Shownotes

My guest for the 27th episode of the podcast is Maya Sadasivan, a friend I have known for over three decades. A fortnight ago when I mooted the idea of creating a space for women in our network she didn't hesitate for a second. She stepped in, offering to facilitate the WellBeing+sessions, carving out time from her intensely busy work schedule. We recorded the WellBeing+ Mantra session on the weekend and here it is.... 

The episode is packed with great advice from this leadership coach and mentor about why it is important for individuals to start with their personal wellbeing; simple strategies for coping with uncertainty; identifying certainties; psychological safety; creating mind space and time space..........

Listen to the full episode on Apple, Spotify or Google Podcasts

Passages from the episode

👉🏾 Thank you Maya for being a guest on The Elephant in the Room podcast

👉🏾 So The Purpose Room held well-being plus drop-in session yesterday. And we did that in response to the current situation in India. We wanted to provide our small community with a safe space to talk about things that matter to them at this point and talk about how they were coping. So the idea was to create a supportive environment for them. 

From the session, my three big takeaways were that it's okay for all of us not to be okay. And what the past year has done specifically if you look at India as a country, is that it has brought conversations about mental health to the forefront and into our living rooms, because there's such a stigma around anything to do with mental health. This doesn't mean the stigma has gone away, but that it is more acceptable to talk about issues that people are facing. And the second was that leaders and coaches need downtime too, and it's okay to unplug and not try to save the world. We're constantly in that mode where we react and respond and we want to do something, take some action. So probably the idea is to step back and look at yourself and see how you're feeling.

👉🏾 The third point from the young people in the room, I learnt that organisations need to do more to be supportive. Because a lot of the people feel that they're not supported, they didn't have the confidence to voice their challenges to managers. The issues that we need to think about is around psychological safety, whether line managers are sensitised around the needs of employees working from home.The blurring of boundaries between personal and professional, the never-ending day. And the reality is like a lot of people in India, live in a flat. There'll be generations of people living in that house and they may have caring responsibilities or may not have caring responsibilities. Isolation has been a big issue for them and you were there yesterday providing great insights and counsel to the people in the room, on how they could cope or how they could deal with those situations. To start with what were your takeaways from the session yesterday?

👉🏾 Sudha, one of the strongest takeaways for me was the realisation that we, as people, we as human beings are fundamentally instinctively supportive. I think in today's times more than understanding, the value is for accepting, are we being unconditionally accepted with all our worries, our apprehensions, our uncertainties, and when we voice it, is there an acceptance that it's okay to feel so?

The second takeaway for me was, as one of the participants mentioned, in spite of our hectic schedule in spite of our activity driven world and life, this one hour which wasn't easy, but we all still grabbed because it was so important to stand and stare, to be still to centre ourselves and to be mindful. And, you know, the most beautiful thing Sudha, no one is really looking for or expecting solutions, answers. They were just looking for a space where they could hold each other's hands, centre themselves. And at the end, the energy shift was so high, we kind of got back to our regular life with greater energy. One of the reasons that I initially joined the session was, myself as a coach, I had started asking " am I giving and am I giving enough?" And I'll be honest by the end of the session I realised, everyone is giving in their own way, whenever they can, however they can. And I think that in sort of doubting whether we are giving or not, if we can acknowledge and appreciate ourselves that brings in tremendous inner strength.

👉🏾 This is one of the most oft-asked questions, this pandemic has turned every employee, every individual's everyday life into a VUCA space, it is volatile, it is uncertain, it is complex and it is ambiguous. When you look at this space that we are in today, one of the most important need for us as a human being is, to feel in control. And to feel in control one of the most crucial elements is to feel certain. The most helpful suggestion I can make here is, instead of looking at an all or nothing space of certainty, identify what are the certainties in our life today. Love of family, a roof over our head and food to eat. The fact that those of us who are still holding jobs do get a monthly salary. What are the certainties in our life? Even if they're only one or two Sudha, identifying the certainty in our life makes us better equipped to face the uncertainty in our life.

👉🏾 This is my first thought that I would like to share that, identify the certainties because all of us have certainties. The second thing is, create that time-space and mind space for being more consciously aware. Not of the people around us, not necessarily your circumstances, because if you notice Sudha, from morning till night, we are running around our day with labels on us. We may be spouses, we may be siblings, we may be children, we may be colleagues, we may be boss, we may be subordinate. But these are labels, which we are living. Through that hectic day find minutes, it doesn't have to be hours, just minutes where you stand and you are mindful. And when I talk about mindful, I'm talking about being relaxed, yet alert, conscious yet, not judgmental.

