How to Lead When Your Team is Tired, Discouraged and Lost

One winter, we tracked two caribou deep into a valley on a remote Aleutian island. On the farthest reach of the valley, we came across a small herd. Between the four of us, we took eight caribou.

It was late in the afternoon.

By the time we had finished field dressing, it was dark. We decided the best thing to do was cache the meat and come back for it the next day. We hadn’t planned to be out overnight.

The valley was treeless. In daylight, it was easy to pick a path through the snow-filled ravines, cliffs and creek beds. Getting lost was impossible. Maps or GPS were unnecessary.

But in the dark, a path wasn’t so obvious. I looked at the night sky and took my bearings from the stars. We began to hike out.

Soon after we began storm clouds rolled in. My view of stars was obscured. The darkness was complete.

Between the darkness and the snowstorm, our vision was limited to only about ten feet. That’s with headlamps. The trail we made on the way in was erased. We had no path to follow out. The terrain had suddenly become a labyrinth in the dark.

I was breaking trail. Navigating for all of us. Even if we had maps or GPS, they wouldn’t have indicated the relatively small but still impassible cliffs and ravines that snaked over the valley. We frequently had to adjust course or redouble our steps. But each detour was based on guesswork.

Without vision, there was no way to know which way to head. All I could do was work off the last thing I could see. The vision I remembered.

Detours didn’t just take more time. They were physically difficult and discouraging.

Worried that the batteries in our flashlights and headlamps may not last.

I began to hear the worry and exhaustion in my friend’s voices.

One, either from overexertion or illness, began to struggle to walk. He collapsed and began to puke.

“Just go on,” He said.

We got him back to his feet. But he wasn’t doing well.

Our energy was depleted. We were cold. We couldn’t see which way to go.

One of my hunting companions had brought his teenage son with us. They were walking directly behind me. I overheard him say, “Dad, are we going to make it out of here?”

It was a nightmare.

Vision can fade, get confused or lost altogether

As anyone who has participated in endurance sports knows, one of the biggest challenges you face is yourself. You are alone with your thoughts for extended periods of time. Discomfort, boredom, fatigue, pain or fear can overwhelm perspective.

It’s very easy to think, “You know, I’ve gone far enough.” There are a million reasons to justify it. Any one can seem good enough.

It’s easy to lose hope, or sense of your goal.

It’s one thing to inspire someone to undertake a long, difficult task or journey. It’s another thing to renew and keep renewing that inspiration to complete it.

When we began hiking out, I was just one member of the hunting party. But by breaking trail, I had assumed a kind of leadership without thinking about it.

I realized that not only were my friends following my trail, but they were following my level of hope and confidence. I needed to maintain a positive vision that we would all safely get out. And I needed to help sustain this vision in everyone else. The potential consequences were too high if anyone lost hope or stopped.

But I couldn’t see anything.

Vision can be lost. Leaders have to renew it.

Vision. The answer to, “Where are we going?” and “Why” can be lost. It needs to be recovered. Renewed. For yourself and those you lead.

A core leadership strength is the ability to inspire a shared vision. Frankly, inspiring a shared vision is often not that difficult once you know how.

However, renewing a personal sense of vision when you are bored, distracted, tired, discouraged or overwhelmed is something else. Being able to renew everyone else’s sense of vision is yet another thing altogether.

I couldn’t just tell my wife, “I love you” on our wedding day and call it good. I need to communicate, “I love you,” through my words and actions on an ongoing basis.

Similarly, our teams need their vision consistently reviewed. It isn’t enough to touch on it once a planning cycle. It should be part of your regular conversations. Even on a daily basis.

Leaders often have the luxury (often unused) to set, think about, and adjust their vision as they go. But many, possibly most, people on your team don’t. Their responsibilities are necessarily more focused and often shorter term in range. They routinely deal with accomplishing immediate tasks and solving problems.

They get tired, overwhelmed or distracted. It can be easy for them to lose sight of the big picture. To forget about, “Why?”

How to Renew Vision

First, renewing vision is easier if everyone originally had the same vision. (Read more about How To Inspire A Shared Vision if you’d like to learn more about this.) It’s difficult to renew a vision that was only yours and never everyone else’s. In those instances, you’ll be stuck trying to renew a vision others never had. Good luck.

But assuming there was a shared vision to renew, here are some tips that will help:

• Personally Reflect: Leaders are often busy and don't make time for reflection. Being busy can cloud a sense of vision. To address this, leaders should make it a habit to regularly take time alone to reconnect with their vision.

I recommend writing your vision. Then read it to yourself on a daily basis. My normal practice is to read mine when I wake up. It helps me quickly regain my bearings for the day.

• Remind your team constantly: I heard one leader say, “Team’s leak.” They leak vision. They forget. They get distracted. They need to have their “vision” levels regularly checked and refilled. Your team needs to be reminded of both the vision and of their progress. Chances are high that they forgot the first and can’t see the latter.

When leaders communicate to their teams, they should refer to the vision constantly. This should be both planned and spontaneous. It can be through extravagant retreats as well as daily reminders. As long as you are making progress toward your vision, you cannot refer to it too much.

• Vision is better with a friend

Being around other people who are actively pursuing their clear, inspiring vision will reenergize yours. Even if their vision is different. Find these people. Seek them out. Go to meetings or conferences where they are. Built relationships and friendships with them. Their new (to you) energy, perspective, observations and response to challenges will reinspire you.

Be careful to curate who you spend your time around. Ensure that you are with people who are producing results and making tangible progress towards their vision.

Don’t spend time with pretend leaders who don’t take action. Their energy is also infectious. Get away from it.

Renewing Vision

I needed to maintain my own sense of direction. Both the vision that we would be successful as well as finding navigation points that would help guide us.

That night, my friends needed me to find direction and keep confidence for them. I have had plenty of other experiences where I’ve needed this from others.

In this instance, I couldn’t surround myself with other visionaries. But I had in the past. As I trudged through the snow, I remembered the many hunting and mountaineering stories I heard growing up. Also, the survival trainings I’ve been through. I took encouragement and guidance from them.

I began to pick up navigation queues. A boulder I remembered. The light from a radio tower several ridges over. A familiar-looking hillside. I was able to reconstruct the path back.

It was a long night. But we made it out. And we did it by forcing ourselves to see the outcome we wanted – when it was no longer visible. By renewing our vision.

Does your vision need to be renewed?

What about your team?

Take good care,

Christian

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