Navigating Election Week Anxiety & Team Morale: 7 Strategies for Leaders

Leanna Laskey McGrath  0:08  

Welcome to the executive coach for moms podcast where we support women who are attempting to find balance and joy while simultaneously leading people at work and at home. I'm your host, Leanna Laskey McGrath, former tech exec turned full time mom, recovering perfectionist and workaholic and certified executive coach.

Leanna Laskey McGrath  0:30  

Hi everyone. Welcome back to the show, and thank you so much for joining me. This week is election week here in the United States, and this episode is going to air two days after the election, and I'm recording it a few days before, so I do not know at the time of recording what the outcome will be. I'm guessing that when this episode airs on Thursday morning, things will either still be up in the air, or results will be being challenged and possibly reviewed by courts, also guessing that anxiety will be high for individuals, especially those who are more actively engaged in politics, and tensions may be high between people and also teams. And so I thought it may be helpful to talk about a little bit, because I imagine at this time next week, it will be kind of at top of mind for everybody or for a lot of folks. And I wanted to talk specifically about navigating this time as a leader so that our teams can continue functioning, our people can continue thriving, and our companies can continue being as productive as possible during this time. 

Leanna Laskey McGrath  1:55  

So I first just want to acknowledge you as a leader who's supporting a team and supporting your family and might be feeling anxiety and stress and tension after the election. I think that whenever we are trying to keep things moving for everybody, make sure that everyone is feeling supported, we often will kind of forget about ourselves and our own needs, and so I just want to offer some empathy to you if you're feeling a little extra stressed or a little extra on edge this week. This is just such an important topic, because handling these interactions with other people on our teams who maybe are voting differently from us, or have very differing political opinions, or maybe we're super engaged and they're very indifferent, or vice versa. I think it is critical for us in efforts to prevent conflicts, build resilience and really strengthen team dynamics. Because I think while we might be masters of compartmentalizing, because we have to be, and we've been challenged to be, that's not how everyone operates. And so it's not like we can just leave ourselves at the door whenever we walk into our office or open our laptop. We still show up as our full selves, and we still have all these other things that we care about. And I think the reality is is that a lot of folks this week, whether it's us or our team members, our peers, the people above us, the people who report to us, the people on our teams, folks are probably going to be feeling a little more anxiety this week than usual. 

Leanna Laskey McGrath  3:49  

So I want to share seven practical strategies that I believe leaders and managers and executives can utilize this week to keep yourselves in your teams, in a better place. So first and foremost is to take care of yourself. Like I said before. I think oftentimes as caregivers, we are so focused on taking care of everyone around us and making sure everyone else is good that we kind of forget about ourselves, and what ends up happening is that we get burnt out. We might feel some underlying resentfulness of like, you know, it's nice that you get to express your feelings, because I never get to, or things like that. And so I just think it's so, so important, and this is why it's my very first of the seven recommendations, because it is of utmost importance to take care of yourself, so recognizing what you need during this time. Maybe if you need to take some time away from work or some time away from other people for mental health, take it. Maybe if you're in a workplace where a lot of people have differing political views from you, and you just want to connect with some like minded people, then do it. Ask yourself, what do I need right now? What is going to fuel me right now?

Leanna Laskey McGrath  5:18  

And I will just caution that if you are taking some time for yourself, and we have this belief that if I'm taking time for myself, I need to be doing something, I need to be productive in some way. And for whatever reason, our brains are like, well, scrolling social media is more productive than just laying here and doing nothing, so I'm going to do that. And I would just say that if you're finding yourself in a place where you need to take some time for yourself, take a mental health break, it might be a good idea to also take a social media break. I have had to take many social media breaks for my mental health during this election cycle, just because I think a lot of the content out there is meant to be anxiety inducing. It's meant to make you feel something so that you want to click on it, so you want to watch it again. And so, you know, whenever we are scrolling social media or doom scrolling and seeing all this content, a lot of times, it's just like increasing our cortisol levels, increasing our stress. And so if we're doing that in our times of rest, then we're actually not resting. We're actually doing the opposite. We're probably adding more stress instead of taking a break from all the stress. 

