quite a bit of effort into connecting multiple times a week in both formal and informal settings. This has helped with a list of things not building up and makes the conversation cadence feel like we are in an office setting without actually being in the same space.
High touch doesn’t mean quick and shallow communications. Is it appropriate sometimes? Yes, but include meaningful and deeper conversations as well.
Some prompts to get you started:
How are you feeling about your workload? Do you have enough time to get everything done?
How do you feel at the start and end of your day or week? (Good question to gauge burnout)
How can I support you or your work?
How are you staying connected to others?
Help your people’s well-being by making sure that they feel informed, included, and appreciated.
Cue into the nonverbal and physical clues We know that there is power in non-verbal communication (EP 186). People that are struggling with stress, anxiety, and uncertainty will often show signs of distress, it’s just a matter of you as a leader being attentive enough to pick up on the clues.
Look for changes in behavior that can include:
Wanting to, or outright avoiding group gatherings, both in-person and virtual.
Showing signs of fatigue, aches, pains, and changes in energy level.
Becoming overly passive, or losing and sense of engagement.
Showing nervousness, irritability, and restlessness.
A drop in the level of communication
As a leader, you make it easier for your people to share when you are attentive and engaged with them on a personal level. They see your attentiveness and will open up more to you. On the other hand, they also know when you aren’t paying attention and will volunteer less information and articulate less on issues and struggles.
Allow them time to refocus, decompress and reframe
Overall, I think people are harder on themselves than they should be. I know that I am. I have a tendency to try to push through physical pain, burnout, or setbacks.
Pushing for progress is always a great approach right? Well maybe not. I had years of built of injuries from running because I kept pushing through them all and tried to quickly fix things so I could continue on. I took the pandemic time to try something new…. rest. It took a long time, but my foot, knee, and hip issues all eventually resolved themselves. Even my back started feeling better and survived a big house move.
When you identify that a person needs some time to focus on their well-being, don’t wait for them to ask for time. Be proactive and help them get the time to take care of themself.
Keep track of their vacation cadence. Encourage them to take time off and get away from work.
Help spread their workload to help ease their stress.
Look for efficiencies in work to help them eliminate time wasters.
Partner together for ways that they can delegate some work to others.
Model and demonstrate how you decompress and refocus your life.
Encourage and affirm your people that is ok to take that time needed for them to take care of themselves. Your team shouldn’t foster a culture where an individual considers it a badge of honor when they go long times without taking a break from work. The work will always be there, but the employee won’t if they reach a high level of burnout.
An employee’s well-being is equally owned between themselves and their leader. They should prioritize their own health and mental well-being and the leader should remain committed to supporting their well-being through their experience at work. Be an impactful leader by starting small and having the intentionality to support your team.
