{"id":4879,"date":"2021-07-13T13:43:38","date_gmt":"2021-07-13T13:43:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/tpcleadership.com\/de-en\/uncategorized\/leading-under-pressure-2-2\/"},"modified":"2025-12-15T16:27:49","modified_gmt":"2025-12-15T16:27:49","slug":"leading-under-pressure-2-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tpcleadership.com\/de-en\/developing-leaders\/leading-under-pressure-2-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Leading under pressure"},"content":{"rendered":"

The word pressure is thrown around a lot in leadership circles. But pressure is a broad term when discussing how it might be navigated. Growing the capacity to\u00a0lead under pressure\u00a0is essential if an\u00a0emerging leader<\/i>\u00a0is to become effective. But an understanding of what kind of pressure you are facing is equally important if you do not plan on burning out \u2013 and to ensure you avoid making rash decisions in the name of rising to the occasion.<\/p>\n

Each type of pressure is its own leadership challenge<\/b><\/h2>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve been trained to think of pressure as the enemy, the unfair burden that holds us down\u2026Pressure is nothing more than the shadow of a great opportunity.\u201d \u2013 Michael Johnson, Slaying the Dragon<\/i><\/p>\n

The two main kinds of stress caused by a single event or stimulus (stressors) are eustress and distress.<\/p>\n

Eustress is a healthy response to a stressor. It inspires us to engage at a deeper level, dive into the moment and increase our performance. When stimulated in this way we are able to respond and adapt effectively, often with a sense of fulfilment swiftly following. This is the kind of stress we cannot afford to avoid if we want to grow.<\/p>\n

Distress is an unhealthy (but often inevitable) response to a stressor. We believe the challenges to be greater than our resources \u2013 either because they feel too large or too numerous. So we cope instead. We might seize up, over analysing the situation. Or blame others, to try and shift responsibility somewhere else. Or we could take control \u2013 leaping into action as the hero we think everybody clearly wants us to be.<\/p>\n

With coaching and by asking ourselves difficult questions, we can slowly shift the thoughts that underlie our distressed behaviour. This is a necessary but gradual process. In the meantime, how do we keep eustress at an optimum, while keeping distress (and subsequently destructive actions) at bay?<\/p>\n

People management under pressure<\/b><\/h2>\n

\u201cIntensity clarifies. It creates not only momentum, but also the pressure you need to feel either friction, or fulfilment.\u201d \u2013 Marcus Buckingham<\/i><\/p>\n

In the Harvard Business Review article,\u00a0How to Bounce Back from Adversity<\/i><\/a>, Joshua Margolis and Paul Stoltz say we need to be quick to move from analysing the causes of a challenging or adverse event, to making a plan of action that focuses on moving forward. Resilient people are able to move their thinking from orbiting the problem to actioning a response.<\/p>\n

On the flipside, Ron Heifetz warns in\u00a0Adaptive Leadership,<\/i>\u00a0that in times of stress, a false pressure can result in hasty decisions. \u201cYou may have been there before. You know how to rise to the occasion. Even if you do not have the foggiest idea of what to do, you have a strong incentive to give in to others\u2019 demands that you: \u2018Do something!\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Ultimately, there is not a single method that will always produce the \u2018right\u2019 response to pressure. Probably, those who usually step back and think could benefit from actioning faster and vice-versa. The key though, is that you don\u2019t perceive yourself as the sole saviour of the situation. You can retreat into your own thoughts because you are terrified what those around you expect from you. Or you can act rashly, without asking for input, in an attempt to seem like you have everything under control.<\/p>\n

The real trick is to bend with the situation, to engage with it actively while creating enough space to decouple ourselves from our immediate response. And then to face the challenge without hiding our limitations and our need for the perspectives of others.<\/p>\n

Leadership qualities to keep you in the game<\/b><\/h2>\n

We\u2019re often told that the key to learning is to get out of our comfort zones, but\u2026 Take us very far out of our comfort zones, and our brains stop paying attention to anything other than surviving the experience. \u2013 Marcus Buckingham & Ashley Goodall, HBR, The Feedback Fallacy<\/i><\/p>\n

It can be exhilarating to live on borrowed energy, but everything has a cost. Some kinds of distress can be sustained for long periods and, if left unchecked, can become chronic.<\/p>\n

We can throw ourselves into the most difficult situations because of our drive to grow and become. But we need to stay aware of when the effect takes a downward turn. The Yerkes-Dodson Law identifies a point where eustress generated by stimulation that increases performance \u2013 maximises and begins grinding down into distress and reduced performance. A desire to stay on top of things, and perhaps to be the next big\u00a0emerging leader<\/b>, can cause us to outstay our welcome in the stress zone. It\u2019s in those situations that we need to ask for help, to let go of pride and the urge to save face and to seriously engage with the\u00a0why\u00a0<\/i>behind our actions. You may find our\u00a0exploration of the link between happiness and purpose helpful.<\/p>\n

Often, the real problem is not the situation, it\u2019s the demand we place on ourselves to be in control of it.\u00a0 But we don\u2019t have to solve anything alone. The best ideas can come from anywhere. When we trust, we share out a load that was never meant for us alone.<\/p>\n

If you want to grow as a leader, difficulty will always be ahead of you. But if you invest in yourself you will be ready for it, and ready to thrive in it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The word pressure is thrown around a lot in leadership circles. But pressure is a broad term when discussing how it might be navigated. Growing the capacity to\u00a0lead under pressure\u00a0is …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4878,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"rank_math_title":"Leading under pressure - TPC Leadership","rank_math_description":"","rank_math_focus_keyword":"","editor_notices":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[],"featured-blog-post":[],"page-type":[],"class_list":["post-4879","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-developing-leaders"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tpcleadership.com\/de-en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4879","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tpcleadership.com\/de-en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tpcleadership.com\/de-en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tpcleadership.com\/de-en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tpcleadership.com\/de-en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4879"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/tpcleadership.com\/de-en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4879\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8232,"href":"https:\/\/tpcleadership.com\/de-en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4879\/revisions\/8232"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tpcleadership.com\/de-en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4878"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tpcleadership.com\/de-en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4879"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tpcleadership.com\/de-en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4879"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tpcleadership.com\/de-en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4879"},{"taxonomy":"featured-blog-post","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tpcleadership.com\/de-en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/featured-blog-post?post=4879"},{"taxonomy":"page-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tpcleadership.com\/de-en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/page-type?post=4879"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}