👉🏾 This question of yours Sudha, actually reminds me of the time when we used to take flights and when the air hostess used to announce that when the cabin pressure drops and the oxygen mask drops the first thing you do is give yourself oxygen so you’re equipped to save and support and help people around you.

And I think that philosophy just underlines the need today for every one of us to nurture ourselves so that we are capable of handling our circumstances and our loved ones in that circumstance. See at the end of the day Sudha, we cannot give from an empty cup, right? We have to be full of compassion, thoughtfulness and energy. And for us to be full of compassion, thoughtfulness and energy we need to be very sure about what are the certainties that give us strength. What is the freedom we have to be kind compassionate and thoughtful in our environment.

And so it is extremely important that we nurture ourselves a little every day, so that rest of the day, we have amazing amounts to share. And to give. 

👉🏾 Yes Sudha. It is something that is very dear to me. It's a very simple routine. And in fact when I talked about relaxed alertness and nonjudgmental consciousness. I must admit, Is it simple? Yes, does it come easy? May not be. So here's what I do at the end of the day, no matter what time it is. I always step out of the house, I stand by the gate and I'm very fortunate to have this very fragrant Jasmine climber next to the gate and in that stillness of the night there's a slight breeze and there's this fragrance in the air and I become an observer. I'm very conscious of the feel on my skin, the fragrance I'm inhaling, the stillness. I can almost feel the stillness, Sudha. And while I am experiencing that moment, I am relaxed, yet I'm alert to all my five senses. I am conscious, at the same time I am not judging anything around me. It's almost as if I'm embracing the stillness in the air within me, and I carry that stillness to bed, and I sleep well. Like I said, is it easy? May not be. But is it impossible? Certainly not!

👉🏾 You're so right Sudha in that. In fact, let me share with you some things I do, when in the middle of a hectic day, I suddenly feel a little frustrated. At these moments, I tend to have certain things around me. It could be a coaster, it could be a table mat. Anything that has a little bit of a rough texture and then usually I just close my eyes and I feel that the texture with my fingertips. And trust me immediately, I feel centred because I am sensing the texture, I am not analysing the texture. 

And the moment you stop analysing it just takes a second or two for us to be centred. Another interesting one that I'd like you to try out Sudha is, just close your eyes and hear the farthest sound that you can make out, and hear the closest sound that you can make out.

Simple strategies, simple techniques, takes just a few seconds and that is all it requires for your heartbeat to get back to normal. And the moment your mind is just clear, the creativity, the innovation aspect, the energy, everything just comes back.

👉🏾 The immediacy with which a company responds to creating safety for their employees is the first step. So for example, there's an MNC that I know that created mantra. It was like "we are a team, we look after each other and we look after ourselves". And every day in the meetings, they would chant this. I know of a company where within three days flat, and the company doesn't have a work from home policy, but in three days flat across five locations, all employees were geared up for work from home.

👉🏾 The immediacy with which the companies responded is one of the first steps towards psychological safety that an employee would experience. And then I must admit that after the immediacy of support, there were about six to eight months of sheer confusion where companies had to change policies to deal with the circumstances and the changes.

👉🏾 So it did take time. The strategies for employee engagement played an important role. It is not just limited to the human resources, the learning and development team, like the line managers everybody has to come together and they have come together to create this space of psychological safety. We cannot attribute this job as it were to one entity. 

👉🏾 So if you look at the HR, they came up with more flexible work hours, to accommodate the work from home space. If you look at the learning and development in many companies, they came up with very apt wellness programs.

And like you mentioned, none of us necessarily have the luxury of a corner in the house, which is isolated so that we can sit and do our work. We have bandwidth issues, internet connectivity issues, and these need to be dealt with. And then of course, very important, the third element, the line managers. Here, and I would like to highlight that we tend to ask, how are you only if we are confident that we can support you. And to deconstruct this thought in line managers, I had the opportunity to run a few very specific programs.

The line managers have to realise that giving them that empathetic space, creates amazing psychological safety than any physical action of theirs. I have really realised that we don't ask people, how are you? If you're not sure if we can help them or not, and we need to get over that. 

👉🏾 Honestly when we look at an organisational perspective, there is a natural tendency to look at senior management. When I think of organisational perspective, I look at it across hierarchy and I think that's extremely important because the crux of the fear factor is in the ground level rather than in the senior level.

