How To Improve Your Work Performance and Resilience With Dr. Marie-Helene Pelletier
In today’s fast-paced, high-pressure work environments, keeping up with the demands of your job can feel like a marathon. But what if there was a way to not just keep up but excel—without burning out? The key lies in building and maintaining resilience, a skill often overlooked but crucial for long-term success and well-being.
In a recent Executive Health and Life episode, I had the privilege of sitting down with Dr. Marie-Helene Pelletier, a workplace mental health expert and leadership psychologist, to discuss how resilience can be a game-changer in improving work performance. Dr. Pelletier, author of "Th” Resilience Plan," s" ared valuable insights and practical strategies that anyone can use to enhance their resilience and, consequently, their work performance. Here's what I learned.
Watch Episode
Understanding Resilience: More Than Just Bouncing Back
Resilience is often misunderstood as merely the ability to bounce back from setbacks. While that’s part of it, resilience is much deeper and more powerful. According to Dr. Pelletier, resilience is overcoming adversity and coming out even stronger on the other side. It’s not just about surviving challenges; it’s about thriving despite them.
But here’s the twist—resilience isn’t a personality trait. It’s a skill that can be developed, nurtured, and strategically implemented in your life and career. This is what Dr. Pelletier refers to as strategic resilience.
The Importance of Strategic Resilience
Think about strategic resilience as you would a business plan. When launching a new product or service, you don’t just dive in without a plan. You analyze the market, identify potential risks, and develop a strategy to maximize success. The same approach applies to resilience.
Strategic resilience involves understanding your personal and professional context, identifying potential stressors, and developing a tailored plan to strengthen your ability to handle challenges. It’s about being proactive rather than reactive.
Recognizing the Early Signs of Declining Resilience
One of the most critical aspects of resilience is awareness—specifically, being aware of the early signs that your resilience might be waning. Dr. Pelletier highlighted several indicators that high performers often overlook:
Overextension: You take on more than you can handle, even if you don’t feel exhausted.
Decreased Engagement: You’re not feeling as motivated or excited about your work as you used to.
Impatience: You find yourself becoming more irritable or short-tempered.
Concentration Issues: Tasks that once required little effort now take much longer and multiple attempts to complete.
Recognizing these signs early allows you to take action before they snowball into more significant issues like burnout or mental health challenges.
Building Resilience: Practical Exercises to Get Started
Dr. Pelletier shared some practical exercises that you can implement right away to start building your resilience:
Values Alignment: Start by identifying your core values. What’s most important to you in life? Aligning your actions and decisions with your values is crucial for maintaining motivation and purpose, which are foundational to resilience.
Supply and Demand Table: Create a simple table with two columns—demands on the left and sources of supply on the right. List all the demands on your time and energy (positive and negative), then list the things that replenish your energy. This exercise helps you identify areas where you might be overextending yourself and where you need to bolster your sources of supply.
Meditation: Incorporating meditation into your daily routine can be transformative. It helps manage stress, improves focus, and enhances overall mental well-being. Even if you’re skeptical or think meditation isn’t for you, Dr. Pelletier insists it’s worth trying—after all, we all have a brain that benefits from a little quiet time.
The Power of Collective Resilience
While personal resilience is vital, it’s equally important to think about it collectively, especially if you’re in a leadership position. Collective resilience refers to the strength of your team or organization. How well does your team bounce back from challenges? How do they handle high-pressure periods?
Building collective resilience involves open communication, proactive planning for high-demand periods, and fostering a culture that values mental health and well-being. When a team is collectively resilient, they’re better equipped to handle challenges without succumbing to stress or burnout.
Resilience as a Competitive Advantage
In today’s competitive landscape, resilience isn’t just a nice to have; it’s a strategic advantage. Organizations that prioritize resilience—both individual and collective—are better positioned to navigate challenges, adapt to changes, and maintain a focus on both internal operations and external opportunities. As Dr. Pelletier pointed out, resilient organizations can keep an eye on the big picture while managing internal demands, reducing the risk of being blindsided by external factors.
Success Redefined: Aligning with Your Values
Finally, Dr. Pelletier emphasized the importance of redefining success to align with your values. Success isn’t just about reaching the next milestone or achieving external validation—it’s about feeling fulfilled and satisfied with the direction your life and career are taking. When you’re clear on your values and your actions align with them, you’ll likely experience true, sustainable success.
Take Action: Start Building Your Strategic Resilience Today
Improving your work performance isn’t just about working harder or more intelligent; it’s about building the resilience needed to sustain high performance over the long haul. Start by incorporating the exercises shared by Dr. Pelletier into your routine, and remember that resilience is a skill you can develop and strengthen over time.
Whether you’re a leader looking to enhance your team’s resilience or an individual contributor aiming to boost your resilience, the strategies discussed in this episode are a great starting point. Take the time to invest in your resilience—it’s a game-changer that will improve your work performance and overall quality of life.
Are you interested in exploring resilience and mental health in more depth? Read Dr. Pelletier’s book, The Resilience Plan, and consider incorporating her strategies into your life. Your future self will thank you.
— Connect with Dr. Marie-Helene Pelletier —
Website: https://drmarie-helene.com/
Book: http://drmarie-helene.com/book/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/drmhpelletier/
Transcript
Dr. Marie-Helene Pelletier
(0:00) When we're anxious, we're often thinking about what's going to happen in the future, we're predicting something fairly negative or catastrophic, and we're predicting it with a fairly high level of probability. (0:12) And that's usually the recipe for now we're feeling anxious because we've created a threat, and we're believing the threat is highly likely to happen. (0:19) So of course, we're the brains reacting to this.
