The easing of lockdown presents the prospect of life returning to normal. For many, this will not be straightforward and some will require additional support. The mental health charity Mind has reported that 60% of adults reported a worsening of their mental health during lockdown. At the same time employees are frequently unwilling to share their concerns about their mental health with their employers. So, whether we are acting as individuals or employers, how can we enhance our resilience, coping and positivity?

A recent study describes how linking flow with goal setting can have a positive impact on the prevalence of anxiety levels at work.

Flow
In the 1970s psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi coined the idea of ‘Flow’. During initial studies of creative people (e.g. painters and musicians) he observed that they were engaged in their activities without any focus on external rewards and seemed motivated to carry out their activity purely for the sake of it. In the process they described being so absorbed in what they were doing that they lost sense of time passing or the environment around them. This became known as ‘Flow’ as people described the experience as like “being carried along on a stream of water”. In the years since, flow has been extensively studied and experienced by people in a wide range of activities.

Flow is associated with higher job performance, greater job satisfaction, positive mood, increased coping and enhanced job engagement. It is negatively related to burnout and anxiety. For example, being in a flow state has been shown to be associated with reduced cortisol levels (a stress hormone). Facilitating states of flow therefore can be effective in boosting and maintaining resilience and positivity.

Flow occurs when the degree of challenge in a task is slightly higher than the level of skill at hand.
 
Goal setting
Adding in focused goal setting appears to help us achieve a state of flow. Goals need to be SMART (i.e. specific, measurable, attainable, relevant and time bound) and the study's researchers place particular emphasis upon the goals needing to be both achievable and challenging. Adding in nudges throughout the day, can help us to keep focused on them.
 
Nudges
Nudges are light touch, timely prompts we can use to encourage us to make beneficial choices which we might otherwise not make. Setting our own goals (self-leadership) sees us taking an active rather than a passive stance and appears to boost our experience of flow at work. Active stances are known to be helpful in maintaining resilience and overcoming anxiety. (As the old saying goes “action is the antidote to despair”)
 
In the study, the researchers asked the participants to set three SMART goals each day with a daily text prompt each morning. They were then sent nudges by text message through the day to nudge them into setting/working on their goals. At the end of the study they found  that this group of participants was significantly more likely to experience a state of flow than those who didn’t use this technique, and that this group self-reported improvements in their daily work performance, daily stress, and work engagement.

There are limitations with this study, as with most: it was a preliminary study with a fairly small group of participants (317) who were self-reporting the results, but it nicely included three distinct areas (flow, goal setting and nudges) for which there is a fair degree of support.

So, might it be something you want to try out for yourself?

They key steps are:

1. Apply this to each workday for several weeks (but not non-working days)
2. Each morning before getting started with work, identify three SMART goals you will set yourself for that day. They must be challenging but not overwhelming such that you can accomplish each one that day. Write these out as “Today I will… “ for each goal. For example, saying “Today I will make sales calls” is not a SMART goal but “Today I will make 10 sales calls to prospects who attended last Thursday’s webinar” is.
3. Using your smart phone (or other smart device) set up 3-4 automated task reminders, to run periodically through each working day, nudging you to check (a) what you are working on now and (b) to set (or focus on) your next SMART goal.
4. At the end of the two week period check in with yourself – overall do you feel that you have been more productive, less stressed and more engaged with work?

If you do try this out for yourself or your team, we’d be interested to see how it went and how you found it. Do get in touch to share your experience and if you have found other approaches that have been helpful we’d love to hear about those too - email enquiries@managingchange.org.uk or call 01223 655667.

For the full study see Nudging flow through ‘SMART’ goal setting to decrease stress, increase engagement, and increase performance at work, by Jared Weintraub, David Cassell and Thomas P. DePatie in the Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology, Special Issue Paper, 2021 

The last nine weeks have been a challenging time of uncertainty, isolation and anxiety. We have all had to adjust to new ways of living and working without knowing when this will all end and what life post-coronavirus will look like. 

