I just gave a talk at an internal event on this topic of organizational resilience—as well as pandemic burnout, trauma, processing feelings, and healing.
And based on the response, let me tell you: your company NEEDS to be talking about this way more right now.
And based on the response, let me tell you: your company NEEDS to be talking about this way more right now.
https://twitter.com/sara_ann_marie/status/1402716636549951488
People are attempting to navigate some massive, overwhelming feelings right now. Stress is through the roof. And most of us learned to shut off our feelings at work. So we're actually really, really bad at even identifying them, much less acknowledging them.
"Shutting your feelings off at work" does not...get rid of the feeling. No one's ever stopped feeling angry because they told themselves they "shouldn't" feel angry.
They just feel angry AND ashamed of their anger. And our shame makes us dangerous to our colleagues.
They just feel angry AND ashamed of their anger. And our shame makes us dangerous to our colleagues.
Our shame is dangerous because it makes us want to hide, which makes us defensive. And when we are defensive, we don't listen. We don't collaborate. We lash out.
And you know who we lash out on the most? People we perceive as having less power than us.
And you know who we lash out on the most? People we perceive as having less power than us.
So trying to suppress feelings at work so you can "get on with it"—stick to the roadmap, focus on the work—is a danger to our own mental health, yes. But it's also harmful to others, and that harm tends to deepen inequities.
So many of us are used to reducing our work feelings down to a single one: "stressed." And to be clear, we're all stressed right now.
But saying we're stressed often elides a deeper feeling that we're uncomfortable acknowledging.
Like fear—being afraid we'll fail or look bad.
But saying we're stressed often elides a deeper feeling that we're uncomfortable acknowledging.
Like fear—being afraid we'll fail or look bad.
Or sometimes, we say we're stressed when the root issue is that we're angry. Especially for women and folks perceived female—because there's so much explicit and implicit training that we're not SUPPOSED to feel angry. We often can't even acknowledge our anger to ourselves.
Going back to resilience: if your org is obsessed with everyone getting back to the office, if it tells folks to "feel free to take some time, if you need it" and thinks that's enough (shout out to @annehelen on that one), your org is not resilient. It is hostile to humans.
Anyway, you should hire me to come give this talk at your company.
It's needed, and tbh I'm as exhausted as everyone else. Help me give this talk all summer so I don't have to come up with new ideas for a sec.
Not even gonna feel bad posting this brag. The talk's really good.
It's needed, and tbh I'm as exhausted as everyone else. Help me give this talk all summer so I don't have to come up with new ideas for a sec.
Not even gonna feel bad posting this brag. The talk's really good.
....And I have put this talk onto a webpage for those who want to forward a link to your boss / your prof dev folks / whoever organizes your speaker series
activevoicehq.com/trainings/burn…
activevoicehq.com/trainings/burn…
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