Episode 8 - "The victims of one person’s self-criticism and how to protect everyone involved"

He seems to be very negative , although not against anyone , just towards himself and his work . He is extremely self-critical and seems distressed and disappointed in his own skills daily . Because he had that two-year break , he now needs to catch up with the newest medication and recommended practices , which makes him feel stupid .

I know that is how he feels because he said that to me and every single one of his teammates . He appears to be often sad and frustrated and very vocal about it . We are all feeling bad for him and support him in rebuilding his confidence as much as possible , but his grim

mood seems to be dragging everyone else down . How can I manage this situation ? I want to be supportive and patient , but I also need to take care of the rest of the team and protect their morale .

I have some of the family members who are actually in the medical profession and they've been experienced for so many years and I'm imagining them now and putting them in that situation where they had a break and they came back and we don't know why this person had a break I suspect was something personal , even like health related . Those things happen right .

And then when I imagine someone who's close to me and I can see them in my head struggling and self-doubting , and someone who is normally perceived as very powerful , as a very strong and eligible , suddenly , if he it must , it must be humiliating for a person to be in that situation my heart really breaks , I know , yeah , I mean you sort of can't really

imagine how that would feel inwardly on a daily basis .

I'm glad that actually this person's leader reached out to us , because it is interesting , because this is a different type of negativity that someone brings to the workplace , because the question , if I caught it correctly , is that how can I support this person while protecting my team , because this person is dragging everyone down , is making them uncomfortable with the

negativity that they bring . Did I catch it correctly ?

It is that spread of emotion between people , because we do have those mirror neurons within us human beings , within our brains . We want to kind of mimic how people around us behave , to be part of the tribe .

So when there's someone so negative and complaining a lot and it doesn't really matter what the reason for that is , but they are just grim and they create that atmosphere Other people will feel like that and it's very natural for us to also drop into that little

hole of sadness there . So the leader , who takes care of the team , who cares about their teammates , they really want to protect them and also protect the performance and also the patients .

They said that they are a practice owner the doctor , I suppose , like some gp , practice something like that , so to protect the clients , the patients to come to that practice . So that's very important . On the other hand , this person's struggling , they're in pain and it's really horrible for them to be there .

So one thing that I would like to advise to anyone who's ever had a situation like that for the leader is to approach that with a gigantic dose of obviously , compassion . However , don't allow it to take over your logical thinking . It's that very fine balance between that assertiveness and the worm so the characteristics of a truly , truly charismatic leader .

Have you ever had a situation like that , emma , that you needed to be compassionate but someone was actually causing trouble ? Yeah , from your leadership perspective .

You know on the team because you don't have that dilution . You know there's only so many people that you know on the team because you don't have that dilution . You know there's only so many people that you know this doctor can kind of vent or talk to or express his concerns to , and I think that that becomes then a real burden on the team .

I , yeah , I think in my experience like , yeah , I haven't really experienced something to like to that effect .

In here they kind of they have one another all the time . So , so intense to be in the middle of that complaining session every single day . And I was just thinking whether obviously I heard a lot of those about those cases from other leaders , but also I think I was on the other side of it . So I was someone , an employee , who was misbehaving .

But I was misbehaving because I was in a really dark place . I had some personal things happening for me . I lost someone in my family and I couldn't go there . I was abroad and I couldn't go to the funeral .

I was very much misbehaving and I can imagine that for that leader it must have been very hard to balance that out , to show me compassion and not be too impatient towards me but also at the same time kind of put me in the right place if you know what I mean to to help me change the performance .

So it's interesting to to be on many different sides of it , right it's always hard for everyone involved .

You know , as you , as you start your new leadership journey per se , you know , and so you know , this is definitely like the more advanced level , I would say , because it's such a complex situation that there are so many factors to consider and , as a business owner , you have even more things to consider .

So I think it's different , slightly different , when you are the leader but you don't own the business . Yes , versus you're the leader and you're the owner . Yes , because obviously there are some financial or potential financial implications , there's potential for reputational damage , which , of course , all leaders care about .

But you know , when it's sort of potentially coming off your own table , it does make things slightly more more complicated .

