At our h³ 'board meeting' this week, we reflected on the word resilience and its problems as a concept - if it means ‘how can we ask people to carry more, further, with less?’, it shifts the problem from company to employee and merely creates ‘burnout debt’.
A more helpful way to think of resilience might be, ‘how do we build the conditions that keep people healthy, safe and strong in the face of extraordinary challenge and uncertainty?’.
McKinsey recently suggested that four ‘disproportions’ are present in companies with resilient, healthy businesses and teams, all of which are predominantly cultural, behavioural and within reach of every leader to some extent:
- Clearer goals and strategy
- Greater empowerment of small teams
- More widespread use of coaching and recognition
- More effective adoption of collaboration tools
Uncertainty is an energy suck in all kinds of ways, and the last 18 months have been nothing if not uncertain.
What can you do to create clarity, collaboration and empowered teams?
And how could you be using coaching in your business and leadership practice (for yourself as well as for your people)?