Bringing Back VITALITY: The Key to Making ‘WORK’ Work

[Welcome back to?Cultivating Vibrant Workplaces! In Issue #19 I highlight takeaways from my interviews with Dr. Larry McEvoy, author of Epidemic Leadership: How to Lead Infectiously in the Era of Big Problems. I share his experiences and models (i.e. ACE and PLV) relating to employee VITALITY and performance inspired by his years as an emergency physician, CEO, and founder of Epidemic Leadership — guiding principles for cultivating organizational well-being and thriving cultures. Also, check out our newest offerings at the end of this newsletter including our "Book + LIWW Course" promo .]

If there is one thing I know for sure, it’s that without vitality, we cannot perform at our best, and organizations certainly cannot perform at their best!

So, what is vitality exactly? Why is it one of the most critical factors for employee and organizational performance, growth, and success? These are some of the many questions and topics explored in my fascinating interviews with Dr. Larry McEvoy of Montana, United States, author of Epidemic Leadership: How to Lead Infectiously in the Era of Big Problems [1] for our book and podcast .

Epidemic Leadership, a term coined by Dr. McEvoy, is an Adaptive Leadership approach designed to help leaders (and their followers) thrive and influence in today’s complex age.

His book provides a “how-to methodology for simply and practically putting the principles of epidemic phenomena into successful practice. By understanding their function in adaptive systems and applying their organizing principles to daily work, you can lead more effectively for greater results, more agile responsiveness, and deeper vitality.” [2]

From his extensive years as an emergency physician and CEO of Memorial Health System to his present-day role as founder of Epidemic Leadership, Dr. McEvoy learned and experienced firsthand a thing or two about vitality and its impact on employee and organizational performance.

Before divulging valuable takeaways from our interview, I thought it might be prudent to examine the concept of vitality—a foundational principle of Epidemic Leadership.

Having vitality is often defined as possessing exuberant physical strength or mental vigor. It can also mean having the capacity to survive or continue a meaningful or purposeful existence.

Alternatively, it could indicate having the power to live or grow or being a vital force or principle. [3]

Risk and opportunity: this is the pandemic century. The following quote from Dr. McEvoy’s LinkedIn profile perhaps best articulates the state of play we find ourselves in today.

“In a new-rules world, conventional methods are failing in the face of unprecedented challenges. Scale, velocity, complexity, and the emergence of both value and peril from anywhere overwhelm approaches. In a world of taxed people and degraded systems, regeneration—at scale—has become essential.” [4]

Yes, life and business have evolved. To say we are now operating in a VUCA (i.e., Volatile, Uncertain, Complex, and Ambiguous) environment would be a massive understatement. As such, I submit for your consideration that we have perhaps transitioned into a VUCA 2.0 environment. One that necessitates a new understanding and playbook for how organizations might survive and thrive now and in the future. A concept periodically referenced in our book .

Multiplier effect of PLV (Performance, Learning, and Vitality)—determinants of growth and success. The future growth and success of an organization will be predicated on its ability to nurture employee well-being, vitality, and wisdom. Its ability to tap into the best of what its people have to offer and do so through a shared vision and collective effort. As he aptly expressed:

The challenge we all face is to design systemic performance, learning, and vitality. To survive, succeed, and contribute—whether in a team, a company, a city, or a society—we need to ‘think and do’ like we’ve never done before. Resilience and adaptability trump control and rigidity. We need to design collective intelligence that can spawn innovation, ensure stability, marginalize harm, steward our future, and simplify amid complexity. [5]

PLV, according to Dr. McEvoy, will be the critical determinant of organizational growth. Team experiences that nurture PLV will rise from the multiplying of little things that make ‘WORK’ work. But (and this is a huge but) people cannot perform well if they are not well. His medical analogy from having worked in an ER perhaps says it best:

"A speedskater lying in an ICU may be a gold medal record winner multiple times over, but he or she will only be able to perform at his or her best when fully healed and not before. Expressed another way, we can only achieve output from our people when there is sufficient input and deposits made into their health, well-being, and vitality." [6]

The following quote from his book regarding personal vitality particularly resonated with me and should likewise give organizational leaders great pause.

“If your vitality is zero, you’re already dead, but if your vitality is insufficient to support the necessary learning and performance, it is only a matter of time before you are.” [7]

Dr. McEvoy also asserts that “for an organization to be stable and thrive, input must be greater than output.” I submit that this is how we cultivate organizational vitality!

Leveraging Top-Down and Bottom-Up Leadership. Reflecting on his years as a CEO, he would often remind his senior leadership team:

“Your cheapest power as an executive is your ability to say ‘No,’ and your greatest strength or generative power is your ability to release the potential of your people.”

