These
transitions are so widespread that executives and managers alike have
no choice but to step in and try to help. The good news: There is
evidence on how to help employees navigate these types of events.
I
spent the last five years talking to people about the biggest
transitions their lives. What I learned is that the average adult
experiences around three dozen disruptors in the course of their lives,
that’s one every 12 to 18 months. These disruptors can be involuntary (a
downsizing or a cancer diagnosis) or voluntary (starting a new venture,
having a child).
We
get through most of these disruptors with relative ease. We adjust,
draw on our support networks, and move on. But every now and then, one
of these disruptors — or more commonly a pileup of two, three or four or
them — rises to the level of truly disorienting and destabilizing us. I
call these events “lifequakes” because they’re higher on the Richter
Scale of consequence and have aftershocks that last for years.
The
pandemic represents a massive, collective lifequake. But while this
lifequake has been involuntary, the life transition that grows out of it
must be voluntary. We must choose to take the steps. A life transition,
at its heart, is the period of adjustment, creativity, and rebirth that
helps one find meaning after a major life upheaval.
So
what role do managers play in this process? A hallmark of the first
century of management theory was that “personal issues” like lifequakes
should be kept separate from “office issues”; “work” and “family” need
not mix. When private matters did arise, the advice was often: Take a
leave of absence; use your personal days; let us know when you’re back
on the job.
That
strict separation of church and state had already been eroding in
recent years with the influx of more moms into the workplace, more dads
into the parenting space, and 24/7 connective technology into every
space. The once-airtight membrane that divided work life from family
life had already become more porous.
The
pandemic has blown that membrane to smithereens. Working remotely,
supervising children doing remote learning, even something as relatively
minor as finding a quiet space for an uninterrupted call have all
forced changes. Issues that were once the sole domain of family are now
the undeniable terrain of business.
The
bottom line: At exactly the moment your employees most need you, you
need a plan to address entire realms of their lives. Here, based on my
research, are four pieces of advice you can give to help your team
members manage their life transitions in a way that doesn’t upend their
work lives.
Start with transition superpowers.
The most valuable thing a manager can provide someone going through a life transition is calm, empathic perspective: You will get through this.
That posture begins with pointing out that transitions have a clear
structure that may not always be apparent to someone just entering one.
Transitions
involve three phases. I call them “the long goodbye,” in which you
mourn the old you; “the messy middle,” in which you shed habits and
create new ones; and “the new beginning,” in which you unveil your fresh
self. Each person tends to gravitate to the phase they’re best at
(their transition superpower) and bog down in the one they’re weakest at
(their transition kryptonite). And most important of all, these phases
need not happen in order.
The
best advice: Start with your superpower. Since managers tend to know
the strengths and weaknesses of their employees, helping them determine
where to begin would be a simple and helpful step. Those who excel at
navigating emotions might start with the long goodbye; those who excel
at blocking out noise and plunging into challenging initiatives might
begin with the new beginning; those who excel at spreadsheets or complex
tasks might begin with the messy middle.
Rob
Adams, for example, was a management consultant from Cincinnati who
took over the Simon Pearce glassware company 10 days after the Great
Recession hit in 2008. While it took him a year to accept defeat in that
job, once he did, he quickly pivoted and moved his family to Africa to
run a nonprofit. “Saying goodbye was hard for me,” he said. “But once I
was done, I relished the messy middle. I’m a consultant; fixing problems
is my expertise.”
Use rituals to say goodbye.
The
long goodbye has proven to be particularly challenging during the
pandemic. Early on, most of us expected we would absorb the impact of
the virus, then return to normal. After a while, we realized we weren’t
going back. The key to navigating a shift like this is to accept that
it’s an emotional experience. I asked hundreds of people the biggest
emotion they struggled with in their life transition. Fear was the most
popular reaction, followed by sadness and shame. Some people cope with
these emotions by writing down their feelings; others plunge into new
tasks.
But
eight in 10 say they turn to rituals. They held memorial services, got
tattoos, visited sweat lodges, purged. Following a brutal year in which
she lost her job in Hollywood, had a blowup with her mother, and went on
52 first dates, Lisa Rae Rosenberg jumped out of an airplane. “I had a
terrible fear of heights, and I thought, If I can figure this out, I can
figure anything out.” A year later she was married with a child.
Managers
can play a helpful role in this process by encouraging colleagues to
use collective, symbolic gestures or experiences, either with colleagues
or not, as a way of making the statement that they’re going a change
and are ready for what comes next.
Everyone profits from sharing.
Many
of the tools for navigating transitions are connected to one of the
three phases. But one tool has no temporal element at all: It floats, it
reoccurs; it happens all the time. It’s sharing your story with others,
and it’s one part of a life transition where managers can be most
impactful, by welcoming, even encouraging, team members to open up about
their challenges.
Human
beings like to share. Personal revelation releases soothing chemicals
in our brains and activates special systems in our bodies that help us
relate better to others. When people relate their most traumatic
experiences, their blood pressure, heart rate, and other physiological
functions rise in the short term, but afterward fall to below where they
were before their confessions — and remain there for weeks afterward.
When
Dwayne Hayes, who working in publishing in Michigan, returned to work
after his wife gave birth to stillborn twins, he hoped to avoid people
and bunker down in his cubicle. A colleague whose wife had been pregnant
at the same time, approached him in the hallway and offered a hug. “It
was exactly what I needed,” he said.
My
research shows that people respond to different kinds of advice. Around
a third of people, like Dwayne Hayes, prefer what I call comforters (I
love you; I trust you; you can do it); a quarter prefer nudgers (I love
you, but maybe you should try this); while a sixth prefer slappers (I
love you, but get over yourself). While encouraging team members to
communicate about their transitions can be valuable, don’t make
assumptions about the type of feedback they’d like to hear. Ask before
you advise.
Priorities will change.
A
life transition is fundamentally a meaning-making exercise. It is an
autobiographical occasion, in which we are called on to revise and
retell our life stories, adding a new chapter in which we find meaning
in our lifequake. The lifequake itself may have been positive or
negative, but the story we tell about it has an ending that’s upbeat and
forward-looking.
This
may be the most important role managers can play. Clearly communicate
that everyone is dealing with the same kinds of adjustments; reassure
them that minor accommodations in their work schedules are not an
existential threat to their jobs; remind them that life is nonlinear and
that modest career oscillations, even ones that oblige them to step
away for a while, are not permanent and can altered once the pandemic
passes.
Above
all, stress to them a truth we all need to be reminded of these days:
transitions work. Ninety percent of the people I spoke with got through
their difficult time. By being an outlet as well as a source of both
wisdom and comfort, you’re not just being a good colleague and friend,
you’re also being a good leader.
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