So so I guess I would just like to say , firstly , what a fantastic leader this person is , who has written into us One for employing someone who does have a gap in their employment history , because for a lot of people , that would be a red flag and an automatic like even though they were probably the best person for the job , they still might get overlooked

because of that . So I think that deserves a

mention . But yeah , but also you can appreciate the sort of challenge for this leader being the business owner and the leader you know the go-to person for that team 100% .

So I suspect that for this leader they either overheard themselves so the author of this letter mentions that they heard from that doctor that he has the self-doubt , the self-flagellation happening there . But also it would be interesting to find out whether it happens literally every day with every employee . Is there a particular situation that ignites that ?

So just to have a really good understanding , is it a particular type of case that ignites that ? So just to have a really good understanding , is it a particular type of case that ignites that reaction or is it in general everything ?

So to understand what is happening first , and that understanding for the leader always comes from looking around the person , so just checking with people around . So tell me a little bit more about that in vocalizing those concerns that , let's say , john does , and when did you notice that ? Just to let your people know that you are aware you are concerned .

You want to help everyone involved in this situation . That shows the team how beautifully proactive the leader is . It's just amazing the author of this letter sent that letter let the team know that you are aware you're doing something about it . I feel like that is the first step to build more trust , even within the team .

Is it the particular case ? Is it the particular part of the treatment or the management diagnosing ? What is it that stresses you so badly , so that you understand what is happening there .

So we start with that compassion , with the curiosity , put the Sherlock Holmes hat and we are diving into that investigation with curiosity and once we understand , we can kind of put those puzzle pieces together and we can start seeing a bigger picture . Okay , this is what's actually happening there .

Now that person , because they're so engrossed in that the drama is happening for them ,

that pain that they're going through , they probably choose that option of venting , I would guess , for two reasons . One reason is for them to release that negative emotion , so that very unpleasant , that heavy emotion that I'm feeling it .

And in this case they don't have that much of self-management skill in those cases , so they let it out , so they don't control how they release their emotion . But also very often , what we see that people do is that when they worry about the judgment .

But also very often , what we see that people do is that when they worry about the judgment , sometimes and I do that myself as well we would be the first person to point out our shortcomings , the things that we're not perfect at right . So we are the first one who mentioned that , so we don't have to be worried that people will say that as well .

So we minimize the judgment . Does it make sense .

Now , to do that gently , I would always encourage leaders to refer to this individual's values , because evidently this person wants to do a good job , they want to be good at what they do , they want to be a good doctor , and part of being a good doctor so high performance is having your team rely on you .

See you , as a professional , have your team energized and focused . So if we know that what he's doing at the moment and it's like kind of like a reflex , like an immediate thing that he doesn't control he just does that quickly we know that that doesn't contribute to high performance and he doesn't realize it .

I would bet all my money on it that he doesn't know the about the effect that he has on the team . So this is where we need to gently , but very openly and very , very much um in detail , let him know what sort of impact his behavior has on the team , show him the bigger picture . So that's the external self-awareness that we need to give to him .

Am I making sense ? How does it sound to ?

This is precisely the effect it's having , and the more specific you can be , perhaps the more they're going to hear .

And I think in that moment we need to see kind of the reaction of this person . If that is enough to make them aware and probably a little bit embarrassed about that impact that they had on other people , they will be motivated to change that behavior . So once we give them more of the self-awareness , so AI skill , we increase their self-awareness .

Then we ask them to adjust the behavior , so to practice more of that self-management skill . And this is where we step into that really more advanced , higher level of how the behavior actually needs to be changed and adjusted . But also we become a little bit more limited as a leader in terms of what we can do .

So we can offer to them some sort of ideas about how they could behave instead of doing what they're doing now . We can offer them kind of like a draft , but ideally we should sit down and we ask them what do you think ? How could you maybe manage that a little bit differently . Leader can coach if they are trained in emotional intelligence coaching .

Like all of my savvies , my trainees , they are trained in doing that to their people , so they are able to sit down with that person and ask them okay , can you catch the moment when that emotion is very much coming to the surface and is just about to come out ? Can you learn how to catch it , control it a bit better ?

