Matt Olney and Matt Watchinski, leaders at Cisco Talos, share their insights
I have the privilege of having managers in my team who are also managers of their respective teams, and I want to draw attention to something for people who are in that position. If you are engaged with your people and know about the pain that some of your employees might be feeling, you might have a tendency to internalize those struggles yourself.
I've had a couple of long conversations with some of my managers to walk them through that so they’re aware of it. I say, “You're not just dealing with what you're dealing with. You also have around 15 people that you're looking out for that depend on you. And they're also suffering.”
If you’re a naturally empathetic person, you can take their struggles to heart. Sometimes we blame ourselves for them.
I would advise trying to be especially cognizant of that. If you’re a manager of managers, make sure that you're talking to your managers about that additional burden which they may not be accustomed to dealing with.
It's important for a leader to show vulnerability from time to time. You can’t have everyone on your team thinking that you’re impenetrable. People will look up to that and may think that they must live up to a standard that doesn't actually exist.
Expressing these struggles helps to build trust, and it enables your people to come talk to you about what they’re going through.
There's a time to lead from the front. There's also a time to lead from the rear and show people that you are a human being.
When it comes to self-care, what works for me is doing something simple, yet active, that doesn't require a whole lot of mental energy. I have a wood pile of trees that fell in my backyard, and I like to go out and chop the “old fashioned way,” that is, get the axe out.
It's not an overly complicated activity to swing an axe. And at the end of the day, you have a nice big pile of wood, so you've accomplished something. You can go stack it up and use it in a fire pit later when you have your family out on the patio. It's a nice simple activity that doesn’t require a ton of mental energy and allows you to focus on a simple task.
