Leadership Derailers: Stress

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Written By kelsey duff

What Causes Our Stress at Work and What Does it Do to Us?

Have you ever cried at work? Gotten headaches, been really irritable, anxious? Felt so overwhelmed or frustrated that it was hard to do what you needed to do? If you have, you’re not alone. The American Psychological Association found in an October 2022 survey that 27% of respondents reported that most days they are so stressed they cannot function.

The causes of our stress are wide ranging and far reaching: the state of the world, the government, discrimination & inequity, money, work, health, relationships & family responsibilities, the list goes on an on.

At work, the cause of our stress has some common themes:

Do any of these ring a bell for you?

Stress is a unavoidable part of our lives, but in many ways, feels like it has grown into a giant spectre or boogeyman, almost obscuring the very real problems referenced above. Stress itself isn’t evil. It’s a physiological response to hard things. Stress is inherent in challenge, and necessary for growth. The impact of chronic stress, specifically stress that feels outside of our control, unmanageable or inescapable, is significant. Unmanaged, misunderstood, or ignored, it can absolutely impact our physical & mental health, our relationships, and our work. It can be hard to access our critical thinking, creativity, and collaboration skills when we’re feeling very stressed.

But a few years ago, I saw a TED Talk by Dr Kelly McGonigal, and it inspired me to read her book, The Upside of Stress. Both changed my thinking about stress. The tools below, pulled together from that book & and the workshop I created on the same topic, speaks directly to embracing the stress of challenge, and how doing so can not only help us grow, but helps us mitigate the negative impacts of stress.

Changing our mindsets around stress doesn’t make bad things go away. This is not a panacea to all of the very real problems and challenges that life throws at us. What this can do is help us recognize and access our own inner resources like resilience, creativity and endurance that can feel hard to reach, but can have a marked impact on our abilities to influence our worlds.

Tool(s): The Upside of Stress

"The science tells us that stress is most likely to be harmful when three things are true: 1. You feel inadequate to it; 2. It isolates you from others; 3. It feels utterly meaningless and against your will. As we’ve seen, how you think about stress feeds into each one of these factors." -Kelly McGonigal, The Upside of Stress

A Stress Is Enhancing Mindset is when we believe: 

  • Experiencing stress enhances my performance and productivity. 

  • Experiencing stress improves my health and vitality.  

  • Experiencing stress facilitates my learning and growth.  

  • The effects of stress are positive and should be utilized. 

The following 4 concepts can help us development our “stress is enhancing” mindsets:

  • Tend & befriend

  • Set bigger than self goals

  • Recognize our common humanity

  • Create community

Tend & Befriend

We’ve all heard of fight or flight, and probably freeze, but we have another psychological response to challenge: tend & befriend. That’s were we reach for and care for others when we are experiencing stress, and the result is caring creates courage & hope. This might look like reaching out to a colleague to check in on them when you’re stressed, or it might look like volunteering in your community when you’re feeling overwhelmed. We’ve all probably heard the self-care quote “you can’t pour from an empty cup” or something similar but the research is clear: caring for others refills your own cup.

  • Who can you reach out to and ask how they’re doing when you are stressed?

  • Can you solve a problem for someone else?

Bigger Than Self Goals

While our typical stress response might say we need to step back from our work to avoid burn-out, research actually shows that focusing on bigger-than-self goals helps you transform your stress. 

“When people are connected to bigger-than-self goals, they feel better: more hopeful, curious, caring, grateful, inspired, and excited. In contrast, when people are operating from self-focused goals, they are more likely to feel confused, anxious, angry, envious, lonely” -Kelly McGonigal, The Upside of Stress

  • How do your goals align with your personal values and who you want to be in your communities?

Recognize Our Common Humanity

Loneliness & the sense of feeling alone in suffering is one of the biggest barriers to accessing our resiliency & courage. McGonigal’s research points to increasing your awareness of other people’s suffering helps you feel less alone in your own. We are in a world full of people surviving and moving forward despite the hardships you see. McGonigal recommends pairing this reflection with the affirmation: “May we all know our own strength”

  • How can you illuminate common humanity for your colleagues?  

Create Community

“When you intentionally shift your focus toward helping others, you end up the recipient of more support. When you go out of your way to make sure others know that they belong, you become an important and cherished member of the community” -Kelly McGonigal, The Upside of Stress

  • How can you be the starting point for the support that you want & need?  

Changing our mindsets around stress doesn’t make bad things go away. This is not a panacea to all of the very real problems and challenges that life throws at us. What this can do is help us recognize and access our own inner resources like resilience, creativity and endurance that can feel hard to reach, but can have a marked impact on our abilities to influence our worlds.

Links for Stress: Managing, Reducing, Harnessing

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Leadership Derailers: Conflict