How do you keep people calm when work is pure chaos and the stress levels are high?

The good news is that you are not alone.  Almost all organizations seem to be experiencing extreme change.  The bad news is that knowing this probably does not make you feel any better.

For most people, change means uncertainty and stress.  As the stress intensifies, we become more uncomfortable. While you may not be able to do much about the change, you can act on the stress.  Here are three general approaches that will help you deal with the change.

• Gather information. While much may be unknown, one strategy is to uncover as much of the mystery as possible.  Most people want to know four things.  (1)  Why are we changing?  (2)  What does the change look like?  (3)  How will things work leading up to and after the change?  (4)  What do I need to do?  If you lead a team, share as much as you can.  If you are a team member, keep your eyes and ears open, and start asking questions.

• Take action. During change, much of the stress comes from the feeling of being out of control.  Find things that you do control and take action.  Serving your customers, improving the way you do your work, and jumping on board with the implementation will help you regain your sense of control.

• Practice effective coping. Sometimes you will be in the dark, and you will not have reasonable options.  In these cases, coping is your best strategy.  Take care of your body.  Take your mind off the situation by engaging in hobbies or other fun pursuits.  Use your support system to discuss your concerns.  Be good to yourself.

You can’t keep things from changing, but you can manage your way through it.  Pick your strategy and go for it.

Sometimes they tell me directly. Often it’s more indirect. For example, when doing workshops on managing stress, I usually talk about the importance of taking regular breaks. Oddly, my suggestion is typically met with laughter. Who would guess that the idea of regular breaks would be a laugh line?

When working with your staff I tell them that their managers are programmed to keep asking for more. That’s just what they do. I also suggest that if those managers are not being reasonable in their requests, it’s the employee’s job to respectfully raise the concern. In my experience, less than half of your team will actually say something to you.

Do you want to be an exceptional leader? When assigning work start proactively checking in with individuals to make sure you aren’t pushing too hard. While you might live to work, that doesn’t mean everyone else does too. And while pushing a bit is not a big deal, pushing hard over extended periods almost always creates serious problems that would be best to avoid.

Here are some things you can say and do that will help ensure you don’t inadvertently push people past their limits.

• Pay attention to signs of stress and inquire about the causes when you notice it. Once discovered, work with employees to remedy the situation.
• Say the following, “I don’t always know when I’ve asked too much of you, so please let me know if I do.” This is a message worth repeating on a regular basis.
• When assigning a task you might ask, “Is this doable considering everything else that’s on your plate right now?”
• Communicate priorities daily, especially if they shift frequently. Let your staff know that as the priorities change, they should adjust the tasks you’ve given them to align with the current priority. Offer to help re-prioritize those to-do lists if team members aren’t clear about how to do so.
• In those (hopefully rare) instances when you know you are pushing people too hard, give people a chance to recuperate afterwards. Also make sure to show your appreciation for their extra effort and make it clear that level of expectation was an exception and not the rule.

While employees are ultimately responsible for managing their own work level, many aren’t comfortable pushing back when too much is being asked of them. Help make it easier for them to speak up in order to head off future burn-out and morale problems.

Photo by Montage Communications

So what’s a good way to deal with this?  First of all you’ve got to help the team acknowledge the situation.  People won’t change a thing if they don’t recognize something needs changing. In a meeting, say something like “Everyone seems a little edgy these days.  What’s going on?”

Second, talking and listening helps.  If the group is cranky, create some space for people to express themselves.  The simple act of blowing off some steam can be quite cleansing for teams. Of course before anyone is honest about what they are feeling, there will need to be some foundational levels of trust already in place. One thing to avoid is dismissing the feelings of the first person who decides to speak up.

At some point you need to engage the group in a conversation about whether the symptoms indicate a real problem that must be addressed or rather a bad alignment of the stars which will pass on its own.  If there’s a problem creating the crankiness, your job is to help the group focus its energy on dealing with it.

The alternative to the actions outlined above is the do-nothing approach.  While this might work in rare circumstances, it usually does not.  A cranky team needs help.  So jump in and do what you can.

