How Positive Leadership builds a culture of care

Welcome to the latest edition of my Positive Leadership & You newsletter. 

It’s great to see so many new people joining the community. I feel energized by how many of you care about shaping a positive world that we can all really thrive in. 

Care is so important, and we will be looking at how we can build an impactful culture around it as this month’s theme. Of course, care starts with taking care of ourselves, but it goes beyond that to how caring connects us to others, helping us build strong and meaningful relationships that power positive transformation in society.

As always, I will include some fantastic insights from my podcast guests about leading with care and how we can weave it into our own lives so we can be the best version of ourselves. 

Me: Focusing on our personal growth, wellbeing and being positive

It struck me how much stigma there is around the idea of self-care when I spoke to Arianna Huffington on my podcast. If we don’t appreciate the value of self-care, as Arianna shared, it can have real consequences:

“I really considered sleep, taking care of myself, as a luxury I could not afford if I wanted to be to be a super founder and supermom. I collapsed and hit my head on my desk, broke my cheekbone, and that, in retrospect, was an amazing wake-up call that helped me delve deeply into the world of burnout and begin to change how I live.”

It takes time, and sometimes, like with Arianna, a trigger, for us to realize that we can only be effective in our personal and professional lives when we know how to energize and take of ourselves. We cannot be our own best version, or lead others in a positive way, when we are physically and emotionally depleted.

For me, investing in self-care means being intentional about getting enough sleep and I really didn’t do this for many years but it’s something I have fixed now. It’s also about doing workouts at the start of my day, because I know exercise leaves me feeling energized and I can use this well of positive energy. For others, it may be about doing breathing exercises or meditation, going for a walk in nature, or writing in a gratitude journal. Even if we have long forgotten about our New Year resolutions, let’s try to make self-care a habit, taking those small moments to re-energize. 

Self-care also gives us the energy and focus to give to others, which creates a virtuous circle, a feedback loop of positivity. To quote Arianna:

“It is the most important way to put your problems in perspective, because when we are totally self-absorbed, every problem we have becomes magnified, and when we give… we feel more abundant.”

I found this really inspiring. It’s so simple for all of us to put into practice. What one caring thing can you do today? Investing in your self-care will deepen your ability to care for others and the world. Giving connects us to our humanity, which is a wonderful mindset to lead from.

You can listen to more of Arianna’s insights in her podcast session.

Me & Others: Connecting with and empowering others to achieve more

If we look at the role of a Positive Leader, being able to connect with our teams and the individuals within them is fundamental. This is where care comes in again.

In a business context, care is not about becoming your co-worker’s best friend, as my colleague Kathleen Hogan explained in our podcast conversation but “it does mean caring about them as a human being and helping them navigate so that they can do their best work.”

If we think about this care as a form of support, I’m reminded of a great conversation I had with Stephen M. R. Covey in my latest podcast on the link between care and inspiration, and how the Positive Leader is at the center of this. “When you connect with people through a sense of caring and belonging, that will inspire others,” he explained. And then, when you link these people who you have a connection with to a greater purpose, that creates a wave of positive impact.

At Microsoft, when we looked at the new world of working and the need for businesses to lead with purpose and drive positive impact, we knew we had to help cultivate a different kind of leader: a more caring, relatable leader.  Which is why, at Microsoft, we developed the Model, Coach, Care framework for managers.

You can find out more by taking the Model, Coach, Care course on LinkedIn Learning. You will see that caring, really, is about empowering those you lead, investing time in their personal growth. It is also something you approach with empathy and openness, to understand different world views and experiences.

To hear more about care and trust, listen to the podcasts with Kathleen and Stephen.

Me & the World: Having a positive impact on the world

I truly believe that a culture of care can bring about positive change in the world. We might be tempted to think this requires big, bold action, but let’s consider the power of “micro moments” of love and joy, which you can read more about in the book Love 2.0. It is written by Dr. Barbara L. Fredrickson , whose incredible work on positive psychology I mentioned in last month’s newsletter.

For Barbara, creating those micro moments of positive connection – smiling at someone on the street, greeting a cashier – gives us a sense of universal human connection or, as she puts it, that “feeling like we’re all in this together”. These happy moments help create an openness within us, and we feel empathy with people. That sense of unity will also see us care more about those around us.

Another way we can care more is through reading. Speaking with the inspirational Dr. Rana Dajani on a recent podcast, she shared how when we make reading for pleasure a habit, we “learn about other cultures and communities, and this builds empathy and understanding of others, even if you disagree”. Simply, when we pick up a book it gives us a glimpse into another person’s world, which makes us more open to and understanding of others’ experiences.

Caring is something Rana does through the NGO We Love Reading , with ambassadors across the world who read out loud to children, some of whom have had deeply traumatic experiences. The impact of her work has shown incredible results, not only on the children’s emotional well-being and positive resilience but also on the sense of purpose, care and connection experienced by the program’s ambassadors.

Hear more about Rana’s work by listening to our podcast conversation.

As we all strive to make caring a habit, try to set time aside to read a good book and understand more about someone who is very different from you. I would love to hear your suggestions for a novel that’s helped you to do this, so please do share your favorites in the comments below. I look forward to discovering something new!

All the best, 

jp