Episode Transcript
Speaker 0 00:00:00 Welcome to the Heart Rate Variability podcast. Each week we talk about heart rate variability and how it can be used to improve your overall health and wellness. Please consider the information in this podcast for your informational use and not medical advice. Please see your medical provider to apply any of the strategies outlined in this episode. Heart Rate Variability podcast is a production of Optimal LLC and optimal HR-v. Check us out at optimal hr-v dot com. Please enjoy the show.
Speaker 1 00:00:32 Welcome to the Heart Rate Variability podcast. I am Matt Bennett here just with you. Really quick to introduce, uh, chapter seven of our book, heartbeat of Business. Um, if you're new to the podcast, welcome. We are in the middle of a multi-month series now on our book The Heartbeat Business, looking at how to integrate H R V into an organizational setting, uh, with a lot of lessons along the way, uh, for the individual as well. So really encourage you if you're new the show, uh, you'll see that these episodes are numbered. Just go back to episode one, start from the beginning, uh, with us. We'd love for you to join us along the journey. Um, also you can download the Heartbeat of Business along with my book, uh, heart Rate Variability, the Future of Trauma Informed Care for Free at optimal h r v.com, where you can also find show notes for this episode.
Speaker 1 00:01:22 So we are going to start to play the audio book here in a second for, so for those on YouTube gets a little bit, you know, under stimulating as far as the visuals here, but, uh, hopefully you can enjoy the show as well. So without further todo, we're gonna look at eustress today, uh, how we turn with the difference between distress, tress, and how that all leads to motivation. So excited to share this chapter with you. Enjoy and ina Dave and I will be back next week to, uh, discuss this chapter. Thank you. Have a great day.
Speaker 2 00:01:53 Chapter seven, eustress Job Resources and H R V. The J D R model shows that engagement results from a mix of eustress motivation and job resources, eustress results from job demands that challenge people to perform at optimal levels. How a leader manages specific job demands has a tremendous impact on engagement, motivation, and outcomes. At this point in the audiobook, it is evident that a leader's ability to help manage distress and burnout is a crucial factor in the outcomes a team or business achieves. In some other reality where humans are not so complicated, the leader's reward for this challenging accomplishment would be improved outcomes in our human reality. However, effectively managing distress and burnout creates a capacity for engagement, lessening the chance for adverse outcomes, but not guaranteeing business success. In this chapter, we explore the precarious dance between what makes stressors, distress, or eustress, how a leader approaches job demands and job resources plays a crucial role in whether the stressor contributes to burnout or engages people toward positive outcomes.
Speaker 2 00:03:10 Remember, to get engagement, the leader must first position job resources to address the distress inherent to the job demands. Then, as Matt likes to say, it's time to rock and roll. You can find a summary of the activity suggested in this chapter in appendix five. In the handout, eustress and H R V there exists a very fine line between whether a person perceives a stressor as distress or eustress as both disrupt homeostasis and demand action to regain a balance with environmental demands. For example, assigning someone their dream project and providing them with the time and resources to experience success elicits a tremendous amount of eustress helping to fuel the motivation necessary for positive outcomes. However, if the person lacks adequate time and the leader does not provide the resources required for success, the exact same assignment quickly leads to distress and burnout. Whether a stressor leads to engagement or burnout depends significantly on the person's current state and allostatic load.
Speaker 2 00:04:22 Let's return to the cup analogy. People are likely to experience a new challenge as eustress if they're firmly in their window of tolerance and have plenty of room in their cup to manage the additional stress. The challenge adds when someone's daily readings and seven day average are high, it is an indication that they are effectively managing their allostatic load and can take on new challenges without getting overwhelmed. When someone struggles to stay in their window of tolerance, even exciting new challenges get interpreted as distress. Assigning a new project to someone in the early stages of burnout might get them excited in the short term, but if they do not recover, they will struggle to find the energy and cognitive capacity to succeed. H R V monitoring is a competitive advantage because it helps leaders avoid setting new initiatives up for failure by assigning crucial tasks to those lacking capacity for success.
Speaker 2 00:05:18 If individuals and teams struggle with low H R V, the reader is more likely to succeed by first addressing the distress and burnout before taking on an important new project. As early as the beginning of the 20th century, two psychologists, Robert Yorks and John Dodson demonstrated the importance of an optimal level of physiological activation. In peak performance, they formulated what is now known as the Yorks Dodson law, which states that when physiological activation is too low, so is performance. If physiological activation is too high, performance suffers as well. There exists a sweet spot of activation that allows people to perform at their best. The York's Dodson laws provided as figure nine in the handout. The specific level of physiological activation needed for peak performance varies from task to task. For example, the level of activation necessary for running a personal best in a 5K is quite different from the level of activation needed to deliver an excellent presentation.