Leanna Laskey McGrath  6:38  

The second recommendation I have, once you have taken care of yourself and met your own needs, is to acknowledge and empathize with your team members. So as leaders, I think it's so important to call out the elephant in the room, because until we bring it into light, it's just going to keep running in the background of everyone's minds, distracting them and causing more stress and anxiety, honestly, because I think that whenever we don't talk about it, we don't call it out as leaders, then people are either talking about it amongst themselves and not always in the most productive ways, or they're just thinking it themselves and kind of creating, like worst case scenarios in their heads, and they don't really like have a place to put that, and they just keep going and going and thinking about it, and it distracts them from their work. And so another thing you might want to do is share your own experience. When I was leading a large team through difficult times, I often didn't share my perspective because I didn't want to share, like, any negative feelings I felt like, as a leader, I always needed to create a positive vibe, and, you know, like, I would open up the space for people to share things, but I never want it to be coming from me, and I got feedback from my team of saying, like, Are you like, a real human because you only have positive emotions? And like, Do you really think everything's great? Because, like, we don't believe everything's great, and we have, like, genuine concerns, and it feels like you're just like, either blind to that or you don't understand. And so it's like harder to connect. And so I think that whenever we are honest and transparent with our teams, maybe about how we're feeling, it kind of validates them, and they feel seen and heard, and it also builds connection to you as a human, not just like this robot manager. You know when, like a leader just says the thing out loud, and everyone just kind of breathes a collective sigh of relief, because they've all been thinking about it and talking about it amongst themselves, so maybe just acknowledging it, either in a group or one on one of like, hey, it's a time of high anxiety. It's election week. I understand that you probably are having some thoughts about that, or feelings. I just want you to know that I understand that I'm feeling that too, and I'm here to support you. 

Leanna Laskey McGrath  9:17  

And then the third thing is, I think offering support and or open conversations, and that's up to you. I think that's very specific to the environment and the culture of the company. It might feel really risky, especially in our current political environment, but it might make sense to offer support, to talk to you, if anyone is really kind of being negatively impacted by the anxiety that's happening right now, whether that's you, whether that's HR, whatever resources are available within your company, just reminding people that they have support at work and you might be able to facilitate productive conversations about how people are feeling and how it's impacting their work, and maybe folks can kind of have a space to share that and even strategize about how they can continue to remain productive or continue to contribute in positive ways during this challenging time. Or maybe they, you know, when you have that conversation, people create support within each other, within the team. Maybe they talk about ways that they're coping and that helps somebody else whenever, you know, there's that space to kind of talk through that. So it doesn't need to be about the issues or anything like that. It can be just more about how is the team responding to the current events? 

Leanna Laskey McGrath  10:46  

And then the fourth thing that I want to offer, this is something that I think is so interesting right now that it's been happening with social media and algorithms. I think the reason why it feels so scary to open conversations, the reason why our political climate just feels like a battleground rather than a place where we can have open conversations, is because of the way that we use technology and that algorithms are essentially creating echo chambers for us. So anytime we like content, then we see more content like that. And now that we've been using social media for so many years, we pretty much are constantly seeing content that confirms our beliefs. It just makes us become more and more rooted in our beliefs, and it's like we become a little bit less open to changing our minds, because we have so much evidence to prove ourselves right in that belief. And I just think it's really important to acknowledge this and recognize that this is happening to all of us, that the type of media we consume and the things that we view and like and engage with are going to continuously put us like on a more and more narrow scope of content that we are going to continue consuming. And I think about this all the time with folks who believe something very different from me politically, that I am seeing all the evidence as to why that's a terrible idea, right? I continuously get bombarded with data and reasons of why my belief is right and their belief is wrong, and that's happening to that other person too. The content that they are consuming is telling them why their beliefs are right, and they are getting more and more grounded in their beliefs, and they're being told why my beliefs are wrong, and I think it's important that we acknowledge this and recognize it, especially whenever we're really upset about someone else's beliefs. I just always think, if I were watching the same news channel that they were watching every day, if I were consuming the same kind of content, reading the same kind of stories every day, I might have that belief too, like, I might come to the same conclusion as they are, but it's almost like we have totally different information, and we're receiving totally different information. And even if it's like, you know, we think, well, it doesn't even make sense. Why would they even believe that? I mean, the reality is is like, when you're shown the same kind of information from different angles that continues to confirm the same conclusion. It's hard to just be like, yeah, no, that's definitely wrong, because it's constantly telling you, this is what to believe, and you're right in your belief. And here's more evidence, here's more evidence, here's more evidence. 

