Emotional Resilience, Road to Empowerment in Crisis Times
The times are turbulent…world of opportunities co-existing with economic disappointments, abundance co-existing with frugality, immense scope, and potential, but a current uncomfortable lull in business…taking the liberty to quote Charles Dickens’ ‘A Tale of Two Cities’ in the present context (since it is still so relevant) …“It is the best of times, it is the worst of times, it is the age of wisdom, it is the age of foolishness, it is the epoch of belief, it is the epoch of incredulity, it is the season of light, it is the season of darkness, it is the spring of hope, it is the winter of despair.”
Professionals are grappling with the negative externalities in a recessionary market, and any individual (desolate and lonely at times even in a crowd), may find it extremely difficult to cope when the crisis strikes.
“The pain and struggle of dealing with uncertainties is aggravated when some news shakes us to the core – the untimely demise of talented celebrity, or maybe the news last year, of loss of a very influential and enterprising person, owner of Café Coffee Day.”
A leader’s or celebrity’s power and ability to influence masses is immense, they do it through charisma, the body of work, lives they touch, and ALSO, through wrong decisions that they take. They are dream pursuers, role models, but ….
- Can fear of failure be so overwhelming to prompt individuals to take extreme decisions?
- Is there really any situation that merits taking away of a ‘successful’ life?
- Can the cost of success ever be so high?
- Human beings are compared to islands since the complexity of emotions of anyone is rarely comprehended fully by another, but they have their own sets of support systems to pull them through in times of need. Does the mad rush towards success sometimes alienate them from the ‘support systems’?
- ‘How to succeed’ is a topic for books, discussions world over, ‘how to deal with failures – in businesses, in relationships, in careers, in stardom…’ is that also not an integral coaching point of our lives?
- Is not there a need to reinforce Winston Churchill’s ‘Success consists of going from failure to failure without loss of enthusiasm’?
These questions do not have easy answers. Words of encouragement support for one and all, for what they do and are good at, is one way. EVERYONE needs it. Dealing with failures or rejection is such a critical competency for life. Gone are the times when being vulnerable would be a vice for a leader (the archetypal trait theory), now it makes leaders look ‘real’ and ‘relatable’. It makes them more approachable to their followers. However, it is lonely at the top for anyone. Where does the reinforcement of solidarity, warmth, camaraderie come from?
No matter how big a role intellectual acumen plays in anyone’s career, the importance of emotional intelligence to build emotional resilience cannot be undermined. Emotional intelligence is an important factor that determines success and psychological wellbeing helps maintain order and stability of life in such a way that the individual experiences less negative events in life. EI has various components – Personal (Self-awareness, Self-regulation, Motivation) and Social (Empathy and Social skill).EI has a strong co-relation with Locus of Control and the two combined can play a strong role in building the trait of resilience.
“A locus of control orientation is a belief about whether the outcomes of our actions are contingent on what we do (internal control orientation) or on events outside our personal control (external control orientation),” explained psychologist Philip Zimbardo in his 1985 book Psychology and Life. Locus of control is a continuum of an individual’s belief system regarding the causes of his or her experiences and the factors to which that person attributes success or failure, most people lie somewhere on the continuum between the two extremes.
People with dominant internal Locus of Control are more likely to take responsibility for their actions and usually, have a strong sense of self-efficacy. They tend to work hard to achieve the things they want and report being happier and more independent, often achieving greater success in the workplace.
People with dominant external Locus of Control blame outside forces for their circumstances and do not believe that they can change their situation through their own efforts. None of the extremes are desirable and have the potential to cause significant damages. But it is important to know where our locus of control lies as an individual and that helps us understand how we respond to negativities and in turn, makes us stronger. The biggest empowerment comes from within, with a solid understanding of our own self and working towards overcoming our own demons.
The current COVID crisis has got us to a different level of struggle, on multiple priorities – managing work, home, ration, supplies, children, elderly parents, and other pressing engagements. All of it has led to much stress for each one of us, in ways more than we can imagine. But can HR play a role in such sensitive times, when resilience is often being put to test?
First of all, the realisation and awareness that any employee can go through times of excruciating pain and stress, irrespective of their position in the hierarchy. Looking into the mental well-being is also an integral part of HR’s portfolio so we have an energised and intellectually, mentally stimulated workforce across the hierarchy. Personal beliefs can impact the job, there is hardly anything that anyone can do since those beliefs are a culmination of years of professional and personal upbringing and are deep-rooted. But organisational biases that create a false sense of accomplishment and feed on the inherent insecurity of individuals, need to be tackled.
Leadership workouts which recognise the need for a collaborative culture and harps on the fact that growth happens with the help of ‘all’ and not at the cost of someone. Engagement with Life coaches, psychotherapists who have a holistic approach to equip professionals with skills that can make them more emotionally resilient and better enabled to manage life. They can guide employees through corporate Atychiphobia (irrational and persistent fear of failure) and highlight when the situation turns out to be one of the medical emergencies for the employee.
Work-related stress when combined with the everyday strain of an increasingly complex society, can lead organizations to experience a drop in employee engagement, along with increases in absenteeism and/or employee turnover. Not only in the workplace, but even parenting, domestic challenges can also put an employee/individual under tremendous stress. Workshops or interventions can be designed to address conflict resolution, manage relationships, the art of parenting. Regular celebrations of accomplishments in a public forum (even if the scale of celebration is small), can bring in that smile and help create a workplace of happy employees.
Employees need to stay connected to support systems, be it at work or in personal circles. If required, they can be given access to organized support groups. When it comes to personal issues that employees would not feel comfortable sharing with supervisors / HR / any colleague due to reasons like confidentiality and fear of hampering personal image within a social circle, EAP (Employee Assistance programs) can be made use of. Sometimes, the promise of anonymity helps people open up about disturbing issues and make them more receptive to solutions. At times, they may move away from supportive family and friends, making outside sources of help increasingly necessary. Every individual has his/her own internal mechanism and inherent personality traits to deal with personal issues, but usually when the four quadrants of life – physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual are at equilibrium, handling pressure becomes easier.
