Anxiety and Leadership

It is too easy to be an anxious leader because leaders often have to venture into the unknown and the unknown can be very anxiety producing. When leaders operate out of anxiety and that anxiety level is higher than those they lead, those they lead will always raise their anxiety level to match or exceed their leaders. It only makes sense. If the leader knows more about this than I do and they are more anxious about it than I am, then there must be something I should be anxious about! When that happens you can create a crisis that wasn’t there to begin with.

There will always be things we don’t know and our gut level tendency is to react and react quickly. This only makes anxiety worse and produces a great anxiety in those we lead. We cannot allow anxiety cause us to be reactionary. Instead we need to proactive and engage the situation to whatever degree we can. We need to be thoughtful in considering how others are experiencing the same thing. We must communicate clearly what we know, normalize what we can and have a calmness that allows those around us to feel at ease about things to whatever degree they are able.

Leaders will face anxiety. That is a given. It is how you deal with it that will raise or lower the anxiety level of those you lead.