And there's many different ways to become more self-regulating , let's put it that way . Ways to become more self-regulating , let's put it that way . There are things like , obviously , destruction , so when he feels like that , he chooses something that will distract him , take his thought away from it .

There are a lot of sensory , kind of visual or even kind of like a smell things that we can do to change the way we feel in that moment is music is really good at that , releasing some energy through movement . Even smelling something like orange , something is very , very good like positive effect on our brains . Everyone likes a different smell .

Find the smell that makes you happy and bring it to work . Honestly , yeah , so it's kind of offering to them different ways . Some of those ways , which are the cognitive ways , will be connected to having a therapist or a coach , so someone who will take care of those thinking patterns . And that takes us to that strong self-criticism .

Perfection is probably comparing yourself

to your previous self and how hard that is , so we need a professional to help with that . I would say .

Is there a risk that when the leader is having this conversation with their team member , um someone that potentially is kind of in this particular negative frame of mind , is there a risk that when they are made aware of the impact their behavior is having on the team , that it actually makes them spiral more or actually feel worse about themselves ?

So is there risk that actually that conversation can have negative effects on that individual ?

We can be as gentle as I don't know an angel , but it's still going to be a reaction there .

But if we follow the information with gigantic dose of support , saying , john , I am telling you this because I care about you and I don't want the team to resent you , I am here to sit down with you and to figure out some ways in which I can help you change that behavior , whether that involves giving you extra time in the schedule between different appointments

or maybe trying to arrange some employee support system . So there's some coaching or financing therapy sessions . Even some owners do that , the owners of the practices . So I am here to help you , because the other option is , if we never say anything , we just perpetuate the process . So what ?

But I think this particular situation really highlights the importance of leadership training .

If you don't have appropriate training for either like the field that you're in , just as leadership in general , and I think personally , training that is specific to your like field is probably very important , because I think there are very different nuances depending on if you're medical or architectural or mining , whatever , it's so important .

This just really it just kind of like struck me when you were talking about how you would approach that , yeah , that's a very careful and considered solution that , if you are not trained , could go terribly wrong absolutely , and imagine the leader who has very much underutilized or underdeveloped levels of emotional skills there .

as we called him , they could take it very personally . It could be a trigger for the leader . So this is why , when I mentioned that this is that very interesting and very advanced mixture of AI skills , that emotion intelligence skills that we're using here , is that it starts with that leader to observe .

Let's say , you're John's leader , emma , you need to be aware , before you step into conversation with him , whether you are triggered or not . Are you ready to have a conversation with someone who will be probably annoying you in a way or maybe they will be terrifying you in a way ? There will be some sort of emotion .

So it's that leader's self-awareness and self-management first and foremost , and then that the true empathy of not trying to imagine how it is for him . We can't do that , but being curious and trying to understand and be truly strategic , I would say , very wise in it . So , absolutely , I agree with you on that .

I believe that emotional intelligence training should be mandatory big , big , big part of the leadership training , really , because it's usually just mentioned . This is why we have this podcast .

Right is mentioned somewhere , and I've got so many coaches coming to me who've done a different leadership training where there was a lot of very important , very good things , and it was just mentioned that aspect of emotional intelligence and it's just nothing , so for some people would be easier , for some people would be harder , but I think working on that aspect

is just really good , yeah .

And that's not being disrespectful to them , of course , but it's just that those sort of subtleties we just don't know , like we just don't know , and , to be honest , weleties we just don't know , like we just don't know and , to be honest , we don't know what we don't know . So until someone points it out , it's kind of like , oh yeah .

So I hope that everything that we said kind of those steps and elements , the must-haves for it , that they do make sense to , to this person , the author . Let us now reach out back . Anyone who's listening to this episode please reach out to us with maybe other questions that are related to it . We would love to continue that conversation yes absolutely okay .

So , um , thank you so much , emma , for bringing that question , that letter , today . I loved it , and thank you everyone who is tuning in to listen to those podcast episodes . I feel like that is that little bit that Emma and I can do to help leaders in the world . And , of course , we are not perfect .

So if you have any feedback for us , we would love to hear that as well . So keep going , keep becoming human savvy and we will hear . You , see you , hopefully hear from you very soon .