Dealing with Emotional Poverty
Why you, as a leader, need to work on yourself more in the future
Recently, employees have complained more frequently about management behaviour incapable of mastering the emotional components of leadership and management work.
The complaints describe situations where management personnel have shown gross misconduct. Some of these moments led to the direct dismissal of employees whom the organisation would have liked to have employed for longer. How can such misconduct occur again and again in management work?
Three examples
To illustrate the emotional component of management work, three examples are given below, which represent different forms of misconduct.
Example 1: Event industry. A festival has to be organised in the blazing heat. The company decides to give employees something special by posting a notice. A snack. One (in numbers: 1) banana. Available only between 9 am and 5 pm.
Example 2: A company introduces remote work and a 4-day week. So far, so progressive. The number of (paid) holiday days is adjusted. This step is also not unusual. Instead of 30 days of holiday, there will be only ten. The case escalates, and management has to announce 24 days of paid annual leave.
Example 3: a person who has worked for the organisation for many years informs the manager that the family dog has to be put down due to a severe illness. This step is scheduled in the evening after work. A request is made not to have to work the next day, and the use of a day’s leave is offered. The manager asked if the dog’s euthanisation could be scheduled for a Friday evening so that the emotional grieving period could be planned for a weekend. The person who has worked for the organisation for many years resigns the following day.
Self-reflection
As unbelievable as the abovementioned behaviour, such behaviour is presented to the public frequently. Social media accelerates the spread and publicity of the misconduct. Company names, brands and individuals suffer massive damage in the process, and not without good reason.
To act better as a manager, you must regularly question yourself. In particular, consider the following aspects: your life situation, emotional experiences, amount and intensity of leadership experience as well as its (scientific) foundation, interpersonal and personal experiences with all their ups and downs, and personal privileges.
Looking at this will most likely show you that in many situations in life, some aspects have made things easier for you, often by pure coincidence. Please refrain from mostly purely fictitious constructs of the have-it-all-yourself illusory world.
Improvement
The gap that you can see between your experiences and privileges and the demands on leaders is the gap you have to close. You need (scientifically) proven content, concepts and usually professional guidance to do this. The worst of all paths is the one in which you project your life path onto others without reflection. Just because a decision, a step, a path worked for you does not mean that the same approach will work for any other person. Advice that is based on n=1 is never sustainable. If you do exhibit that behaviour, don’t be surprised if employees take what you say only partially or not at all seriously. In such cases, you will rightly be denied a following by your employees. On the other hand, emotionally appealing leaders are considered charismatic, they are willingly followed, and these leaders create a long-term bond between employees and the organisation.
More on dealing with emotional poverty
in this week’s podcast: Apple Podcast / Spotify.
Do you care about the topic of being an excellent leader?
Let’s talk: NB@NB-Networks.com.