Speaker 2 00:06:23 The trick is to achieve the optimal activation level for the task at hand. How does somebody know the right amount of activation they need for success and to elicit the proper sympathetic ventral vagal balance? Self-regulation lies at the heart of the mind and body's ability to settle into the sweet spot of activation for each task. Again, H R V plays a crucial role in matching activation to the task. Remember that H R V is an indicator of the ability of the mind and body to self-regulate, allostatic, load, and maintain homeostasis. Too much or too little stress yields performance lags. H R V monitoring provides the leader with data to ensure the capacity for a new challenge that will engage people in pushing themselves to achieve positive outcomes. In the cup analogy, the leader wants to push people to the edge of their window of tolerance without overwhelming their capacity.
Speaker 2 00:07:20 Tony Schwartz states leaders inspire higher performance by pushing those they lead beyond their comfort zones, challenging, stretching, exhorting, emboldening, and inspiring them to exceed their own limits stresses the means by which we expand capacity as long as it's balanced by intermittent renewal. H R V measurement provides leaders with quantitative data to help ensure that capacity exists and people push themselves without experiencing allostatic overload throughout the project or challenge. As tress increases, H R V might decrease slightly and the person has a chance to adjust their level of activation to this novel stress. The leader should work with the person to ensure their excitement does not turn into distress. Schwartz's statement of intermittent renewal supports the research reported in previous chapters on breaks throughout the day and the use of time off for recovery. A leader helps prepare the person for the challenge with resources and support to elicit peak performance for a set period of time. Recovery and renewal allow the individual and the team to bring their best to the next challenge they face With the lessons learned and confidence gained from meeting the previous success, tracking H R V scores quantifies this dance between challenge and recovery.
Speaker 2 00:08:44 Shared values eliciting motivation for excellence requires the leader to manage the relationship between shared values, shared vision and motivation. A shared vision is a destination. Shared values are the means by which the business reaches the vision. Motivation is the fuel for the journey. Values are guiding principles that are timeless and require no external justification. There are tremendous benefits for businesses operating from shared values. The power of shared values comes from helping people realize how their work allows them to apply their values and life purpose to their work. Personal values are a small set of concepts that define the personality and aspirations of the person. As a powerful motivator, leaders could help their people to identify their values. Several questions can help people identify their values. A work session focused on values is a great team building activity. What beliefs and convictions are core to who you are and that you would never change?
Speaker 2 00:09:51 What do you care most about in life? What are the rules you live by? There are no hard rules on the number of values a person should identify. The typical number is between five and seven. Some people find it helpful if they have a list of possible values to help them identify their own personal values. A quick internet search will provide many options for these value lists. An individual's answers to these questions serve as critical motivators and sources of resiliency. The process for creating shared values from here will differ depending on the size and strategy of the business. The crucial next step for a business without established shared values is to bring the activity from the individual, identifying their values to the business, identifying its values In larger businesses, leaders might consider having teams work on their collective values. A few questions can help guide this process and assess if the word is powerful enough to serve as a value.
Speaker 2 00:10:53 If you were to start a new business, would you build it around this value? Would you want us to continue to stand for this core value 100 years into the future? Would you want us to hold this value? Even if at some point the environment penalized us for living this value, do you believe that those who do not share this value should not work for the business? Would you change jobs before giving up this core value? Smaller businesses might create a set of shared values as a retreat. Larger ones can lead teams through the process and have representatives from teams come together and create shared values for the entire business. These larger businesses might consider bringing in an outside consultant to help them structure and facilitate this process. Establishing shared values is only the first step. Gallup found that only 27% of people strongly believe in their business' values.
Speaker 2 00:11:49 Only 41% strongly agree that they know what their company stands for and what differentiates their business from competitors. The process of establishing shared values sets a standard for leaders to strive to live up to every day. Leaders need to be the embodiment of these business values. The leader's job is to keep these values at the forefront of people's minds. Leaders breathe life into values by helping people connect their values to their work and the work of the business. One measure of success is simple to measure. Once a business identifies its values, ask people to name them. If they cannot name them, it is not their fault but the fault of their leadership. The challenges to ensure that there is enough exposure to the business's values that they become part of the business's DNA. N a one meaningful way to integrate values into the business's DNA n a is by implementing a values-based decision making process.
Speaker 2 00:12:48 After defining the problem, the team names the possible values that might help guide the decision and select the key ones that should drive the decision making process. Revisit these values at the beginning of every team meeting or discussion about the change as a solution emerges. Continue asking. Does this solution support our shared values? When communicating the decision to others, explain how values help guide the process. The above process works well for more significant decisions. Shared values also provide an ethical foundation for actions and more minor choices made every day and an every meeting. When values are shared and people apply them to more minor decisions, leaders can trust their people even if they are not in every meeting or part of every decision. Values should speak to the heart and soul of the business and its culture. Chapter six showed the destruction done. When a business or leader acts against shared values, violating moral safety, moral distress negatively impacts H R V and trust in the leader.
