The Resilient Leader

CRESTCOM ON CULTIVATING RESILIENCE IN OUR COMMUNITIES, ORGANIZATIONS AND LEADERS OF TOMORROW

FACING ADVERSITY

The American Psychological Association defines resilience as “the process of adapting well in the face of adversity, trauma, tragedy, threats or significant sources of stress.” Research shows us that the need for resilience is more common than you might think. Dr. Meg Jay, author of Supernormal: The Untold Story of Adversity and Resilience, explains that studies show that up to 75% of people have experienced adversity before the age of 20 (2017,p.4). This statistic is quite shocking at first glance until you consider how common it is to experience illness, poverty, divorce, addiction, abuse, natural disasters, or loss of a loved one. These experiences shape our lives
and our worldviews. Throughout our lives, we all face some adversity. While we often talk about the extraordinary successes of leaders, we don’t usually talk about the many trials, tribulations and failures they experience along the way. However, leaders who have endured adversity are more likely to have the resolve needed to succeed. Moreover, many CEO’s believe that a person’s resilience level may determine their success more than other factors. That is true in the cancer ward, it’s true in the Olympics, and it’s true in the boardroom. The good news is that resilience is something that can be learned and developed. In fact, George Vaillant, the director of the Study of Adult Development at Harvard Medical School in Boston observed that within groups studied over a 60-year period, some people become markedly more resilient over time. (Coutu, D. 2002)

A CALL TO ACTION

Now more than ever we are in need of more resilient leaders . In her blog on Psychology Today, Madelyn Blair, Ph.D. states, “As the world around us moves, grows, and changes with increasing rapidity, the need for resilient leaders increases as well. There will always be a place for servant leaders and visionary leaders, but there is now a fundamental need for resilient leaders.” She also emphasizes that “With the near- constant volatility we experience from globalization, technological advances, terrorism, corruption, political upheaval, and generational interactions you would be hard-pressed to find an organization that was not repeatedly facing some form of adversity.”
One timely example is in Puerto Rico, where leaders are working hard to help the community not only recover from Hurricanes Irma and Maria but to use this opportunity to become stronger and thrive into the future.

Recently, Tammy R. Berberick, President and Chief Executive Officer of the world’s top leadership development company, Crestcom International, gave a conference on Resilient Leadership at the Inter- American University Metro Campus in Puerto Rico. During a speech at that conference, she explained that “resilience is not a trait that you are born with. It is more about what you do. A resilient leader is a person who can fail, learn, and recover quickly. They fail forward. They maintain a strong sense of direction and action during periods of high turbulence and loss. Adversity is our sameness, and it can help unite us all into productive action.” We must practice resilient leadership in all aspects of our lives as parents, as teachers, and as business and community leaders.

Businesses are also facing new challenges in managing their online reputations and dealing with security and data breaches that negatively affect their customers.
When a company’s reputation is on the line, it is vital for leadership to respond and recover quickly. For example, in 2013 Target was the victim of hackers that managed to steal information from about 40 million shoppers, including debit and credit card data. The security breach cost the company $148 million, and the CEO lost his job. However, the organization recovered under new leadership by learning quickly from their mistakes, making changes to the company and publishing them for the public. Target revamped their security and technology and is now at the same security level as banks. Thanks to the transparent communication and quick action of the leadership team, within two months of the data breach, Target’s stock had its largest percentage gain in the previous five years. By 2015, Target’s online sales had increased by 40%, demonstrating they had regained the trust of their customers. (A, 2017) If executives had thrown their hands up or played the victim; it could have easily been the beginning of the end for this store. Instead, they accepted their call to action; they faced their problems head-on and learned from their mistakes, which is a sign of a truly resilient organization. Target is now a stronger organization.

HOW DO WE DEVELOP RESILIENCY?

How do we develop resilience in our communities, organizations and leaders of tomorrow? In 2011, Tammy Berberick answered a call to action and set out to create and facilitate a leadership class at Florence Crittenton High School, a high school for teen mothers in Denver, Colorado. Her experiences and learnings there lead her to write the book, Teen Mom Prom, Transformation Through Practical Leadership, which provides practical and inspiring guidance for other teachers and facilitators who may teach young people who have been dismissed as failures. What she learned through her work with these young mothers was that there are three essential elements needed to help build resilience: reinstating a feeling of control, developing good habits and finding a sense of purpose.

