5 "real myths" about work & wellbeing

It is easier to talk about sex these days than wellbeing at the workplace.

(Summary of article at the end if you are in a rush).

When it comes to a startup, scaleup, small business and/or a remote team, the situation takes a back seat to a number of other priorities - the big ones being survival and growth.

If a founder has some spare budget, it would go first into growing the company than talking fluff about mental wellbeing.

During the lockdown, I was speaking to a few founders, 3 of whom had lost investors due to the pandemic. Two of them were freaking out. While the third one didn't. I wondered why.

It was still pandemic with a second lockdown and the third founder successfully raised funds from new investors. It was time for a phone call to him.

"How could you raise funds after the last debacle, and with the pandemic still on?"

"I don't know", he replied. "I just kept going".

"But so did the other two", I countered, referring to the conversation we had a few months ago.

There was a pause.

"Maybe they kept going on but freaked out more than me", he chuckled.

"Yes, that's true. What made you keep your cool when you know that investors pulled out?"

"Again I don't know. Perhaps, being a long distance swimmer and runner, I learned how to hold on calmly. If I freak out, I lose oxygen, energy or whatever happens scientifically when freaking out. If I lose that, I would stop swimming/running midway and have an early 'death' so to say?", he said with another chuckle. "Constantly trying to come back to a calm readiness helped me look for new investors who were also looking for good companies during the pandemic - and it worked!". I could feel his relief and happiness.

"Instead of freaking out, constantly trying to come back to a calm readiness helped me look for new investors and get funding during pandemic." - quote from an interview with the one of the 3 founders who survived a tough period.

What do you say about that from the perspective of survival and growth? This particular founder faced the same issues as many others. He did freak out but he kept coming back to calm readiness, he said.

"I learned to breathe as a long distance swimmer and runner. If I freak out, I drown faster." Oxygen is similar to money for your company. Are you breathing well or freaking out until a quicker demise?

Here are 5 myths and bluffs about wellbeing:

Myth 1: "Raising money and growing customers is more important than fluff about wellbeing".

Growing without concern for your and your team's wellbeing is like climbing a greasy pole. You try something and you grow but you keep slipping back when things go down.

Of the 5k+ interviews with founders, investors and team members in fast-moving teams, above 90% agreed that having a method to come back to calm readiness helped them overcome a number of crises in their journey. Personal and professional.

As humans, it is natural to freak out but we should have a means to come to a state that helps us do something about it.

Freaking out for a long time is not going to solve your problem, get yourself heard, get money or customers - freaking out in the long run simply uses up whatever remaining energy/money you have and speeds up the downfall.

Investors, like any predator (for the lack of a better word in this context), can smell fear.

Investors can smell fear!

When you stand calm, even a predator will respect your boundary and you. They wait to see your next move and act accordingly.

Myth 2: What's the RoI? It's difficult to measure wellbeing and the impact of measures taken for wellbeing.

Time to throw some numbers from my survey and research.

The links for some of these sources are are available on request so that you don't jump away to those sites - LinkedIn wants you to stay on reading this article - thank you!

• Caring about wellbeing increases engagement that leads to 21% improvement in profitability.
• Mental health issues cost the UK economy ￡99B (Billion with a capital B) a year. General anxiety and depression lead to 300,000 job losses a year. In the US, disengaged employees (who have a direct link with wellbeing initiatives), cost the economy higher than $550B.
• Listening to employees and caring for their wellbeing increases likeliness to perform better by 4.6 times.
• 6 in 10 employees feel burned out globally - this stat is higher during the pandemic, during remote working with children / parents / patients at home, and more for startups and small businesses than larger companies.

Like the example I shared in the previous point, the founder who had a way to keep coming back to a state of calm readiness, even after freaking out, found new investors and kept the business growing while many others fell to the ground.

Does this convince you about the RoI? On top of these 'past' surveys and studies, I have also engaged in research that are ongoing, and especially funded by investors for their portfolio founders. We have solid tools and data to measure the impact of wellbeing measures in the company, on a continuous basis. This is no more fluff.

You care for your wellbeing, your team's wellbeing and watch the company grow during both good and not so good times.

Myth 3: 'Mental' wellbeing is a taboo topic. Aka: Anxiety is a bad thing. Aka: If I share about feeling even a bit anxious, I will be stigmatised.