(0:23) And, and there could be many answers to you know, what do we do with this? (0:28) But sometimes a short way to start thinking about it is making a difference between a possibility and a probability.
Julian Hayes II
(0:40) Welcome to another episode of Executive Health and Life. (0:43) I'm your host, Julian Hayes II, back at it again, as I always say with a fascinating guest. (0:48) And today we are talking about resilience.
(0:50) And this is a blurb that my guest said in her book, most of us have an eye on our resilience when things are mostly fine. (0:57) Like on the first day, when we could be very good. (1:01) But when we get caught is on day eight.
(1:03) And you can add even further beyond that. (1:05) This is when more things are going and we have more unexpected and larger demands. (1:09) And then we're not as attentive to what we need to do to stay resilient.
(1:14) And because of these inherent demands, professionals often assume that they are naturally more resilient due to their ability to handle more than an average person. (1:23) But that's not necessarily the case. (1:26) My guest today, Dr. Marie-Helene Pelletier
is someone who knows what it's like to work in a demanding role where expectations are high and the stakes are even higher. (1:38) She's an award winning workplace mental health expert, executive coach, leadership psychologist, author of the Resilience Plan, which has been included by Inc. (1:48) and Forbes as a top five book to have your team read. (1:51) And lastly, she's a faculty member at UBC Souther School of Business.
(1:56) So without further ado, Dr. MH, how are you doing?
Dr. Marie-Helene Pelletier
(2:00) I am great. (2:01) So excited to have this conversation with you, Julian.
Julian Hayes II
(2:04) Yes, yes, I am as well. (2:06) I love this topic of resilience because as you're very familiar with a lot of times, high performers are people in high stressful industries and everything. (2:15) They're so used to just chaos around them and just being able to pride themselves on handling so much that to even slow down and admit something like, like I need to work on my resilience or I'm not feeling as good as I should be is hard for them.
(2:31) And so so before we dive into that, I'm curious, I want to go back into the past a little bit. (2:36) So if we visit you as a teenager, would we be surprised at what you're doing right now? (2:42) Or is this totally expected?
Dr. Marie-Helene Pelletier
(2:46) Oh, fun question. (2:48) In part, you would expect it's funny you say this, because I was actually looking at my high school graduation album recently, and it was saying a couple of things related to the interest in research and science. (3:04) So that aspect was there.
(3:07) Some aspects of being on stage was there as well. (3:10) I was a dancer at the time, amongst other things. (3:12) And I was very much into the outdoors.
(3:15) So some elements of both my personal and professional lives were there. (3:20) But the combination of the advanced studies in psychology and in business, and then that work in workplace mental health came as I started my career, but a bit later.
Julian Hayes II
(3:31) Okay. (3:32) And so now I want to go back into mental health a little bit. (3:35) And I was just thinking about this, maybe for the last couple of days and everything.
(3:40) And it was a conversation with some friends. (3:41) It's been four years since really the pandemic and everything has been going on. (3:45) And I was telling them that I feel like there's like a shift during that time where I just feel like a lot, I see more people, I can just sense it.
(3:54) Maybe I'm good with energy or something. (3:56) But just a lot more people seems to be going through something with their mental health. (4:00) And so I'm curious, as I'm sure that you're back on the road, traveling, doing different keynotes and trainings, have you noticed kind of a shift or residual effects or something in terms of mental health during the last four years?
Dr. Marie-Helene Pelletier
(4:16) Yes. (4:17) And I think there is a combination of variables that contributed to this observation. (4:24) There, even before the pandemic, in a number of countries, we were talking more about mental health in general, we were talking more about workplace mental health.
(4:36) And so that was there. (4:38) In Canada, there had been the Mental Health Commission that was also bringing this under radar quite a bit. (4:44) During the pandemic, we talked more about it, which is very appropriate.
(4:48) And the pandemic itself represented a chronic demand for all these years. (4:55) And to some degree, for some people, is still part of what they experienced. (5:00) And so when you look at the combination of we were starting to talk more about it as a pillar of health in general, just like we have physical, mental, financial health all together, that conversation was there, the pandemic accelerated the conversation.
(5:15) And now we have additional chronic demands that are there, whether they're political, economics, the fact that artificial intelligence is more present in both our personal and professional lives, bringing some positive results, but also creating lots of questions, lots of uncertainty, and therefore representing a chronic demand as well. (5:35) So we're experiencing more of it, we're talking more about it, and we're experiencing more demands and that can lead to more challenges.
Julian Hayes II
(5:44) And I'm always curious with the fields that people choose and everything, like what really excites them and just keeps them doing it a lot of times. (5:53) And so for you, what is it about the area of resiliency and psychology that just really fascinates you?
Dr. Marie-Helene Pelletier
(6:00) Yes. (6:01) And I would say, Julian, I would add it's the resilience, the psychology, and the strategic aspect of it, the importance of not just having this information, this list of to-do or wishing to do behaviors that would increase proactively our resilience, but how we can be strategic about it. (6:21) And what makes me on fire about this is the opportunity, the opportunity for extremely high-performing, successful individuals that are bringing fantastic contributions and that need in order to keep doing this and to do this at even higher levels, need to invest strategically in their resilience.
(6:44) So it's this opportunity that if you take it, brings you even further.
Julian Hayes II
(6:51) And what is the difference that you've noticed between mental health and in the clinical world versus the business world?
Dr. Marie-Helene Pelletier
(7:03) It's the same everywhere. (7:05) We're all humans with a physical, a financial, and a mental health. (7:10) It's there everywhere.
(7:12) But what is often an important, useful perspective is to think about mental health the same way we would think about our physical or financial health on a continuum. (7:24) And that's important, particularly with our psychological health, because sometimes we otherwise will tend to assume that this is a on or off. (7:35) You're fine or you're not.
