Five strategies for building and communicating Hope in your organisations’ teams

Leadership through Crisis – Five strategies for building and communicating Hope in your organisations’ teams.

Emintell is a high-quality provider of conscious leadership and executive coaching services, based in the East Midlands. Since 2011, we have worked with organisational clients, both nationally and internationally supporting them build their leadership capability. Predominantly, we work with senior leaders and their teams, in both private and public sectors, across a diverse range of industry sectors.

This is part of a series of articles exploring how senior leaders and teams support themselves and their people, maintain focus, commitment and their psychological health as they navigate through this extraordinary period of ambiguity and adaptation. In this first article, we are looking at “Hope” and how leaders can imbue hope in their organisational teams.

In the Cambridge dictionary Hope is defined as “to want something to happen or to be true, and usually have a good reason that it might”. A crisis can be described “as a time of intense difficulty or danger, and a time when difficult and important decisions need to be made. “

In the midst of any crisis, Hope is a crucial ingredient in keeping people connected and motivated in the absence of any real certainty or clarity.  The importance of a leader and their relationship to hope is as important now as it ever was. Napoleon Bonaparte, arguably one of history’s greatest military leaders allegedly said: “A leader is a dealer in hope”.

This quality was never more needed that at this unprecedented time in our history. Political, scientific, organisational and community leaders are being looked to for reassurance and direction, but ultimately in the midst of a crisis it is hope that people most require. Hope lifts spirits in a way that few other emotions do. It is most akin to joy, but the nuance is different as it is an anticipatory feeling, an expectation of a future positive outcome. Hope is often coupled with high motivation, optimism, and a generally elevated mood. It offers a glimpse of joy, a feeling that “this too shall pass” and future life will be better for ourselves, our loved ones and our communities.

How do leaders imbue hope, amid a major crisis, where there is much ambiguity and the future viability and direction of the organisation is unclear? Here are five key strategies for effecting this successfully.

Clear, transparent communications with consistent core messages delivered regularly.

The most important is clear and consistent communication delivered with honesty, authenticity and heart, but always underpinning the core message, the leader integrates a message of determination and hope that we will overcome this, clearly indicating a better future for the business and all its stakeholders. Leaders need to communicate through as many mediums as are appropriate to their business, and to do so on a much more regular and consistent basis, than they would normally. A great irony is that at a time when there is the least amount of clear information, people have the greatest emotional need for it. Being able to hear and see a leader at times of crisis is of key importance. This means, even the most naturally introvert of business leaders must learn to become more comfortable with becoming much more visible.

People appreciate when leaders are honest about the things they are getting right and also where they could be doing a lot better during a business crisis or other major upheaval or transformation programme.

A recent example of this was the announcement by Eric Juan, CEO of Zoom technologies, who spoke for two hours on a live streaming platform openly admitting they had made serious mistakes, when the major security deficiencies in its’ software application programme became apparent as Zoom use took off exponentially. Importantly, in referencing these key errors, he said “For that, I am truly deeply sorry”. In the same message of apology, he also made a detailed and unequivocal commitment to resolve the issues, promising a much more secure encrypted platform to be available in the Autumn. He also committed to delivering a weekly webinar enabling the user community and other stakeholders’ regular updates on progress in addressing the technologies deficiencies. In a crisis situation, when leaders are not being honest and transparent, people sense it and the result is loss of trust and potential reduced engagement by its employees, leading to a potential additional negative impact on the business brand.

Acknowledgement – Human suffering and impact.

The messages must always acknowledge the suffering of others, the negative impacts the crisis or major trauma is having on their people. A good leadership example of this is Governor Andrew Cuomo of New York. During the current crisis he has not hid the facts, he is very honest in his messages, acknowledges the suffering, impacts and efforts of people. Crucially, he also offers a core message of hope in every communication. Leaders need to acknowledge their own humanity and reveal in some way how they are impacted or suffering as a result of the crisis. Here the focus of the message is on showing empathy and understanding for others, recognising our common humanity, which is all part of the message “We are in this together”

Maintaining two-way communication pathways, and creating a forum of safety and trust

The communication pathways naturally need to be two way. What teams of people need, especially when they have either been furloughed for the foreseeable future or working remotely is the opportunity to keep in touch with colleagues and their leader, to have their concerns and anxieties heard and acknowledged, as well as focussing on practical strategies and projects to keep the business viable whilst the period of crisis continues.  The emotional landscape and tone will be largely informed by that of its team leader and the senior leadership team.  Good levels of emotional intelligence and management will be required.  Striking a balance between honest communication and retaining an up-beat optimistic undertone can be challenging. It will require some discipline on the part of the senior leadership team’s members to retain this consistent tone.

Structure and discipline

Keeping team members focussed on achievable tasks over which they have a degree of control and influence is another important strand in the overall strategy of retaining Hope and focus.  Even in the most extreme of crisis situations, a senior leader knows that keeping team members busy and focused on tasks that reduce the time on negative ruminating and focusing is imperative.

“Difficulties are just things to overcome, after all.”
Ernest Shackleton, Artic explorer.

Ernest Shackleton, leader of the infamous expedition to cross Antarctica via the South Pole in 1914, knew a lot both about Hope, discipline and endurance. When the “Endurance” boat became impacted in the ice for a number of months, he knew that keeping the men busy on tasks was imperative in terms of retaining discipline, focus and Hope. Each member of the boat’s crew had his role, others had adapted or new roles, such as keeping the sled dogs fit or fixing leaks and other parts of the boat, as it tried to resist the pressure of the ice. When the boat eventually sank, he kept that discipline and hope, re-orienting the team to a new purposed and focus, as they took the next leg of a most extraordinary journey of human hope and survival.

Vision for the future

As soon as possible, senior leadership teams must start to create and communicate a vision of a viable business re-emerging in the future. Even if there are uncertainties about its’ eventual modus operandi, developing and communicating an emerging vision of what is possible is crucial. Keeping it simple is key to this. The vision needs to be communicated in a number of formats, accommodating the main types of learning and communication preferences of the business stakeholders. The intention is always on providing some shape of clarity, and a clear idea of the future, that people can focus on, one which acts as important ballast against a sea of current unresolved ambiguity. Using simple metaphors, stories and analogies can be useful to capture attention and appeal to people’s imagination to the power of possibility, and of course, the most important emotional ingredient of all Hope.

In the next post we will be looking at how leaders and their teams can manage their emotions and optimise their strengths as leverage to help themselves and their team members, proactively recover and manage their states of well-being and resourcefulness, through this crisis.

Emintell is an agile enabler of conscious leadership solutions for senior leaders, senior managers and their teams, which it delivers through specialist support;

Master Level Executive Coaching   Team Coaching   Resilience and Wellbeing Services

If you are interested in having a conversation with us about how we can support you and your teams through this crisis period and beyond,  please call Emintell on 0203 733 2335 or email hello@emintell.com