Anyone Can be The Captain When The Sea is Calm

"Enthusiasm is common. Endurance is rare."

Angela Duckworth

Very often during leadership trainings, we are asked what the essential qualities of a good leader are. The answer always starts, along with many others, with willingness to listen actively in order to understand, conscious choice to show empathy and ability to build and, more importantly, to maintain trust.

Of course, especially in the beginning of our careers, most of us are eager to share our knowledge and enthusiasm with the rest of the world and it is really difficult to develop skills that require active listening. The challenges come one after the other. We grow in the hierarchy usually based on our expertise as subject matter experts and on our performance as well, rather than our managerial capabilities. It is a great challenge to develop a team when we are missing instruments to lead.

And when times become turbulent, it gets harder and harder to lead.

Based on the self-awareness of their own actions or lack of it, in my experience there are two types of managers:

1. Unconscious.
2. Conscious.

The first type is the majority of the managers. They either act intuitively or as a consequence of the filters developed through experience - small mistakes, big failures, successes, etc. No matter how successful they are, or they can become, most of the time their actions are actions without conscious understanding.

Of course, this is not necessarily a bad thing. When we think we are knowledgeable enough to do something right and we don't need to develop a skill step further, we use our experience to perform on highest possible level.

But here, in fact, we act unconsciously like our own condition is dependent entirely on external factors that operate towards us. In other words, "we are victims of someone else's crime". It often may result in sabotaging ourselves by being unable to analyze the situation on a conscious level and act differently to our habitual reaction.

Let's assume for a moment that you have 10+ years of experience in driving a car. That usually means that when you get into the car, you don't have to think consciously which action follows which. It happens automatically. But what will happen if, for example, one of our tyres runs flat while we drive in high speed on a highway. In a split of a second, adrenaline rushes into our system, helping us deal with the situation in the best possible way - increasing the heart rate, increasing blood pressure, expanding the air passages of the lungs, enlarging the pupil in the eye, improving vision, hearing and other senses, etc.

In modern work environment, life threatening situations are unlikely to happen, but very often we, especially as leaders, have to deal quickly with highly stressful situations.

Normally, we act almost always unconsciously, without a choice how to act differently.

Which reminds of a story:

"One day a man went to the fair and bought nine donkeys. He rode home on one of them. The other donkeys followed behind. After a while he said to himself, “Are all my donkeys here?” Just then he turned round to count them. “One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight. Oh! Where’s number nine?” The man became angry. He jumped down from his donkey. He looked around. He looked behind the rocks and the trees. But there was no donkey to be seen. "I’ll count them again,” he said to himself. “One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine. Oh, he must have come back.” So, the man climbed back onto the donkey and rode away. After a while he counted his donkeys again. Again, he counted only eight! Once again, he jumped down from his donkey. He looked behind the rocks and the trees. But there was no donkey to be seen. “I’ll count my donkeys again,” he said to himself. And this time there were nine. Just then the man saw a friend of his walking along the road. “Hi. Thank God, I met you” he called. “Help me to count my donkeys. I keep losing one. When I stop to count, I find only eight, but when I get down looking for the ninth, there he is again!” “Well, I can see ten donkeys, actually,” laughed his friend. “Ten! How can you see ten?” “Well, you are sitting on one and there are eight donkeys behind you.” “Of course,” the man, “Oh! I am very foolish. But where is the tenth donkey?” Bursting in laughter the friend said, “He is sitting on the first donkey.”

...

To be able to do a choice to act differently, we have to know our "triggers" - what provokes our reaction.

The second type is managers who in those difficult situations try to analyze, plan and perform consciously. Those who try every time to learn and develop from every single experience they have, both at work and in their personal life.

It starts with:

• deeper awareness
• analyzing the situation
• reflect on our own patterns
• actively trying to develop new patterns
• be persistent

Being aware is a quite difficult task. It starts with paying deeper attention to our own thoughts, feelings, emotions, actions, etc. in different situations and to know what provokes them.

By being aware, we are able to analyze better and to react accordingly. We decide whether our typical behaviour suits us or not. If not, we plan and try executing a different reaction.

That is the reason why it is so important to reflect on our own patterns every few months. Whether we know it or not, we could unconsciously change our models. And not always in a way we are content with.

And, of course, to change those patterns that are not effective for us by developing new ones instead. A task which is almost impossible if we are not persistent in our willingness to change our reactions and behaviour. The endurance to keep on doing that when it is getting harder and harder, is the hallmark of the great leader.

Our self-awareness always gives us a really important choice - to continue, and consciously to act the same.

Or to change our response with a different one.

-Stoyan