(7:36) You're the rock or you're the wreck, right? (7:37) One extreme to the other. (7:39) The challenge with this is that it's not the reality.
(7:43) It is more of a continuum. (7:44) But if we think of it this way, what that means is we might have a slightly gradual decrease in our psychological health, but we will not pay attention or notice it until we're at the other end. (7:57) If instead we think of it more in this full continuum, that means we recognize, we're aware that we're humans, we pay attention to the signs, and it allows us to take proactive action the same way we would want to look at financial statements and grab any small information early as opposed to waiting until it's in the red, right?
(8:19) We want to do the same.
Julian Hayes II
(8:21) You mentioned early signs and early, that gradual, but slowly, decline that someone may experience. (8:30) Are there any early signs that you've noticed in people where you start to say, okay, I know what this is leading to?
Dr. Marie-Helene Pelletier
(8:38) Yes. (8:39) And I would say what often happens with high performers, professionals, leaders, is that they will have these early signs, but they will disregard them. (8:50) They will just say, well, that's normal.
(8:52) It's not a big deal. (8:52) It's nothing. (8:53) I'm not paying attention.
(8:54) I don't have time for this. (8:56) I'm fine. (8:57) But if we paid attention, we could take early action.
(9:00) And so the signs that often, especially high performers and professionals and leaders will potentially experience is just noticing that they're not completely exhausted yet, but they're overextended more than the usual. (9:20) They're not completely cynical about everything yet, but you're not feeling the engagement that you used to feel. (9:27) And you haven't made massive mistakes, but the amount and the seriousness of things falling through the cracks is a bit bigger than usual.
(9:38) You might also notice that you're more impatient than before. (9:42) You're reacting in a way that's not your usual self. (9:46) And the other one that often particularly this group will notice is a slight decrease in your concentration.
(9:53) So you're reading something, and usually you've read it, you move on, it's in, and now you've read it, and it's as if you have not read it at all. (10:04) You read it again, and it may take a few times. (10:06) And these are early signs, nothing terrible, just good signs to listen to so that you can take early actions, get out of this faster.
Julian Hayes II
(10:14) Okay. (10:14) I'm curious about this also. (10:17) And this is just me just thinking, I tend to think a lot of times that people in this high performance world are probably going to have a bit of an ego, which is good, because you need to be confident, you need to have maybe a slight percentage of delusion to believe you can do these things.
(10:35) And that's probably served you well to even rise up to these positions or to build that company. (10:42) So my thing is, how do you get the buy-in for someone to look into these types of things? (10:49) Or is it, as I say in the health world, a lot of times, people, it's not really a problem until it's a problem.
(10:56) So a lot of times, we have to experience some kind of pain that's enough to awaken us. (11:01) Is that the same case in your instance? (11:03) Or do you get sometimes clients and people that come before that happens?
Dr. Marie-Helene Pelletier
(11:08) Yes, you're 100% right. (11:12) The thing that will get people to for sure realize they need to invest is if it hurts. (11:18) If they've gotten a bit further on that continuum, and it got to a point where it's a problem, that is one circumstance.
(11:25) Another one will be if they have someone close to them who have gotten close to it like this, someone that they didn't think could ever, the reality is that it could be any of us, but sometimes that will also raise that awareness. (11:39) But I will tell you that more and more, and potentially it connects (11:43) with our first, the first part of today's conversation about increased awareness, more (11:49) and more people consider it their strategic advantage, getting into this earlier, ahead of (11:56) the curve, using that additional resource, because the kinds of things we're using in full psychological (12:03) treatment in therapy, are tools that everyone can use, even if we're not in need of these tools, (12:10) we can use them proactively. (12:12) And so that puts us in an even better position for ourselves, it increases our baseline, so to speak. (12:20) And in that sense, not everyone around you is going to do this, and therefore it creates a strategic advantage.
Julian Hayes II
(12:27) Where do you think this, I guess you could say, this renaissance of more people actually having self-awareness is coming from? (12:35) Where do you think that's been birthed from?
Dr. Marie-Helene Pelletier
(12:39) Well, it probably does connect with what we were talking about earlier. (12:43) The fact that there has been increased awareness and attention to mental health, children are hearing more about it in their education as well. (12:53) So it's much more present on everyone's mind, literally.
(12:59) And so that's one part of it. (13:02) We're also seeing that as we continue to progress in our organizations, in our teams, as AI becomes a cognitive partner on teams, on boards, in organizations, it becomes even more important to pay attention to the human side. (13:20) We're seeing more individual senior leaders having people-focused KPIs, much more people-focused KPIs, and the importance of them is much higher.
(13:31) And that all connects together. (13:34) Mm-hmm.
Julian Hayes II
(13:35) So you mentioned AI. (13:37) I'm curious, what's your overall opinions about AI, and how are you seeing it kind of infusing into your world?
Dr. Marie-Helene Pelletier
(13:46) Oh, it is infusing in everyone's world and probably even faster than we think it will. (13:53) My main angle on AI is the impact of AI in our work and personal lives, and how, as individuals, as team leaders, we can help surf that wave in a way that is going to be as healthy as possible for everyone. (14:14) And we're seeing emerging research.
(14:17) It's a lot of what I talk to our organizations and overall teams on how we need to recognize this, not wait until it's so present that we don't have a choice, ideally be as proactive as possible. (14:30) And there are a number of ways to do this. (14:33) But much similarly to how I'm arguing we very much want to be strategic and proactive about our resilience, we want the same.
(14:43) We want to be investing in our AI resilience in a proactive way, because it's here, it's going to be here in even more, in larger ways.