For a lot of people, this means now working from home. This brings a different set of challenges, and we were curious about how people have experienced this situation and keen to understand how to best shape our coaching and support to help. A couple of weeks ago we asked people to tell us about their experience of working at home during the pandemic. 

What we found most interesting in the responses was that people were not overly challenged by technology or the logistics of working from home. What they did find particularly challenging were the more emotional aspects. We asked what respondents found to be the top 3 biggest challenges in working from home. Just 9% included poor internet connectivity as a problem. The top challenges were:
            1: general anxiety about the impact of coronavirus on my life (54% mentioned this)
            2: difficulties communicating with co-workers (45%)
          =3: social isolation (36%)
          =3: being motivated to keep a regular schedule (36%)

Others included:

• too many distractions at home
• childcare
• fear of the return to work

Interestingly, despite these being listed as common challenges, 91% of people considered that they could continue comfortably working from home with their current arrangements for three months or more. Given that the most commonly given concerns were job security, redundancy and the return to work, this is a curious finding. One possible interpretation is that the current lockdown situation has created a sense of psychological safety for people which might, for some, postpone having to confront the reality of the post-coronavirus world.  This is an area we'll be looking at further.

These have been fascinating insights for us to consider as we continue to develop our programmes to support people in the workplace. Specifically, we have shaped a new resilience programme to incorporate these findings, which we are particularly excited about.  The new programme will help people find strategies to bolster social connection, develop their realistic optimism responses and manage effective transitions to the world, post-coronavirus.
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You can see the results of our survey here.

​Managing Change provide specialist coaching and development programmes in resilience and well-being throughout the UK. For more information about how we can help you support your people, do get in touch - e: enquiries@managingchange.org.uk or call us.

​If you would like to take part in the ongoing survey series or wish to share it, the link is here.  And we're always interested in your experiences, so please do leave your comments below.

If you have ever made the move from an operational, management role to a more strategic, leadership one, or know someone who has, you'll know that this can be a challenging and stressful time. Not least because the context and expectations are new and there is a strong desire to be successful. 

One of the most common challenges involves getting to grips with the new role (and everything that entails) with a lack of resources and time. These two factors are commonly cited as key pinch points and they frequently result in heightened stress and poor work-home balance. A senior executive recently promoted to a Board level position described the feeling as being like trying to cling onto a bucking bronco without falling off. It's not a fun position to be in and when the situation continues for some time it starts to take its toll on health, family and general performance.

One senior leader told me that he was seriously starting to question whether he should even be in the role as he felt so out of control, and another said that she was thinking of resigning before others started to realise she wasn't up to the job. Confidence takes a severe knock when this starts to happen and can be slow to rebuild. 

In the examples given all three leaders were aware that they were stressed and struggling and this had led to their request for coaching. Sometimes leaders lack that self-awareness but their behaviour  indicates to others that an intervention would be helpful. Unfortunately these behaviours are sometimes self-destructive and/or harmful to others. 

Stress is considered to come from the interaction between the person's environment or situation and their response to it, and usually results in a feeling of an inability to cope.  ​As coaching psychologists and coaches with appropriate psychological training, we are able to apply a sound assessment of executive stress using established protocols. This quickly enables the coach and executive to understand the degree and nature of stress being experienced and to assess its change over time. If you, or someone you know, is in this situation you might, for example, experience changes in sleep or eating patterns, changes in concentration and memory, feeling flat or over-emotional, or becoming detached from people around you. Assessing these signs can provide a good baseline from which to begin steps to address the situation.

Coaching to address executive (and other forms of) stress will seek to explore both the situation (what is going on) and the person's response to, or perception of, it. This helps them make changes to their situation, adjust their responses to it, and usually do both. The wider goal, to regain a reasonable sense of control and perspective of the situation, helps to alleviate stress and rebuild confidence.