The teen mothers came from various backgrounds, and more than half were daughters of teen mothers themselves. As they progressed through the leadership class, they faced adversities such as gang shootings, deaths, evictions, and health problems. In order to instill resilience in these students, Ms. Berberick knew she had to give them a sense
of control rather than letting them get stuck in a victim mindset. To prepare for this challenge, she grounded herself with knowledge by reading several studies about adolescents. In one such study, Self- Efficacy Beliefs of Adolescents, she discovered that “to strengthen resilience, people need to develop coping strategies...to reinstate control after setbacks”. To do this, they need to experience small wins and enjoy a sense of accomplishment. After experiencing small wins and boosting confidence, self-efficacy beliefsbecome a habit of thinking and can be developed like any other good habit. (Pajares & Urdan, 2017)

To help the students develop their leadership skills, Ms. Berberick needed to unite and excite the class in a shared project to complete. They decided to organize and host the school’s first prom for the students at Florence Crittenton. The book captures the essence of their personal growth as the project evolves and helps the reader better understand the importance of purpose on a personal level. The girls found that their pregnancies and/or children created a new reason and purpose for them to work hard to succeed. People must be vested in a meaningful purpose for their work, or it becomes too easy to give up when the going gets tough. As Pajares and Urdan explain, “A vision of a desired future helps to organize their lives, provides meaning to their activities, motivates them, and enables them to tolerate the hassles of getting there.” This is true not just for adolescents, but for all of us. Most researchers agree, finding meaning in one’s current environment is the way resilient people build bridges from hardships in the present to a better future. When the present becomes overwhelming, focusing on your vision and purpose can create meaning to keep you motivated enough to ultimately achieve your goals. (Coutu, D. 2002)

Good leaders have the ability to bounce back when faced with adversities, make necessary course corrections and then get back on track. They build this resilience by remembering that experiencing small wins boosts confidence and maintains motivation. They create these small wins by measuring progress, rather than absolute perfection. In the book Good to Great, Jim Collins shares the concept of “The Flywheel Effect” using a metaphor about making a heavy metal flywheel rotate on its axis for as fast and as long as possible. At first, it takes considerable effort to move the wheel even a small amount, but, as you keep pushing you eventually reach a breakthrough where momentum builds, and the wheel turns quickly with the same amount of effort. The breakthrough
is not achieved in one fell swoop or miraculous moment, but rather, it is the result of consistent effort and making progress one step at a time. (Collins, 2001, p.14) Measuring success in terms of continued progress towards a greater goal can create sustainable motivation and make it easier to bounce back from small setbacks. Therefore, Ms. Berberick empowered each student to build confidence in their own capability to perform by applying leadership principles to practical tasks that gave the students the opportunity to demonstrate accomplishments. This created a repetitive cycle of creating wins for each student and allowed them to regain control, develop leadership habits and find renewed purpose in their learning.

ARE YOU A RESILIENT LEADER?

In addition to the benefit of being able to bounce back from challenges, resilient leaders are also perceived more positively in their organizations. Joseph Folkman, President and Co-Founder of Zenger Folkman and renowned psychometrician, created an assessment that measured resilience along with several other leadership competencies. The evaluation used ratings from managers, peers, direct reports and others on 40 behaviors. They found that the most resilient leaders were also viewed as the most effective (see fig. 1).

When a leader is perceived as resilient and effective, their organizations become more resilient and effective. Whether you are teaching, parenting, or leading an organization, earning the confidence of those following you requires being very clear about your vision and goals. It is vital for a leader to understand their “why”. Having a clear purpose provides direction and creates energy along the journey.

A Bocconi University researcher, Nicola Belle found this to be true in an experiment to determine the effect of transformational leadership on job performance. In this study, they looked at a group of nurses whose job was to assemble surgical kits containing tools and medicine to be shipped to health practitioners in the area. While this is a tedious job, it is very important and failure to assemble them correctly could have life-altering consequences. For this experiment, the nurses were divided into groups. Some would get a standard training video, others would get additional information about why the program was important, and another group got that same training, but also met the doctors that would be using the tools and a former patient who benefited from the program. The results showed that the nurses who met the beneficiaries of their work (the doctors and patients who were using the kits) made 15% fewer errors and worked 64% longer than their peers. Simply seeing the real impact and importance of their work boosted the nurse’s resilience and motivated improved performance. (Bellis, 2016)