Julian Hayes II
(14:54) Mm-hmm. (14:55) Yeah, AI is a very interesting thing. (15:00) You're absolutely correct.
(15:02) It's in every field. (15:03) It's definitely in the health field. (15:05) It's useful because it's so much data that you can accumulate now.
(15:08) You can be much more precise when you're giving out certain KPIs and certain plans for individuals. (15:15) So are there any downsides to AI? (15:19) What are some of the top concerns that organizations have about AI?
Dr. Marie-Helene Pelletier
(15:25) Well, so I'm not going to speak on the technology aspect of things, but on the psychological, right? (15:30) The psychological, the human side of it is, one of the recent numbers I was looking at were statistics from the American Psychological Association, most recent Stress in America survey. (15:44) And reminding us, showing, which we've seen in other surveys as well, how the more individuals are worried about AI, the more they also tend to report negative impacts of their workplace on their mental health.
(15:58) Now, that's important because what we're seeing here is that the worry is making things more challenging. (16:05) We don't even know yet if the impact is going to be a challenging one, but the worry is there and has an impact. (16:11) And what that means is, is that as leaders and team members, we can do things that can mitigate that impact.
(16:20) We can bring more training. (16:22) We can create cultures of even more psychological safety where, meaning, individuals can bring their concerns, can bring differing perspectives, which will be critical to, in order to stay ethical about what decisions we make about AI. (16:40) So there is a number of ways in which the impacts can be there.
(16:46) And there are a number of ways in which we can mitigate these impacts.
Julian Hayes II
(16:53) And what we're thinking about, I'm going to dive into a little more of the resilience aspect, just, and we'll build that out. (16:59) I guess the first question is, what does resilience mean to you?
Dr. Marie-Helene Pelletier
(17:03) Yes, it's, it's, there are many definitions of resilience. (17:08) And as many writers, many researchers tend to use that same definition that I'm also using in my book. (17:15) So our ability to go through adversity and come out even stronger.
(17:22) Okay, so it means we, that adversity here can be an acute moment. (17:27) And that's often what people think about. (17:29) It can also be those chronic demands, like we said, the pandemic and economical stressors, political stressors, AI, all of these, the chronic stressors we tend to sometimes dismiss, because we think, well, everyone's going through this anyway, so it doesn't count.
(17:44) Yes, it does. (17:45) It's there. (17:46) And then the other important element in this definition is really the growth aspect that we are learning from this coming out even stronger.
(17:55) So that's the definition I use. (17:57) And we use the same whether it's for individuals or teams.
Julian Hayes II
(18:00) Mm hmm. (18:01) And now let's add the word in front of that, that you used a lot in your book, and that's strategic resilience. (18:08) And so what's the extra piece of that mean?
Dr. Marie-Helene Pelletier
(18:12) Ah, the extra piece there is, you know, Julian, it's similar to, and that's how this, this combination came in my work. (18:22) I was talking with business leaders and all about resilience, and they were like, oh, you know, what's the, you know, what do I need to do here? (18:30) And why?
(18:31) So then I was using the analogy that if we are in business, say you and I, and we just had a great idea for a new product or a new service, would we just have the great idea and launch? (18:41) Or would we just have the great idea and look at who else is offering this product or service? (18:48) How much are they charging for it?
(18:50) Who is buying it? (18:52) What forces in the near or far future might impact the demand for it? (18:56) We would do all this, right?
(18:58) We would have a strategic analysis that would create a strategic plan, and then we would launch. (19:04) So it would take the context into account. (19:08) So same thing here.
(19:10) If all we do is say, yeah, sure, I would love my resilience to be higher. (19:14) And we've heard the kinds of things that would make our strategic, our resilience higher, like exercise, cardio, strength training, and meditation, for example, managing our mind, making sure we have a growth mindset, all these beautiful things. (19:31) Knowing all this is going to change nothing.
(19:34) What is going to change something is the implementation. (19:37) And what happens is everyone's life is already full or overflowing. (19:42) So there isn't time, and therefore, they don't implement.
(19:46) What makes a difference is to actually look at their context and create a strategic plan. (19:53) So a plan that takes into account the reality of their context, and then that creates implementation that is possible, realistic, doable, and people do it.
Julian Hayes II
(20:04) Okay. (20:05) And so let's think about this. (20:06) So let's say I'm coming to you, or a business leader's coming to you, and they're like, I want to grow my resilience.
(20:16) What's the very first step or two when it comes to someone growing their resilience?
Dr. Marie-Helene Pelletier
(20:22) Yes, it will depend on each person's context, of course. (20:26) So I'll usually ask more questions. (20:28) What I'm saying, and what I've put in the book are, is I've extracted some of the questions, some of the reflection that the key elements, the minimum viable parts of the reflection that will allow you to look at your context in a realistic way and create your plan.
(20:47) And so in the book, what I'm talking about there is looking first at your values, what's most important for you in life. (20:56) Because this is the same as, again, the analogy in business. (21:00) We're not going to throw out any of the products or services we think about.
(21:04) We will have many ideas, but we will first connect them with our values, our mission as an organization, right? (21:13) So same thing here. (21:15) What's going to make this plan yours, make it meaningful, purposeful, make you want to connect with it, is to tie it to your values.
(21:23) So that's where we'll start. (21:24) And in the book, lots of exercises. (21:26) We'll provide access to the worksheets in the show notes.
(21:30) So you don't have to have the book. (21:31) The sheets are very self-explanatory. (21:33) But that's one of them.
Julian Hayes II
(21:35) Okay. (21:35) And would you say also, I guess what I'm hearing also is that when you can connect to your values and what's important to you in life, this is going to help you be able to endure. (21:47) It's going to help you to be, one, proverbially just not to quit as easily, not to give up as easily.