​Lack of resources and limited time are, unfortunately, increasingly common features of organisational life. Yet interestingly, on average, levels of stress decrease the more senior you are. This is thought to be largely because these more senior positions involve greater control, which is associated with reduced stress. So a key part of the transition into a more senior role is getting the right perspective and skills in appraising your situation and responding to it.  This might include looking at skills and attitudes to work and workload, managing time, planning and prioritisation, assertiveness, structured thinking skills, and so on.

​Anticipating and preparing for that promotion might be the best time to acquire the skills and insights to avoid these traps ahead. For example those whose previous careers have been defined by working very long hours can quickly find that they've reached the limit of hours available; those who have prospered by being willing and saying yes to every opportunity now find that that overwhelming desire to please is unsustainable; those who have enjoyed firefighting and reacting quickly to events now find that they need to delegate those bits of the job they enjoyed most. These features are often tied in with core values such as working hard, a need to be liked and fear of failure. An effective coaching programme will often involve exploring these values and core beliefs and identifying where they are now outdated or unhelpful and in need of updating.

Changing perspectives in this way can be a difficult but valuable component of the work involved in developing a clear and successful leader identity. Developing our own strategies to mitigate stress can be hugely valuable in creating a flourishing and sustainable career.

#NewLeaders

Practicing some form of meditation, like mindfulness, is super fashionable now. It is considered by some to be as necessary to them as their daily workout. But is this yet another example of an over hyped trend or is there real benefit?

Mindfulness (and similar) meditation is a Buddhist-inspired practice that trains people to focus their mind on their experience (such as sounds, feelings, thoughts) in the current moment and to be fully present and aware. This usually involves a quiet space, breathing routines, relaxation and so on. People are often encouraged to develop a daily practice working either on their own or following guided meditations via phone apps or audio.

What is the evidence for the benefits and applications of meditation?

Practices such as mindfulness meditation have been found to provide moderate benefits in reducing pain, depression, anxiety, insomnia and stress in some studies. However many scientists remain concerned at what they consider to be the overblown hype around mindfulness given the limited studies and evidence to support it. In 2014 a group of scientists led by psychologist Nicholas Van Dam looked at these previous studies, collectively including over 3,500 participants, and found essentially no evidence for benefits related to enhancing attention, aiding sleep or controlling weight. This does not suggest that the practice is necessarily ineffective but that there is as yet little supporting evidence as to the benefits or applications.

Mindfulness in the workplace

Here’s where the effectiveness of the practice gets even more sketchy. The hype around it confidently says that mindfulness meditation will help with resilience, rational thinking, job satisfaction, clarity of thought, etc. It is hard to disassociate these claims with the increasingly lucrative market in promoting apps and books about it (a market valued in 2017 as worth $1 billion in the US alone). American behavioural scientists Kathleen D. Vohs and Andrew C. Hafenbrack recently wrote about the unintended negative consequences of mindfulness use in the workplace. Their studies suggest that the sense of calm achieved by mindfulness practice actually reduces motivation at work.   

Keep an open, but sceptical, mind

“Overall, I suspect that a large number of the health promises will not be fulfilled, mostly because therapies, phone apps and other interventions are being rushed to market without sufficiently rigorous testing and appropriate implementation,” Van Dam says. “But given what we’ve seen to date, I suspect evidence may accumulate supporting mindfulness practices for anxiety, depression and stress-related conditions.”

Many of us at Managing Change find mindfulness practice beneficial and will continue with it. We won't be recommending it for spurious purposes or overblown benefits though!

Julia is referred to us as she is frequently in tears in the office...

Hugh is referred to us as he has been flying off the handle for no apparent reason...

Azaria has been referred to us as she feels she can no longer cope with work...

We are witnessing a perplexing, troubling but growing trend in our practice,  encountering people who are struggling to cope with everyday life and who experience stress and anxiety to a debilitating degree. What was an occasional feature in coaching assignments fifteen or so years ago has now become an almost frequent occurrence. And these are just those whose employers are sufficiently concerned to seek help.