Photo by bareknuckleyellow

Resentment and fear don’t help people stay on their best behavior.  Effective teamwork requires great communication, mutual respect, support, and accountability.  Hard times create an environment where gossip, backstabbing, blaming, and team members protecting their backsides are all too common.

So what can you do to keep your team together when times are tough?  Here are several strategies that will help.

1. Share what you know.  Some team leaders try to protect people from the truth because they assume it will make folks more nervous.  People are smart enough to know when things aren’t great.  If you don’t tell them everything you know, they will start making up their own versions of the truth, and their versions will likely be quite a bit worse than what it actually is.  Be honest and forthcoming.
2. Lighten up on the goals.  If the conditions make it impossible to meet goals, neither cheer-leading nor demanding is going to change the fact that it isn’t going to happen.  You may want to back off on the performance expectations for a particular goal or take one or two goals off the table altogether, allowing the team to focus on what is achievable under the circumstances.
3. Keep a lookout for people who are stirring the pot.  Let’s face it, when things get tough there are some people who handle it better than others.  If you know people who are creating more fear within the team, it’s time to provide them with some extra support so that you minimize the damage they cause.  Remember to help them work through their concerns rather than threatening them.  The latter will only create more unproductive behavior that will be harder to discover as they take their concerns underground.
4. Use slow times for team development.  When things are booming we don’t do development work because everyone is too busy.  If things are slow, it’s the perfect time to do some skill development that will strengthen your group’s teamwork.  Three topics that can always help are communication, conflict management, and change management.  Check out some of these workshop ideas.  Invest in your team’s future.
5. Provide a good example.  You certainly don’t want to strut around wearing rose-colored glasses.  People will think you are either manipulative or clueless.  But you can stay positive, focus on the work at hand, and remain optimistic about the future.  People look to their leaders for cues about how they are supposed to respond.  Model the behaviors you want to see.

If the economic conditions are affecting your team, don’t wait until things improve, take action now. If you need help with a specific issue, contact us so that we can discuss some of the team building services that might improve the situation.

Workplace stress levels seem to be at all time highs. With budgets slashed and staffing levels cut; many people have too much to do and not enough time to get it all done.

When stress levels go up, teamwork often heads in the other direction. Stress affects us in a variety of ways. It saps our energy, changes our moods, and messes with our concentration. Instead of supporting each other, we start snapping at our teammates. Bad behavior wears on relationships.

While stress does create a lot of problems in organizations, it doesn’t necessarily have to. How do I know? Because there are plenty examples where two people can be in the exact same circumstances, one deals with it while the other melts down. This same phenomenon shows up when examining whole departments and even organizations. Some remain effective during tough times and others don’t.

Learning to manage our stress and applying what we learn is part of being an effective team member. One might also say it’s part of being an adult. I do a lot of stress management workshops, and share with people the same strategies that others before me have shared. The information isn’t new. The problem is that we don’t apply it. Which of these strategies might you make use of in your team?

• Use diversion. If you aren’t thinking about the stressors in your life, they won’t affect you. So one popular and relatively easy strategy is to distract yourself by watching a movie, playing with your kids, or diving into your favorite hobby. Taking your mind off the problem for awhile isn’t a long term fix, but it’s a great way to give your body and mind a break.
• Straighten out your thinking. Stress isn’t a result of what happens to us; it’s a result of the story we tell ourselves about what happens to us. Sometimes those stories are pretty incredible. They don’t represent reality and aren’t helpful. Make sure the stories you tell yourself make sense. The power of positive thinking really is…well…powerful.
• Solve the problem. Most of the things that cause stress in our lives can be defined as problems. The best way I know to remove stress is to solve the problem that’s creating it. Life is full of problems. Instead of worrying about them, why not take action? Think about those times where you gave more energy to worrying about the problem than you gave to actually solving it. That’s what I call wasted energy.

Stress really can mess up our relationships and teamwork. If you notice it taking a toll on yours, revisit the three strategies and put one or more of them to work for you.