(21:54) And that, in a sense, is part of what resilience is. (21:58) Is that the right thing?
Dr. Marie-Helene Pelletier
(22:00) Correct. (22:01) It allows us to be more sustainable. (22:04) You know, a strategic plan that works will be valid, reliable, and sustainable.
(22:10) We'll be able to maintain it over time. (22:12) Now, part of what I do talk about in terms of our plan, just like a strategic plan in business, is we need to have agility within it because context changes. (22:22) Sometimes you're traveling for business.
(22:25) Sometimes you are on vacation. (22:27) You know, different things are going on that will impact your ability to implement the plan as you originally designed it. (22:34) And that, too, will be part of what keeps it sustainable.
Julian Hayes II
(22:38) What is something, I guess, in today's times that's been pretty current that's causing a lot of, let's say, difficulty for leaders in terms and is really testing their resilience in today's times?
Dr. Marie-Helene Pelletier
(22:54) You know, a number of variables. (22:57) I'm sure, you know, your listeners are thinking, well, you know, could be coming from my board of directors. (23:02) It could be coming from the economic context, from the very rapid AI changes, from people's reactions to AI changes.
(23:11) It will come and it also will vary from where you're at in this particular moment. (23:16) If you just took up the most senior role in an organization, some of the challenges involve building trust with people who are your close collaborators and potentially your board of directors. (23:29) So that's how you see how, even in my response, how the elements of your current context are so central to answering questions like this.
(23:40) But yes, there are characteristics of our overall environment on the planet that are contributing to creating even more uncertainty and changes.
Julian Hayes II
(23:51) Yeah, and what I hear is there's a lot of nuance involved. (23:54) And that's why you spoke of agility as well, is that, you know, there's a lot of things that are the same, but there's a very small percentage that's different. (24:01) But that very small percentage that's different is actually very huge in our macro picture.
(24:08) So what are some myths that you hear around resiliency and resilience that kind of, should I say, kind of makes your skin crawl, makes your stomach upset, or just kind of annoys you when people talk about resilience?
Dr. Marie-Helene Pelletier
(24:24) You know, it's interesting being a part of my training being as a psychologist, I tend to have a reaction of interest when people have different reactions more than any of those things. (24:39) But I still hear what you're saying. (24:42) The misconception, probably the largest one, the one that keeps particularly leaders and high performing individual contributors from investing strategically in their resilience, is a misconception, a belief that it's who they are as a person.
(25:04) And it is very understandable. (25:07) The reality is they've gone through many demands before, and they see that they have and so they come to a point to think that it is who they are as a person. (25:16) And the key shift that needs to happen here is, well, number one, we know from research, resilience is not a personality trait, it's a state.
(25:26) But second is, is it possible that the data you're using right now is old data? (25:33) So the ways, yes, you have gone through very demanding things two, five, 10 years ago. (25:38) And the context, your context at that time was very different.
(25:43) The types of demands you're now facing are much higher, they're more frequent, and more unexpected. (25:51) That's usually part of progressing in more senior, exciting roles, that's what we wanted. (25:56) And they represent a different caliber of demands.
(26:01) And so you need a different caliber of approach to them.
Julian Hayes II
(26:05) When you have a client that's anxious and worried or something, or do you notice that more of your leaders tend to live in the future too much, or live in the past too much?
Dr. Marie-Helene Pelletier
(26:21) Well, the tendency, when we're anxious, it usually is a bit more future oriented, it tends to involve, as opposed to say, when we are, our mood is lower, it tends to be a bit more past oriented. (26:35) It's not always the case, but it's often something that people observe. (26:39) When we're anxious, we're often thinking about what's going to happen in the future, we're predicting something fairly negative or catastrophic, and we're predicting it with a fairly high level of probability.
(26:50) And that's usually the recipe for now we're feeling anxious, because we've created a threat, and we're believing the threat is highly likely to happen. (26:58) So of course, we're, the brain's reacting to this. (27:02) And, and there could be many answers to, you know, how do, what do we do with this, but sometimes a short way to start thinking about it is making a difference between a possibility and a probability.
(27:16) Because as, especially as, you know, competent leaders and individual contributors, of course, we want to think about what could possibly not work, we're doing risk mitigation, that's normal, that's part of what we do, it's a job description. (27:30) So that's good. (27:31) And we want to make sure we still keep a perspective, step back, is that's a possibility, the probability is not necessarily that high.
(27:40) Now, it may be low and needs attention, of course. (27:43) But that's part of what helps us keep a realistic mindset, allowing us to take the appropriate actions, have our eyes open, look at the full picture, but not make worse predictions than we need to.
Julian Hayes II
(27:57) Mm hmm. (27:58) And I forgot to ask, I know we were talking about growing resilience, and you mentioned there's a bunch of exercises in the book, which there are, what is, let's say, just share, let's share maybe one exercise that we can do that you think is a great start for the majority of people?
Dr. Marie-Helene Pelletier
(28:13) Yes, I, well, the one on values that we mentioned earlier would be a good one to do, it does not take a lot of time, and it starts you from a very grounding place. (28:25) Another one that I've probably received the most feedback about is, again, very simple, but it does the job. (28:33) So table, one page, create two columns.
(28:37) On the left, your demands, and I'll explain that in a second. (28:41) And on the right, your sources of supply. (28:44) So that's my demands and supply table, but not in the same way that you usually think about it in the business sense.
(28:49) Here, we're listing all of the demands you're facing at work and in your personal life. (28:57) And usually people will start with demands they don't want to have, but they have to deal with, great, put that there. (29:03) But then also list what I call the positive demands.