Speaker 2 00:13:56 If unaddressed, this moral distress will result in moral injury besides decreases in H R V and mental health, moral distress and injury, decrease job satisfaction, commitment and performance, it leads to an increase in distress, burnout, and turnover while moral injury destroys trust and psychological safety. Shared values pay off in measurable business results compared to businesses without shared values. Those with shared values saw revenues increase four times. Stock prices grew five times faster and profit performance increased by an astounding 750%. Values might not show up on a balance sheet as a line item, but they powerfully impact the bottom line. In addition to financial excellence, shared values also increase job creation by seven times when connected values, business goals become more powerful as job expectations directly relate to the success and purpose of the business. Values help leaders prioritize what is truly important and help people focus energy on activities that lead to success.
Speaker 2 00:15:08 Shared vision, a shared vision creates motivation by setting an ambitious and inspiring goal that challenges everyone to work together to achieve something great. This shared vision comes to life when a leader connects the future direction of the business to the passion and values of their people and helps them see how their work can positively impact the world. Without a vision, businesses can get lost, chasing quick short-term payoffs or the business trend of the month while losing sight of tasks that help differentiate them as a leader in their market. Like shared values. A great way to assess if a business has a shared vision is to ask people, ask them what the business will look like five to 10 years from now, and how their work and the work of their team contribute to the vision. Vision should speak to everyone's ambition, motivation, and passion, not just to those in leadership.
Speaker 2 00:16:05 An excellent tool for framing a shared vision is the hedgehog concept. Hedgehogs do one thing really well and that is to curl themselves into a protective ball of sharp spines no matter how hungry its predator is. The thought of a mouthful of sharp spines keeps the little animal safe. Similarly, businesses that do one thing better than anyone else, not only survive, but can thrive in their environment. The hedgehog concept is the intersection of purpose, passion, and ambition. This intersection is where excellence happens in great businesses. Purpose comes from an understanding of why the business exists. Simplistic answers such as to make money or to create value for shareholders do not motivate Most people. Leaders and their people need to go deeper and ask what real value the business delivers to the world. Many businesses find it helpful to create a shared purpose or mission statement while creating or revising shared values.
Speaker 2 00:17:07 The purpose tells people why the business exists and values let them know how it operates. Creating a shared understanding of the why and how of a business will help focus energy and effort toward thinking and actions that support the vision. Here are some questions that help test a good purpose statement. Do you find this purpose personally inspiring? Does the purpose help you think expansively about the long-term possibilities and range of activities the business can consider beyond its current products, services, markets, industries, and strategies? Does the purpose help you to decide what activities not to pursue to eliminate them from consideration? Is this purpose authentic something true to what the business is all about? Not merely words on paper that sound nice? Would this purpose be greeted with enthusiasm rather than cynicism by a broad base of people in the business when telling your children and or other loved ones what you do for a living?
Speaker 2 00:18:10 Would you feel proud in describing your work in terms of this purpose? As with values, first, have people identify their personal purpose. Personal values state a set of guiding principles. A personal purpose evolves out of their values and creates a statement describing how the person lives their values to accomplish what is important to them. These individual purpose statements provide the leader with a deep understanding of what motivates their people. Larger businesses should allow teams or departments to create a purpose statement for how that unit supports the larger business and vision. The data collected throughout this process will inform the business's purpose statement. Purpose provides the why. Passion speaks to the emotional investment between people and their work leaders and the overall business. As mentioned in the fit section, only 20% of people answered a strong yes to the question, do you like what you do each day?
Speaker 2 00:19:11 A lack of fit is part of the problem. This finding also demonstrates a lack of passion in the typical business. When work becomes just a job, people will struggle to find motivation for excellence. They show up for the paycheck when pay becomes the most potent motivator. Meeting basic expectations or striving for personal gain becomes the focus. Whether work is just a job or it is a calling is a crucial leadership focus. When establishing a shared vision in sports, the vision is usually to win the championship. The leader, like a great coach, must help every person see their role. In accomplishing this vision, the leader strives to help everyone see the benefits for reaching the vision, understands how the work of each individual and team furthers the effort to realize the vision and knows their people well enough to connect the vision to the individual's values and aspirations.
Speaker 2 00:20:07 People desperately want to be a part of something great. Sports fans pack stadiums hoping that this is the year their team wins the championship. Fans of the arts spend a lot of money to see a fantastic performance in person when they could easily save their money and listen to the same music or watch a recorded performance at home. This innate desire for winning and greatness comes with them to work every day. Great leaders and businesses harvest this potential passion by giving everyone something inspirational and exciting to contribute to each day when they come to work. While a championship in sports is an apparent concrete goal, creating a shared vision requires establishing an equally tangible goal. The final aspect of the hedgehog concept is answering the question, what can we be the best in the world at? What is the business's equivalent of the Super Bowl World Cup or Oscars?