Leanna Laskey McGrath  13:56  

I think two great things to watch if you're interested in learning more about this, I love the Social Dilemma documentary that was on Netflix. I thought that was so interesting. It showed that more people were more moderate 10 years ago, or however, many years ago, and now everyone is kind of moving more to the outside, either one way or the other. And I think you know, when I reflect on my own experience, I can see that in myself, and I can see that in so many other people too. And it's just like these factors that are at play in our society and in the technology that we use. Another really interesting one that I watched was, kind of random. It was David Letterman's My Next Guest Needs No Introduction, and he had Barack Obama on for an interview. And I just thought it was fascinating, because Obama was talking about this. He was talking about how we are receiving different sets of information, and so therefore we are coming to different conclusions. And so in the past, whenever you were having a conversation on an issue with somebody, you could debate the issue with facts. And now it's like we can't even really debate the issue with facts, because we are debating it whether or not the facts are right and which facts are actually correct and accurate, and so it's hard to even really get to debating the issue in a civil way. And it just kind of makes having productive, fruitful conversations about politics a lot more challenging given how our brains are being trained and radicalized by the algorithms on the internet and in social media. So I just think it's important to recognize those factors that are at play. To me, it helps to give a little bit more empathy whenever people are having very opposing viewpoints, and also for me to be able to recognize it within myself that I am continuously seeing evidence to prove my point right. And I think it's just so helpful to have that self awareness. 

Leanna Laskey McGrath  16:16  

The fifth thing that I will recommend is promoting a culture of curiosity. I believe that curiosity is our saving grace. I mean, it's like something I recommend to everyone, and it's a coaching tool, curiosity over judgment, because whenever we go into a conversation with curiosity, we go in with openness. We go in with possibility, and there's just so much more room in conversations where curiosity is present. When we go into conversations where judgment is present, then it's closed, it's decided. And often, you know, I'm bringing my judgments, others are bringing their judgments. It just doesn't really leave a whole lot of room for possibility and potential. Like there's very little potential in a conversation that's full of judgment. There is so much more, there's a vast amounts of potential in a conversation that's full of curiosity. And so whenever people acknowledge that in influence of echo chambers from algorithms, then they're more likely to approach differing views with curiosity, rather than defensiveness and digging their heels in. 

Leanna Laskey McGrath  17:32  

The sixth thing I'd recommend is bringing the team back to a focus on common goals. It's so important to remind the team of the shared objectives and of the vision that we're working on together, that we need all of these diverse perspectives, sometimes to get there and to be successful as a team together. So kind of reminding everyone that like we're all here for a common purpose, even though we have differences in opinions elsewhere, can also be helpful in kind of bringing the team together. Let me just caveat this, because I think it's really important to say this after we have acknowledged the elephant in the room, after we have opened up some space for folks to share how they're feeling those kinds of things. I think if we go in and just say, like, Hey, I know there are differences here, and we need to be united as a team, because we're working towards the same goal, that feels a lot more kind of hollow and like I'm being told what I need to do and that I need to, like, kind of forget about all these things that I'm thinking and feeling right now. So I would definitely recommend this in kind of after the previous things that I'm sharing. 

Leanna Laskey McGrath  18:49  

And then finally, seven is just to lead by example. Leaders set the tone. So in terms of taking care of yourself, if you're telling your employees to take care of themselves this week, they don't actually feel that they have permission to do that unless they can look to you as a leader, that you're doing that, too. So make sure that you are taking care of yourself. If you are asking everyone to approach each other with curiosity rather than judgment, then that means that you need to be doing that too. You need to model respect and open mindedness, self awareness, self care. I think that it is so important for us to remember that our teams are watching us and that we need to, you know, model the culture that we want to create in our workplace and at home as well. I think it's so important as well that you know how we're feeling, depending on the age of our kids, they might be noticing or hearing about, you know, these things too, at school or in their community, and so also having conversations with them, being honest about how you're feeling and the things that you're doing to take care of yourself, so that they can start to learn those ways to take care of themselves as well and also know that that's important in validating them, just like we validate our teams at work. So I hope that this is helpful for you as we are navigating these challenging times, it's so important to support our teams and support our kids and our families and our communities. 

Leanna Laskey McGrath  20:24  

And I will just say one more time, first, we need to make sure we support ourselves. So if you take nothing else away from this today, please just go ask yourself, what do I need right now? How can I meet my needs? And then go and do it. Make sure it happens, because it's so important, and just remember, you know, some thoughts might be offered by your brain of, well, I can't take time for myself, or I can't take care of myself because I have all these other things to take care of. We have the opportunity to teach people and show people how we can take care of ourselves while also taking care of others. So I hope this is helpful. I am sending so much love out to everybody during this week, and I hope you have a great rest of your week. Thank you so much and talk to you next week.

Leanna Laskey McGrath  21:17  

Thanks so much for tuning in to the executive coach for moms podcast. Please like, subscribe or follow the show so you'll be notified when the next episode is available. I hope you'll join me again next time. Take care.