(29:07) So the things that are requiring more energy than usual, even if you're very happy to have them. (29:13) So you just got this new role. (29:15) You're very happy about it, but it represents a demand, right?
(29:18) Because now, lots of changes and adjustments. (29:21) So you do your demand side, and you do your supply side. (29:25) So what brings you energy?
(29:27) And here, pause for a second, you have to make sure that you list on the supply side, what is actually happening. (29:34) I'll give you an example. (29:35) Sometimes I'll ask people to do this, and we're in conversation, because sometimes people say, let's just do an exec coaching session instead of me going through your book and the exercises.
(29:44) I need one hour, all of this done. (29:46) We do that too. (29:47) And so then I'll say, wait a second, don't write.
(29:51) Tell me some of the things you're going to put on your supply side. (29:54) And they say, well, you know, I try to go for a walk three times a week with my partner in evening after dinner. (29:59) Okay, great.
(29:59) How long? (30:00) Oh, usually at least 45 minutes. (30:02) Great.
(30:02) Last two weeks, how many times did you go? (30:05) Well, not the past two weeks, because it's been very busy and all, but you know, well, then it does not go on the list. (30:12) Because that's the thing.
(30:14) This simple exercise catches so many blind spots. (30:20) As high achievers, we tend to minimize the demands. (30:25) And we tend to overestimate the sources of supply.
(30:29) Now, all this has many adaptive reasons, we can understand and explain how we got there. (30:34) But the reality is, in the current situation, if we're stepping back to really create a realistic plan over here, we're going to need a realistic visibility on what's truly going on in your context now, so that we can build a plan that makes sense.
Julian Hayes II
(30:53) And so after the values and taking this initial step of developing our resilience, what would be the next step that someone would generally go to?
Dr. Marie-Helene Pelletier
(31:03) Yes. (31:04) So after that, so the values, supply and demand. (31:06) The other exercise that I've brought forward in the book, trying to again, extract with tends to move people forward in the most effective way, is doing what I call a SWOT analysis on yourself.
(31:20) So you're looking at internally, just for yourself as a person, what types of things tend to support your resilience naturally? (31:28) And what types of things tend to create a challenge? (31:31) For example, I tend to value resilience, I want to invest in this.
(31:36) And challenge, I tend to say yes to everything. (31:39) So it becomes, I have too many demands. (31:42) And then you look at the external context, same thing, what in your context helps what in your context creates a challenge.
(31:50) And with that piece between your values, supply and demand, and your SWOT analysis, you cover a good range of your overall context, that is usually what you need to create your strategic resilience plan. (32:05) Usually, I go with three to five pillars, strategic pillars and tactics or actions within each and you're on your way.
Julian Hayes II
(32:14) Okay, and I have another question that's maybe a little out there. (32:19) And this one's going to be, so in the fitness world, a lot of times I tell people that I'm training on the edge of over training, right? (32:31) I work out a lot, I run a lot of miles, I lift a lot of weights, all those things.
(32:36) But there's a fine line that I walk between going over the edge and then staying within it. (32:44) And I'm curious in the professional world, how is someone going to, or even if you've seen this, do they navigate the flirting with burnout, being on the edge of that burnout, if that makes sense?
Dr. Marie-Helene Pelletier
(32:58) Yes, it's a great way to, it's a good analogy, a very good analogy for what happens here. (33:05) Because part of what, I'll make assumptions here, but potentially what keeps you on the healthy side is you are very self aware, you're paying attention, you're probably combining a bit of objective numbers, how many actual miles have I run in the past week, you know, there is a bit of numbers to this. (33:26) And there's also the when you're doing your stretching, how is the body feeling (33:30) when you're waking up in the morning, how's the energy level feeling that you're so you're doing (33:34) this combination of checking in with yourself, checking in with the numbers that you have access (33:39) to, you're maybe looking at your weight, you're getting all the data you can to see where you're (33:44) at, and you're probably looking on a daily basis. (33:48) So what happens on the work side, is we tend to do none of this, we tend to be thinking others need me, I'm receiving all of these demands, I'm going to put my head down and keep going. (34:04) And part of what needs to happen to navigate that line but with health and and safety, to some degree, optimization is we want to weave in ways to be more self aware to check in with yourself.
(34:21) At times, it may be once a week, that's fine. (34:24) At times, it may be more than once a day. (34:27) If we're in the launch part of a project that is extremely intense, it may be much more frequently.
(34:34) So you want to pay attention on how you're doing. (34:36) And also look at the numbers. (34:39) How many actual hours am I working right now?
(34:43) There's a limit to how many days you can do at an extremely high number of hours without impacting your ability to concentrate. (34:50) So I would say it's a combination of that self awareness, which we also hear about quite a bit in the conversations about emotional intelligence, for example, which is also very backed up by research. (35:02) So that self awareness, and checking your numbers.
Julian Hayes II
(35:08) And you used a word also I saw was collective resilience. (35:12) Yes. (35:13) And so let's, for any listener who's not familiar with that, what is collective resilience?
Dr. Marie-Helene Pelletier
(35:19) It's as often we hear about it in the context of leadership. (35:23) And so definitely as a leader, you want to think about your personal resilience and the collective collective resilience of your team. (35:31) So you want to think about both.
(35:33) But even if you're in an individual contributor role, you can do that as well. (35:38) Thinking about what do we need as a group to be able to bounce back from demands. (35:44) So for example, in a team context, what we may need is more proactive conversations about what are the upcoming moments in the next whatever makes sense, three months, six months, year, where we know the demands will be much higher?
(36:03) And what can we do proactively to mitigate these? (36:08) So instead of saying, oh, our financial year turns, whatever, March 1, and it's always the toughest time of the year, we just try to survive it. (36:17) Can we approach it differently this year?