There is an unspoken stigma about anxiety in our workplaces. People laugh about it or show off how strong they are. But more painfully, people don't talk about it. Like I said at the beginning, people talk more easily about their sex lives than about something that is giving them sleepless nights.

In many of the interviews, founders and team members shared how words spreads in the workplace about them being unwell. Soon they are getting 'Oh Dear' looks, opportunities are missed, gossips increase - why not keep it a secret and keep struggling.

There is an emotional trigger to the word 'mental'. This is worsened by the way a 'mental' person is shown in movies. Remember, television and movies (yes, includes the likes of Netflix), often show an extreme and/or sarcastic version of a mental person - that helps them get you focused for 2 hours on the movie!

Normal life has infinite paper cuts - we see small issues about mental wellbeing, that create small levels of stress and anxiety, and instead build up to a monster issue when not addressed.

Most people do not know how to respond to someone else's anxiety without getting anxious themselves to some extent. This worsens while the person is waiting on outputs with a tight deadline and this topic is another task in their list that will delay things further. Its not a good feeling for either side but ignoring to talk about it or resolving the issue simply delays the problem.

I was watching an interview recording (with permission) where a team member was sharing their thoughts on the project with their manager. As soon as they shared how they felt anxious and stressed about a specific topic, the manager replied with various versions of the following phrase: "Its part of the job! Get on with it."

I then spoke with an investor who cares about wellbeing and asked him about his response on a similar situation (without showing him this video). This person had lost something significant to being unwell. He empathised with the team member in the video and said, "I keep about 15 minutes to spare to check on these topics before they become a performance issue."

84% of responses from founders and investors interviewed agreed that 'Anxiety is a taboo topic at workplace' and 99% of those responders agreed that they 'Anxiety is a normal part of life' (not a bad thing).

Here comes the interesting part from these interviews: Anxious people actually perform better because they are worried about the end result. This is the subconscious motive behind old-school managers when they create extreme urgency for a task so that the employee gets it done at the earliest. (How many times have you seen that the task was not as urgent at all?).

Anxious people actually perform better because they are worried about the end result. They are worried about being stigmatised as under-performers. Old-style managers create anxious situations (fake urgencies) to get better performance. Not helpful in the long run.

An ex-colleague gave an example where her manager asked her to prepare a report as soon as possible, with hourly reminders, for a meeting that he knew was cancelled - reminds me of Dilbert explaining his day to his mum.

Source credit: https://dilbert.com/strip/1997-07-20

This does not mean that you have to create anxiety to get better results. You will have burnt-out team members who are simply sticking to the role until they find something better (and believe you me, they will).

Myth 4: Good Leaders cannot or do not have anxiety. Good leaders always have wellbeing. Highly paid staff have less wellbeing issues.

Oh yes, I can hear the chuckle from the room when I first shared this point in a workshop. One comment in the audience was, "Does Elon Musk or Mark Zuckerberg never have a bad day?" On the contrary, we hear numerous stories about how 'crazy' leaders can be - and there are 'good crazy' and 'the other kind of crazy' leaders.

"Does Elon Musk or Mark Zuckerberg never have a bad day?" !!

Good leaders have been compared to, for the lack of a better example here, to a duck swimming in the water where you see a calm exterior but underneath you have frantic paddling with their feet.

Good leaders have more reasons to be anxious - yet, they process it to their benefit.

Being industrious or hard-working is not about anxiety.

What good leaders do is they process their anxiety and those of others in the team. Part of processing such anxiety is to acknowledge that general anxiety is a part of life. Once they know this, they can even prevent general anxiety before it occurs. And if it occurs, they have methods to manage, calm down and come to a 'ready state'.

Related myth: Anxious people are always with low confidence.

This is not always true. You will be surprised that at times, anxiety increases confidence depending on the task. However, it is not a healthy way of increasing confidence but a fear-driven method.

To maintain their secret and with the fear of being stigmatised, an anxious person keeps on performing to the very best even while struggling.

It is short-term burst but in the long run, anxious people burn out trying to keep up to their own standards.

Secondly, confidence has its own blindspots. I have met a leader who was very confident in the boardroom but never confident when doing annual reviews for her team. We all have blindspots to work on.

Related myth: Anxious people should avoid stress and only given small tasks - and are a weakness in the team.

Engaging in work keeps the negative self talk away. Giving less work to them makes the issues worse in the long run. This borders and often spills to discrimination.

People who need to be heard about their wellbeing issues are an asset to the team - they are struggling to perform and can amplify their performance multiple times (4.6 times from studies) when listened to in a genuine manner.