Leaders also model resilience by being mindful of their own attitude and communication style. These leaders stay focused on what they can learn in the face of adversity rather than focusing on the failure. Instead, they use it as a trigger to change course based on what they have learned. They maintain an attitude of abundance rather than scarcity. In The Art of Possibility, Ben Zander warns against falling into the habit of downward spiral talk. “Every industry or profession has its own version of downward spiral talk, as does every relationship. Focusing on the abstraction of scarcity, downward spiral talk creates an unassailable story about limits to what is possible, and tells us compellingly how things are going from bad to worse.”(Zander p.108) He explains further that the more you focus attention on obstacles and problems, the more they will seem to grow and multiply. Resilient leaders focus on “speaking in possibility”, rather than speaking out of a place of fear and scarcity . A resilient leader “...carries the distinction that it is the framework of fear and scarcity, not scarcity itself that promotes divisions between people... This leader calls upon our passion rather than our fear. She is the relentless architect of the possibility that human beings can be.” (Zander, p.63) However, we should not confuse this with being overly optimistic. Staying focused on the possibilities for solutions or changes means you must first face the reality of your current situation. While Jim Collins was researching his book Good to Great, he assumed that he would find out that resilient companies were filled with optimistic people. He found that not to be true at all. He discovered that resilient people “have very sober and down-to-earth views of those parts of reality that matter for survival...for bigger challenges... a sense of reality is far more important.”(Coutu, D. 2002)

A good leader will also entertain and engage people. They aren’t afraid to change things up and involve their employees, in order to make everything a learning experience. Resilient leadership occurs when people can bring others along. Effective communication is vital to keeping employees engaged in times of adversity. In The Leadership Habit, the authors explain that “organizational goals are achieved by leaders with the ability to influence and persuade others to do something, believe something, feel something, or learn something necessary for completing objectives. Through their level of ability to influence others, leaders either hold an organization together or propel it forward or they do not.” (Berberick, Lindsay, Fritchen, 2017 p.33) Leaders must also be a coach and a role model by promotingearning, encouraging questions and being a good listener. Through this kind of coaching, employees (or students, or children) are encouraged to determine their own solutions to problems. That experience develops resourcefulness and builds confidence which leads to better job performance. Resilient leaders must also demonstrate both empathy and accountability with a balanced approach. While it is vital for people to feel understood and heard it is also important as a leader to avoid becoming enmeshed in their personal challenges. It is helpful to be able to put yourself in your employee’s shoes, but they should still be held accountable for their responsibilities. Encouraging people to find ways to meet their responsibilities despite bumps in the road helps foster their resilience.

Resilience comes from within us, but like a muscle, it gets stronger when used. In the face of adversity, we all have a choice about how to move forward. Good leaders not only demonstrate resilience themselves, but they also cultivate in others. Everyone faces difficulty, but a real leader views it as an opportunity to learn, grow and get stronger. In today’s ever- changing world, we need more resilient leaders to answer the call and help our communities, organizations and future leaders develop the skills they need to thrive when facing the challenges of the future.

REFERENCES:

A. (2017, May 21) 5 Companies Who Had Their Reputation Damaged and Bounced Back. Retrieved June 7, 2018, from https://profiledefenders.com/blog/5-companies-who-had-their-reputation-damaged-and-bounced-back/

Bellis, R. (2016, February 12). 3 Simple Yet Effective Ways to Teach Team Resilience. Retrieved June 6, 2018, from https://www.fastcompany.com/3056635/3-leadership-strategies-for-building-more-resilient-teams

Berberick, Tammy Rivera. 2012 Teen Mom Prom: Transformation Through Practical Leadership. Camp Hill, PA: Sunbury Press, Inc.

Berberick, T. R., Lindsay, P., & Fritchen, K. (2017). The Leadership Habit: Transforming Behaviors to Drive Results. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley.

Blair, Madelyn (2016, Sept. 14) This Simple Leadership Behavior Also Increases Resilience: What you may already be doing that is helping to grow your resilience. Retrieved on June 6, 2018, from https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/resilient-leadership/201609/simple-leadership-behavior-also-increases-resilience

Collins, J. C. (2001). Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap ... and Others Don’t. New York, NY: Harper Business.

Coutu, D. (2002, May). How Resilience Works. Harvard Business Review. Retrieved June 6, 2018, from https://hbr.org/2002/05/how-resilience-works

Folkman, J. (2017, April 06). New Research: 7 Ways to Become a More Resilient Leader. Re- trieved June 6, 2018, from https://www.forbes.com/sites/joefolkman/2017/04/06/new-research-7-ways-to-become-a-more-resilient-leader/#3fe9032c7a0c

Jay, Meg. 2017 Supernormal: The Untold Story of Adversity and Resilience. New York, NY: Twelve, Hachette Book Group

Pajares, F., & Urdan, T. C. (2007). Self-Efficacy Beliefs of Adolescents. Greenwich (Conn.): Information age.

The Road to Resilience. (n.d.). Retrieved June 6, 2018, from http://www.apa.org/helpcenter/road-resilience.aspx

Zander, R.S., Zander, B. (2000) The Art of Possibility. Boston, Mass: Harvard Business School Press

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