(36:20) Can we build in advance, different app schedules, different ways of preparing ourselves different work structures, such that we will get there with a different amount of buffer? (36:35) And how will we manage it at this time could be different.
Julian Hayes II
(36:39) And, excuse me, earlier on, and we talked about resilience actually being a form of having a competitive advantage or strategic advantage. (36:49) And so I'm curious now, in terms of your eyes, and you don't have to share just a bunch of them, but maybe a couple, what does a resilient organization look like compared to one that's not as resilient?
Dr. Marie-Helene Pelletier
(37:04) Yes, a resilient organization will have resilient individuals, resilient teams, and will create a culture that similarly is able to go through adversity and come out even stronger. (37:18) At the organizational level, some of the signs that the organization is resilient, from a human side of things, because we sometimes also think about the financial resiliency, operational resilience, but from a psychological side, it is an organization that will continue to be able to look at both what's going on internally and what's going on externally. (37:41) Organizations that become very taxed from a human perspective will have to retreat and look at internally what's going on to try to retain their people and deal with the crisis and all that.
(37:52) If we have built internal resilience, we continue to, of course, take care of what's going on internally, and we can keep an eye on what's going on externally, which is critically important. (38:04) Otherwise, we're putting ourselves at risk, right? (38:06) That's often what we see, say, in mergers and acquisitions.
(38:09) Part of what creates this phase of vulnerability is that the organizations retreat on internal focus, and then that puts them in a vulnerable position. (38:19) So the resilient organization will be able to maintain both.
Julian Hayes II
(38:24) And continuing on with organizations, and I'm sure you've seen this a lot, and I've seen this a little bit already, is that a lot of organizations, when you're trying to convince, when you're trying to discuss with them what I would say soft skills or skills that are not as hard-pressed with data. (38:41) So, for instance, wellness, and even in your case, psychological resilience, right? (38:47) Sometimes people have a hard time of quantifying that in their head and seeing, whereas if I go in and talk about marketing and sales, if I do this input, it's going to give me that, and then I can see it on the financial chart and everything.
(38:59) How do you connect that bridge to leaders when it comes to psychological resilience, and in a summary, getting that buy-in?
Dr. Marie-Helene Pelletier
(39:08) Yes. (39:09) The ways you will measure it is, you're right, different. (39:13) It requires a number of indicators, and these indicators will need to be measured over a longer period of time.
(39:22) So it's not a one simple number that you measure today and you've got your answer tomorrow. (39:27) It often involves a number of indicators, such as your ability to attract talent, to engage that talent, retain them, the amount of people who need to be off work for health-related issues. (39:43) If you're doing engagement surveys, that will be part of your measures.
(39:46) So you'll be looking at different measures. (39:50) But ultimately, your main resource is your people and your ability to attract and retain and sustain these talents is what's most important. (40:00) And so it will be measures related to how this most important resource is going.
(40:06) And you've already seen how it's hard to attract this talent, retain it, and retain it in a healthy way, and not lose people to burnout, for example, or other issues. (40:16) And so that is what you usually will be looking at. (40:20) Now, in an organization, often it means creating a business plan, a business case, looking at how are our numbers looking like?
(40:30) Where are we already good in terms of creating psychological health and safety in our workplace? (40:37) And where is our next opportunity? (40:41) And you know, I'm not saying the next 10 things, but maybe just the next one.
(40:46) And that's how organizations usually will build their mental health strategy.
Julian Hayes II
(40:52) That makes sense. (40:53) And so speaking of mental health, and how do you ensure that you operate with strong, optimal mental health?
Dr. Marie-Helene Pelletier
(41:03) You like me, you mean? (41:07) Well, I apply my own recommendations. (41:11) And I do.
(41:13) I do use strategic resilience plans that I evolve over time as the context changes. (41:21) And you know, one of the recent context change that I had was when I was about to launch my book. (41:28) And that's my first and possibly only book by Julian.
(41:32) But right now, it definitely is my first. (41:34) And so in order to plan for this phase, I asked people around and they were telling me, oh, you need to really manage your schedule differently the month prior, the month during, the month after. (41:45) And I was like, seriously, the book is written.
(41:46) How complicated can that be? (41:49) But I listened, thankfully. (41:51) And what that meant is I created a strategic resilience plan for that three-month phase, literally.
(41:59) And yeah, so I apply my own recommendations.
Julian Hayes II
(42:05) What's been the most rewarding thing about writing a book?
Dr. Marie-Helene Pelletier
(42:10) There are many. (42:12) But one of them is literally conversations like this. (42:16) I was told before that, of course, as an author, even if you have lots of resources around you, your publisher and everything, that you would need to be involved in sharing information about the book.
(42:28) And I was thinking, yes, you know, my business side was thinking, absolutely, I will be doing this. (42:33) Yes. (42:34) You know, seeing it as a necessary action.
(42:38) That's it. (42:39) Oh, my God. (42:42) Just this, right?
(42:43) The chance of meeting you, speaking with you, enjoying this inspiring conversation, for me, anyway, today, would not have happened without the book. (42:54) And it has created so many of these wonderful opportunities. (43:00) You know, having conversation with someone like yourself would not have happened otherwise.
(43:04) And so that's got to be one up there, one of the very positive outcomes of the book. (43:11) There are others, of course, people talking to me about how it is the thing they needed in this moment in time. (43:17) It was said in the way that they needed it, which is very much what you try to do when you're writing.
(43:23) You're writing for your reader. (43:25) So that's another one.
Julian Hayes II
(43:26) Absolutely. (43:26) And I think you'll have another book in the future. (43:30) I just have that hunch.
