by: Janice Bastani
The moment your employees park into the lot and walk into the office they are already setting the energetic tone for the day. If you were standing in the window, looking out, and watching them file in for the day, how would you tell if they are Anabolic or Catabolic in their gate? How would you spot the employee that is going to close the biggest deal in the company’s history or the employee who is going to cause you to miss your Wall Street earnings? Which one of them is going to be the one who misses a quality control issue that will cause the entire line to go down for 72 hours while you retool?
The truth is that most of us cannot just look out and see this picture unfolding before our eyes. Yes, we can look at the body language and surmise what their energy leadership is, but it would be a guess. So, how would you deal with this common occurrence? Where would you start? Would you say: “… these are daily events in the life of our company and there is little we can do to stop them?” Alternatively, perhaps you have been very proactive and have engaged your employees in many training and other motivational seminars, in order to keep them on track. Statistics have proven that the rates of retention loss are very high once the event ends and are universally the same. So, I will ask again, please give me another way in which you could prevent this from happening more than say, 80% of the time? How does a leader teach, train and instill sustainable leadership in the organization?
Energy Leadership is a skill set that anyone can learn. If you are a C-Level employee, a small business owner, a college freshman or a sales person in the local grocery store. You see we all play off each other in an energetic manner. Like attracts like. When our mindset continues to play out in a negative or Catabolic manner, everything and everyone we encounter that day will also be directly affected by our energy. This person will pull everyone, every job, every meeting, every figure, every outcome, every encounter s/he has that day down to his level if left unchecked.
On the other side of this equation is the person who is upbeat and looking for the positive or Anabolic solution to life that day. What is the difference in the outcome and productivity of this person’s day? This Anabolic employee will lead with a positive force and lift everyone and every outcome around him/her in a productive way. The numbers and growth of the company will reflect what the energy level is with the employees who work there.
Which one of these two employees do you want to be pulling into the parking lot?
What is Energy Leadership and how is it measured? Energy Leadership is all about physics. You do not have to have a PhD to understand this concept. What you do need to have is an open mind that is willing to connect the dots and to let the scales fall from the eyes to see how this is playing out all around us.
Each one of us radiates energy. Do you remember those “stress dot” cards of the 80’s? These were plastic credit card size cards that you would hold in your hand with your thumb over a spot or you put a little colored dot on the back of you hand and leave it there for a minute. On the card was a sequence of dots which changed color based on your temperature, or if the dot is on your hand, the dot changed colors. It was a visual queue as to what was going on inside your body. What it measured was “warmth”. If a person is stressed; the blood is redirected to protect the organs and goes to the core of our body to keep them warm, and thus the extremities are cool showing up as a “black dot”. On the other hand, if the person were calm the thumb would be warm with blood flow indicated in a “blue dot”.
Energy is like this example above. It flows through us and everything we do that day is impacted depending on what level of Catabolic or Anabolic energy we are resonating at.
Executives as well as those whom they direct all are leaders. Each of these individuals indeed does lead daily either by “default” or by “with purpose”. Choice is an interesting topic in that we are always choosing every minute of every day. Think about how many choices you have made up to this moment. You have made thousands and thousands of choices. My guess is that you make almost 80% of them without much thought at all. You just do what you have always done. This is an example of “default” choice.
When we think about what we are about to make a decision about that is using a choice based on “purpose”. What do I want to happen with this choice? Who will be impacted with my choice? This is a different perspective in our thinking. This is also using effective leadership skills in the workplace.
When we choose to remain in a negative or Catabolic state the result is a bitter, resentful person that people avoid at all costs. On the other hand, a person who is upbeat and is always looking for the benefit, the win-win will always have success following them with others who are rising to the top in whatever area that this Anabolic person interacts with them.
Energy Leadership is the process that develops a personally effective style of leadership that positively influences and changes not only yourself, but also those with whom you work and interact, as well as your organization as whole.
Look out your window. What do you see? What do you want to see? What are the results that you want for your organization? How will you lead your organization today?
