Leadership can be hard. And thankless.
Through the pandemic, employees have turned to their company's leaders to maintain brevity, strength, and a level head. They have been exasperated by the ever-changing world that we are all living in. And they have relied on us, even though we are living in the same world as they are.
In the past weeks, our team has had uncountable questions about how to keep employees motivated when all the team wants to do is follow what is happening in Ukraine. Many business owners have asked us how they can hide their own concerns about the building situation to keep productivity up. To these questions, we have two answers:
Kindness.
Don't.
As business leaders, we are powerless against the constant onslaught of news and how it is affecting productivity. Your team will want to check their phones for current updates, and they will want to talk about it with their co-workers. Trying to stop this conversation and concern will turn you into an enemy.
Instead, try kindness. Ask your team how they are feeling about the crisis in Ukraine. Share your own feelings and concerns. Provide them with reputable sources of information to help them learn more about the situation. And give them a chance to take a break if they get too overwhelmed. Allostatic load (something we'll talk about in a future post), or the cumulative effect of stress, is amplified during times of stress. Sometimes, an extra 15-minute break can help them to clear their minds.
Your team probably won't thank you for your kindness, or your willingness to share your concerns. But, you will boost your culture and your team's respect for you without even trying.
Another way you can help your team: offer to donate a share of profits to helping Ukraine in a way that is meaningful to you and your team. For example, our team decided today that we will donate 50% of our profits from this week to Nova Ukraine, an organization providing humanitarian aid to vulnerable groups in Ukraine. Such a gesture can help the team find meaning in their work in a stressful time.
We don't need to suppress our team's feelings. Giving them a way to cope with them is far more important and helpful to them.