Today I want to tell you about the story I heard at the business breakfast meeting that I was attending this morning. The story comes from a lady who works in media and she told us about a company that she had been visiting or working with before.
We were talking about leadership and stress and what happens when you get too stressed out then and all the things that surround that. That was today’s theme.
She told us about this company that she was working with and it was a rather big company and in one of the departments where she was hired to do some media work she soon realized that through the guy who was her “helper” so to speak that nobody in that work group were happy, they were stressed out. They felt bad and everyone said “it’s the boss!”, because they had this lady boss and she was always screaming, yelling and demanding things and whatever they did was never enough, as seen from her point of view. That’s what they thought at least.
People were starting to go on sick leave because they didn’t feel well and there were even some of them were saying things like:
“I need to go and get another job. I can’t stand this anymore. I don’t want to be in this mess. She is not a good boss and I do not want to work with that kind of people.”
That’s how everyone was talking and the mood in the group was just getting lower and lower and the more they complained or didn’t do exactly what they were supposed to do this lady screamed even louder.
So one day the guy who hired the lady from my business group went higher up the management ladder to try and figure out a way to resolve the situation. He spoke to the manager of the team leader that was causing the problems and explained the situation. He said if you don’t do anything right now then this work group is finished. It’s just not gonna work anymore. People are going to leave or get sick from the stress of it all so you have to do something.
They booked a meeting where the screaming boss and her boss was there plus a few from the work group and they put all the cards on the table.
“This is how we feel.”
“This is what’s going on.”
“We don’t want this anymore.”
“What do you have to say?”
She started crying. She cried and cried and then she said:.
“I had no idea I was doing this to you. I didn’t realize.”.
When they talked for a while everyone saw that it was actually her that was so stressed out that she could not think and she was just going on autopilot.
When you are that stressed out your brain doesn’t work, you do things that you don’t want to do and it’s so hard to see it yourself. People in her workgroup had seen things with her getting worse and worse but but they haven’t dared to say anything to her. The longer the time was going on the worse it got and it was getting harder and harder to actually do something.
She did not want it to be this way. When she was acting out like she was she was crying for help. Her own management team organized things in a good way so that everyone was happy. She’s still in the position and that they are doing a good job helping her and her work team by putting together structures so that it won’t happen again.
And they opened up they opened up the way of being in the group, the tolerance, the transparency and the trust within the group. If you want to be a good leader you need to give the group these things so that they feel trusted they have to feel that they they are believed in and I think this story teaches us a lot of what you need to be leader.
If you need help or if you are stressed out you do have to go and get help or hopefully someone in your nearby will see what’s going on and they will give you help and you have to take care of yourself and you know what I talk about when I talk about taking care of yourself it all starts with looking at your sleep seeing that you’re eating properly and that you exercise so that you get the energy to actually take care of yourself. And then you have to work with the structures and all that that’s surrounding you.
If you need help with this feel free to reach out and we’ll find a solution on how to help you. Know someone who might find this helpful? Feel free to share this blog with them.
Book a Free No Obligation Call With Dr Annika.