Work engages internal thinking.

In some cases, someone struggling with personal wellbeing may be using work as a place to vent or cope with their life. If you give them silly work or a day off (see my next point), it does not help.

The worst thing a person with general anxiety hears is a "Oh dear..." expression filled with pity. People who understand general anxiety are empathetic and respectful instead of pitying the person. Pitying the person creates and increases the stigma around anxiety and wellbeing in the workplace. It makes the person feel helpless.

Side myth: Increasing salary improves wellbeing and reduces anxiety!

You wish.

I can already hear the whistling in the audience. Money can temporarily solve these situations up to a certain extent beyond which, the situation is simply amplified if the root cause is not being taken care of. This is a topic that takes a whole afternoon in wellbeing workshops.

Money gives a nice buffer to enjoy things. If our wellbeing is affected by our beliefs and surroundings affecting us, money is not solving the situation yet.

If money can be used as a solving factor instead of delaying agent, it definitely helps improve wellbeing.

Money is a catalyst to situations. When the root cause continues, higher money can lead to higher anxiety. But lower money does not lower anxiety! Strange equation - its not as simple.

Myth 5: Giving a wellness day away helps reduce anxiety in the team and improve wellbeing.

Away days (especially with remote working these days) again can be a delay factor with no opportunity to talk to someone.

I had a colleague who took a special day off for his haircut, not just because he needed one, but more because his barber was a great listener and he used this as a talking session! I have another investor friend who uses a golf day once in a while to talk to friends.

Even though they are named as wellness days, personal days or away days, and even if they are quite popular, like money, they can be a delaying factor. Involve people interacting with people.

People who have issues with wellbeing need a non-judgemental listener. Talking with someone is far more helpful than having a personal day off, away from people and alone with your thoughts.

Spa days, gym memberships, social events such as bowling and dinner, etc are really useful to a certain extent. They are more useful when done in a group of cross-functional members so that they do not end up discussing project goals when bowling.

Gym membership or a restaurant pass is more useful for improving wellbeing than a personal day off.

While these days have been proven to help relax, I have asked a number of people the same question - what would help you go towards wellbeing? The surprising answer is: have a good chat with someone. This comes from men too. They might prefer is over a beer or a gold course. But talking leads to sharing in some manner (men don't call it sharing, they'd rather call it banter!).

Sharing leads to different perspectives.

Summary

Here is a summary of the myths we spoke about. Read above to see the facts about them, and solutions.

Myth 1: "Raising money and growing customers is more important than fluff about wellbeing". See above on how a founder kept coming back to calm readiness and found investors even during the lockdown. Investors can smell fear!

Myth 2: What's the RoI? It's difficult to measure wellbeing and the impact of measures taken for wellbeing. See above of some well-known stats on employee turnover and engagement. You get your money back with better work, engaged employees, and in many case even raise funds as shared above.

Myth 3: 'Mental' wellbeing is a taboo topic. Aka: Anxiety is a bad thing. Aka: If I share about feeling even a bit anxious, I will be stigmatised. It's a sad truth that needs to change. It's easier to speak about sex lives than wellbeing - it is changing slowly but needs to change further.

Myth 4: Good Leaders cannot or do not have anxiety. Good leaders always have wellbeing. Highly paid staff have less wellbeing issues. Even Elon Musk has bad days. See above on how work can actually engage the employee away from anxiety. Money plays the role of a catalyst and a delay factor but not a solution.

Myth 5: Giving a wellness day away helps reduce anxiety in the team and improve wellbeing. People get benefits from talking, sharing and being with others. Away days help to some extent but don't solve the situation.

Startups, scaleups, and investors work in an area that magnifies wellbeing issues even more than in larger companies. The fear factor is worse in there.

Keep standing.

Here is a quote from The Bridge of Spies:

"Rudolf Abel: This one time, I was at the age of your son, our house was overrun by partisan border guards. Dozens of them. My father was beaten, my mother was beaten, and this man, my father's friend, he was beaten. And I watched this man. Every time they hit him, he stood back up again. So they hit him harder. Still he got back to his feet. I think because of this they stopped the beating. They let him live. 'Stoikiy muzhik'. I remember them saying. ''. Which sort of means like uh, 'standing man'... standing man..."

Stand your ground with calm readiness. Wellbeing is the first step to that.

(This article was originally published on author's own blog, and other platforms such as TealFeed ).

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