His sage advice illuminates the possibilities and merits of an integrative top-down and bottom-up leadership approach—a construct foundational to both cross-silo leadership and speak-up cultures.

Performance is requisite; learning is requisite; vitality is requisite—all living things need to perform. Abraham Maslow once said, “A musician must make music, an artist must paint, a poet must write if he is to be ultimately at peace with himself. What a man can be, he must be.” [8]?

Employees are no different—they too have an innate desire and need to create, innovate, and bring the best of themselves to their work.

The challenge before organizations in this new environment will be their ability to tap into, capitalize on, and develop the unique skill sets of their people. Manifesting such will require employers to have a deep awareness and understanding of the gifts of their employees and the deployment of such.

In our discussion, Dr. McEvoy posited:

“Organizational performance will be largely driven by optimizing ‘internal capacity’ of its people. And we build this capacity from nurturing wellness and vitality.”

Epidemic Leadership is the sum of organizational interactions and synergy—it’s what defines success and growth. Larry expands on this assertion in his book by stating: "The organizational charts, prescribed protocols, defined decision-making processes, and specified Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) of formal organizational activity lull us into a sense of operational reality, when reality is actually a vast, seething cloud of innumerable and tiny interactions. Shift interaction, and you can shift the outcome of those interactions." [9]

As I see it, identifying and fostering meaningful interactions and opportunities that mutually align employee needs and interests to the organization will be the secret sauce to both employee and organizational vitality. Therefore, organizations will be best served by focusing on and developing critical skills and tasks (versus defined jobs or roles) to fulfill mission-critical projects and achieve competitive advantage. Employees should similarly be encouraged to develop new skills for emerging growth opportunities and pursue assignments that will help them grow, flourish, and self-actualize as a person and a professional.

As Dr. McEvoy addresses in his book and our interview, optimizing performance, learning, and vitality are equally important requisites for employee and organizational well-being and growth. They simply go hand in hand. These requisites also build the case for embedding wellness into employee and organizational growth objectives. Organizations that get this and execute on such will undoubtedly become the leaders of tomorrow.

Doing wellness in an unwell way. An undeniable fact and one our WWCOE program trainees hear me say often is, “You can’t create healthy employees in an unhealthy or toxic work environment.”

Equally on point is Dr. McEvoy’s assertion that “we have been doing wellness in an unwell way.”

He suggests that for organizations to become wellness-centric, they must first understand that systemic wellness is “foundational and exponential, not optional and politically correct.”

So, how might leaders do their part in fostering systemic wellness? The answer might lie in Dr. McEvoy’s ACE model of practice—Affirmation-Appreciation, Curiosity and Empathy. Embracing and engaging in these practices can amplify and fortify work relationships, employee recognition, retention, and productivity, which help build thriving cultures.

Perhaps the most fitting words to summarize and highlight the significance of our discussions is this quote from his book:

?“The only way that you can learn and adapt is if you’re vital, and the only way you can perform is if you learn and adapt.” [10]

Offerings to help you?Cultivate Healthy & Vibrant Workplaces!

1] Develop your organizational wellness leadership skills through our special ?"Book + LIWW Certificate Course" promotional offer (valid to March 31/23) >>?https://workplacewellnesscoe.com/book

2] Cultivate employee-centric Performance Coaches with your leadership via our dynamic, experiential, workshop-style?"Leader Turned Coach" Course.?Contact us at?[email protected] ?to schedule a consultation.

3] Explore all our?Workplace Wellness Centre of Excellence?courses and certification programs, Executive Wellness Coaching Programs, corporate wellness solutions, CHVW podcast, Facebook/LinkedIn groups, >>?https://linktr.ee/WWCOE

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Sources:

[1] Larry McEvoy, MD., Founder, Epidemic Leadership, interview with author, December 16, 2021.

[2] Larry McEvoy, MD., Epidemic Leadership: How to Lead Infectiously in the Era of Big Problems (New Jersey: Wiley Publishing, 2021).

[3] Definition of Vitality, https://www.dictionary.com/browse/vitality accessed on Dec 29, 2021.

[4] Larry McEvoy, MD., LinkedIn profile. https://www.dhirubhai.net/in/larrymcevoy/ accessed on December 29, 2021.

[5] McEvoy, Epidemic Leadership.

[6] McEvoy, Interview with author.

[7] McEvoy, Epidemic Leadership.

[8] Goodreads, “Author quotes, Abraham H. Maslow,” accessed on Dec 29, 2021, https://www.goodreads. com/author/quotes/4570807.Abraham H Maslow.

[9] McEvoy, Epidemic Leadership.

[10] Ibid.