👉🏾 One of the things that the organisation could do is create greater visibility of the C suite with the employees, webinars session, regular circulars appreciating and acknowledging their employees and in the meantime, offering support. Greater visibility of decision makers across hierarchy with periodicity that is important,. The second thing that I would recommend is that bringing more learning in those spaces. Let me share an example of an amazing consultant that we hired recently. And this person joined the company and within a month, the pandemic hit, we went into lockdown and this amazing leader, she was handling three projects with about 170 employees. None of whom had met each other. And you know Sudha the most interesting thing is, she chose learning as a tool to create connection between project teams. So she sat with the learning and development team, created a series of programs, which were conducted once a week for one hour or two hours each.

👉🏾 And then she would use those learning programs to connect with her team members, to share her thoughts and get thoughts from them. So I think it was amazing how creatively a leader was able to create togetherness in teams that have not even met each other. The third point is something that the youngsters who have joined a company could work on, and I think it works at every level. Create relationships with your team members, your managers, so that during a crisis, when you really need support, you can leverage that relationship. Let's look at that aspect. How can we demonstrate sensitivity without compromising business outcomes.

👉🏾 This something that has actually foxed me in the last few months, as to how a generation can actually be living in their mobile. Yet, if you ask them to connect with their managers, if you ask them to connect with their team members, the expectation is, I'm new they should connect with me. I would encourage the young generation to be curious.

The more they are curious, trust me, the more they will create visibility and the more they create visibility, the more they will find spaces to be included into the team culture. Because you don't know the team members, you don't know what the project is or process is. So be curious, ask questions. As you ask questions you create a persona that says, I want to know, I want to be included. And then as people respond to you, you start building relationships, you start building connects, you start building go-to people and that's how we start getting a feeling of being more included in the team. 

👉🏾 And there was this question that you asked about managers, having the need to feel in control. One of the things that I often recommend is that micromanage process and protocol so that you can macro manage people. See we need to give a sense of flexibility and freedom to people. 

👉🏾 I think this is so very crucial and so very critical for all of us to know what is a break for us. If we have this clarity Sudha, this certainty, like I mentioned, at the beginning of our conversation, That certainty, "I need a break, why I need a break, how long do I need a break, and how will it affect my work". If we have certainty on this, this will give us the confidence to raise a voice. And when we raise the voice about wanting a break, I would recommend that we talk about that intent. So let's start conversation with why do we need a break. And then we create a space for a conversation, a discussion, a negotiation to make that break happen. It is natural that in an organisation, no matter how understanding people are, there's always an urgent, critical escalation that is happening. And there's always an emergency that's happening. And there's always a deliverable.  

See, I always believe that if you want your leader to show you empathy, then you as a team member need to show empathy. Trust me, like I said in the beginning, we're all human beings and we are all supportive. We just need to elicit that supportive part of our managers. 

👉🏾 I know, in fact I do realise that it is not easy, especially when most of us are not really wired to think that it is okay to ask for ourselves. We may ask for our family members. We may ask for our colleagues, we may ask for our friends. But when it comes to asking for ourselves, suddenly it becomes too much a work. Isn't it strange. Like if our spouse was not well, or child was not well, our parents were not, well. We would not hesitate to do what it takes to negotiate with our bosses. But when it comes to ourselves, you're so right Sudha, we hesitate and in that hesitation, our tipping point is not forward it's backward. There I'd go back to the oxygen mask. 

👉🏾 I can actually conduct full sessions on these two points. I would say to be productive, identify your brain alive time. At which time in the day, do you really feel that your brain is alive? And at those moments, usually, it could be anywhere between half an hour to two hours at your brain alive spaces. Slot what is challenging, what is problematic, what needs creativity? If you can challenge these really tough things during your brain alive time Sudha, one is able to complete them faster and when one completes them faster, a larger chunk of time is available for mundane activities. 

That is one strategy I would recommend for productivity. And for nurturing oneself, something that you and I have discussed, find a few minutes of mind space and time-space and nurture yourself because at the end of the day, we matter we are precious and we are alive

👉🏾 Thank you Sudha helpful having me with you for this conversation. And I think the most beautiful part was, you actually helped me articulate a lot of things that I hold in my head and heart, but now it is out there in the space of giving and sharing. Thank you Sudha

Follow Maya on: 

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/systemicoachmaya/?originalSubdomain=in

Twitter: @MayaSadasivan

Important Links

https://thepurposeroom.org/wondering-what-stops-an-assertive-you-at-work-place/