(43:31) Because I think it's, I wrote a book maybe seven or eight years ago. (43:35) And I'll do another one at some point. (43:38) But I think when you have, you'll have ideas, and probably now you're already learning certain things.
(43:44) And I just think it's, when you're going through the process, it's not, you get tired of it at one point, it's like, oh, and doing the editing and all the rewrites and stuff like that. (43:54) But then when you're done, you're like, wow, this is cool. (43:57) And then even just to have one person that's really benefited from it, it's a very rewarding thing.
(44:03) And you're like, I want us to do this more.
Dr. Marie-Helene Pelletier
(44:05) Very true. (44:06) Very true. (44:06) I've said that as well before.
(44:09) And 100%, it's funny, right? (44:11) Because you think you need more than one, really. (44:15) But, but truly, it does feel like this.
(44:18) If only one has been impacted, you already feel like it's a massive win.
Julian Hayes II
(44:23) Yeah, that's, every time I write an article or anything, I just think about if one person finds benefit, then it's a success and on to the next one is pretty much how I think about it. (44:34) And that pretty much helps me keep my psychological resilience up and not get so lost in all the other superficial vanity metrics and that type of thing.
Dr. Marie-Helene Pelletier
(44:44) Yes, very true.
Julian Hayes II
(44:46) And so I'm curious when we think when we hear the word success, a lot of times and dealing with a lot of high achievers as well, they probably have a lot of what people would say, maybe materialist success or superficial success or, or not even superficial as is empty, but superficial meaning that we can see these things, right? (45:05) And these are things that a lot of us general public have has said, Oh, this is what it means to be a success. (45:10) But I've seen it.
(45:12) I've had a times myself, where you on paper have these things that are a success, but you still feel a little unfulfilled. (45:20) So I'm curious with you, what does success mean to you?
Dr. Marie-Helene Pelletier
(45:25) Yes, it in everything you just described happens so often. (45:30) I think it's in part because it I can see it in my clients as well, that we tend to pursue certain things because they're interesting at a certain point in time. (45:41) And while our values are fairly stable over time, the way you know, which ones we're focused on more may be different at certain points in time.
(45:52) And so and that's actually why in creating that strategic resilience plan, I start with inviting all of us to reconnect with our values and having that clarity. (46:03) And so success and it also connects with happiness. (46:08) You know, often when people talk about success, what they actually think about is happiness, that sense of being very satisfied with what it with what is there and feeling very good about it.
(46:20) And we know from research on happiness, that what will tend to generate that happiness is that clarity on our values, and to what degree we're connecting what happens in our current daily, weekly, monthly life with these values. (46:36) And so I would say to your question, probably the best investment is that clarity on your values and aligning them with what you bring into your personal and professional life.
Julian Hayes II
(46:47) Okay, and now let's say you, you have access to put a message on a giant billboard, and everyone's going to be able to see it. (46:54) And so what would your one piece of advice be for people to really adhere to, to really soak in, to marinate, to really have this idea get hammered into their head when it comes to resiliency?
Dr. Marie-Helene Pelletier
(47:12) I only have one sentence, it's going to be be strategically resilient.
Julian Hayes II
(47:19) Okay. (47:20) And now the last question here is, we're going to go a little more micro now. (47:25) So say someone is coming up to you at a cafe, and this individual is, is wants to finish this year out as strong as possible, and lay out a strong foundation for themselves for the next for the upcoming year as well.
(47:40) And so we're a little over halfway in this year now. (47:43) And so they come up to you and they're like, Dr. MH, what are three things that I can do today to start becoming more strategically resilient? (47:54) What would you tell them?
Dr. Marie-Helene Pelletier
(47:56) Hmm. (47:57) I would have to ask them more questions. (48:00) But let's say I can't.
(48:01) I'll, I'll play along and pretend that I can't. (48:05) So I'm going to go with assumptions based on others I've worked with that very often these three things will help. (48:14) I would say, number one, bring meditation.
(48:19) A lot of the people I work with are recovering in very active ways in exercising, that kind of thing, but they have not yet incorporated meditation, or in only small ways. (48:29) Even if you think it's not for you, it is, you have a brain. (48:32) Therefore, yes, you need that.
(48:34) So I would say meditation is one. (48:36) Second, I would say, identify one goal you have for the next year, and one action you can take now towards this goal. (48:46) And then I would say, number three, and connect even more.
(48:52) And I'm saying this because people know the values of connections, they are connected with people. (48:59) However, the high performers will sometimes have a bias towards getting stuff done. (49:04) And that's important.
(49:07) And we also know from research that if we're increasing our connections, we're going to be better at everything. (49:13) So that will be my third one.
Julian Hayes II
(49:16) Awesome. (49:16) Those are, that's a great way to bookmark this conversation. (49:19) I really enjoyed this conversation.
(49:20) And I enjoyed the book as well. (49:22) I want listeners to go out to get the book as well and to keep up with you. (49:26) And so speaking of keeping up with you, where can everyone go to keep up with you?
(49:32) And or should they be directed to and everything?
Dr. Marie-Helene Pelletier
(49:35) Thank you, Julian. (49:36) I will have this in the show notes. (49:37) One place where you can get everything is theresilienceplan.com.
(49:42) So you'll get to the book, what I do, all of this. (49:45) And of course, we'll have the link to LinkedIn. (49:48) I always love to be connected with people and hearing your parts of the conversations, sharing my parts, and so that we can all continue to build.
Julian Hayes II
(49:56) Awesome to hear. (49:57) Awesome to hear. (49:58) Thank you again, Dr. MH for joining me. (50:01) And for listeners out there, stay awesome, be limitless. (50:05) And as always, go be the CEO of your health and your life. (50:08) Peace.