Speaker 2 00:21:03 Engaging people around this question after establishing shared values and purpose challenges them to apply the business's strengths to reach some future state. The best way to elicit motivation around getting to this future state is through a goal setting process. Jim Collins calls this goal the big hairy audacious goal or B H A G. Accomplishing A B H A G is not easy. It challenges everyone to find innovations, develop new competencies, and focus attention and energy on a defined set of variables that allow the business to accomplish this goal. Think of the vision as a sports championship At the beginning of the season, even the favorites rarely have 50% odds of completing the goal. A strong vision or B H A G should answer the following. What images or emotions does the future state described in the vision illicit? Does it use specific concrete examples and analogies to bring the vision to life?
Speaker 2 00:22:06 Rather than bland platitudes? Does it express the ultimate potential of our passion, values, and purpose? When reading the vision, do you think, wow, it would be fantastic to be a part of that, and I'm willing to put out significant effort to realize this vision. Will the vision excite a broad base of people in the business, not just those with executive responsibility? Do you believe the business has less than 100% chance of achieving the vision? 50 to 70% chance is ideal. Yet at the same time, acknowledge that the business can achieve the vision. If fully committed, how will we know we reach the vision and what metrics will we use to measure progress and completion? The idea of shared values, purpose, vision, and expectations all set up a culture of accountability. The work put into developing these establishes norms and behavioral expectations for individuals, teams, and the business.
Speaker 2 00:23:07 Everyone becomes accountable to ensure their behaviors align with shared values and promote the shared vision. When behaviors contradict values or hinder progress toward the shared vision, it provides a context for leaders to address the issue based on a shared understanding of what is vital for business success, cognitive dissonance, and motivation. One of Matt's areas of expertise is in a cognitive behavioral therapy approach called motivational interviewing or mi. MI is the gold standard in psychology for helping people find the motivation to change thinking or behavior to achieve their goals. According to William Miller and Steven Rollnick, the creators of mi Motivational Interviewing is a collaborative, goal-oriented style of communication with particular attention to the language of change. It is designed to strengthen personal motivation for and commitment to a specific goal by eliciting and exploring the person's own reasons for change within an atmosphere of acceptance and compassion.
Speaker 2 00:24:16 Decades of research in MI help leaders effectively manage eustress to improve motivation, supporting thinking and behaviors. To improve outcomes, MI helps leaders utilize a specific type of tress called cognitive dissonance to help people find the motivation to improve performance. Cognitive dissonance emerges from discrepancies between the person's desired outcomes and current reality. People thrive when they live a life according to their values and purpose. Similarly, teams and businesses succeed when values, purpose and vision guide their behaviors. The power of shared values, purpose and vision is that they elicit eustress and motivation to realize the vision, but create anxiety and stress. If behaviors and outcomes do not promote these agreed upon norms. Discrepancies are differences between the business' outcomes and envisioned future and its current reality. When people realize that their behaviors are out of alignment with values, purpose, or vision, it creates cognitive dissonance by its nature.
Speaker 2 00:25:23 Cognitive dissonance is uncomfortable. As discrepancies force people to confront their shortcomings. It is natural for people to search for ways to bring their behaviors back in line with expectations. Cognitive dissonance can become a motivator for improved performance and innovation. There are two types of motivation resulting from the desire to resolve cognitive dissonance. The first is push motivation. Push motivation results when aspects of the current reality create cognitive dissonance. As an example, let's say that quarterly data shows that outcomes fail to meet established targets. This feedback proves that the team is falling short of helping the business reach its vision and quarterly milestones. Sitting in this reality does not feel good and will motivate the team to correct the situation next quarter. The second type of motivation resulting from cognitive dissonance is pull motivation. A shared vision by nature describes a better desirable future. A good vision challenges the business and its people to make specific behavioral changes to reach the ambitious vision of the future.
Speaker 2 00:26:32 Pull motivation results from someone realizing that their current ways of thinking and operating prevent them from benefiting from a realized vision. If someone has room in their cup, cognitive dissonance becomes eustress and motivation for innovation, improved outcomes and making complex changes. Not surprisingly higher H R V predicts flexibility to turn cognitive dissonance into motivation. For people already struggling with burnout, cognitive dissonance will feel like more distress in an already full cup. People need the energy to resolve cognitive dissonance. When exhaustion or business barriers prevent alignment, it results in moral distress and injury. Leaders play a crucial role in whether people perceive cognitive dissonance as distress or eustress. The leader needs to help people to identify pathways and position job resources to help people and teams resolve conflicts between their current situation and desired state. Sometimes people need additional resources to brainstorm with their leader to find solutions to poor performance or to address other issues behind their cognitive dissonance.
