How do leaders show up when thriving versus drained?
There is an unrecognized key factor to leaders showing up at their best: vitality.
Vitality is defined as positive aliveness; it is the inner resource that includes physical, psychological and emotional and spiritual energy. It is on the opposite end of the spectrum of burnout.
In a recent study, I interviewed 20 Fortune 1,000 CEOs to understand what leadership performance looks like when executives are highly vital (i.e. thriving) versus when they are burned out.
In a previous series of five posts, I explored one of the findings: the top five drains to a CEO’s energy, which applies to all leaders.
Another key finding was the emergence of eight opposing themes of leadership behaviors that occur when leaders lead from being highly vital versus drained.
Overall, the research results reveal that highly vital leaders create the highest leadership capacity, improve team performance and help organizations thrive. In contrast, leaders suffering from burnout operate with reduced productivity, create negative environments, and have an adverse ripple effect on the organization.
Having a foundation of vitality gives leaders the abundance of energy needed for themselves, to share with others and to meet the extensive demands of leadership.
Through a series of four posts, I’ll explore the opposing themes in depth and provide strategies for how leaders can demonstrate highly vital leadership behaviors.
Each post will focus on two opposing themes, as follows:
- Sharing positive relational energy versus sharing negative relational energy; encouraging others versus discouraging others
- Creating a positive environment versus creating a negative environment; being inclusive versus being exclusive
- Having access to the highest leadership capacity versus operating with low leadership capacity; being visionary versus being myopic
- Being engaged versus being disengaged; displaying curiosity versus acting closed-off
This post will focus on these two opposing themes:
- Sharing positive relational energy versus sharing negative relational energy
- Encouraging others versus discouraging others
Below is an overview of behaviors and impacts.
1. Sharing positive relational energy versus negative relational energy
How leaders display the behavior
What is relational energy? Relational energy is the energy that occurs within interactions between individuals.
Positive relational energy is the positive energy a leader creates when interacting with others. If the individual is energized after interacting with the leader, that’s positive relational energy. If the individual feels drained, that’s negative relational energy.
It’s the difference between being a “positive energizer” versus a “negative energizer” in the workplace. Positive relational energy is the number one way highly vital leaders in the study share their energy.
Leadership impacts
When leaders share their positive relational energy with others, it results in the recipients feeling positively energized after the interaction. As one CEO in the study stated: “I feel it’s my time when I am at my best. There’s energy flowing out of me into the vessels of people around me.”
Kim Cameron, a founder of positive leadership, discovered in his research that the positive energy leaders display in interactions has the greatest impact on performance. Additionally, such leaders are high performers and create extraordinary results for the organization.
When leaders transfer negative energy to others, it can deplete the recipient’s energy, if the recipient doesn’t protect themselves and their own inner resources. It creates a negative ripple effect, causing others to experience more negative emotions.
Leadership Essential Reads
2. Encouraging versus discouraging others
How leaders display the behaviors
Leaders give more encouragement to others when feeling vital. In the study, a CEO spoke about how he focused on encouraging those around him: “I use the energy to point out people’s superpowers—what they’re great at.”
Leaders are more likely to discourage others when they themselves are exhausted. Being drained of vitality leads to an overall lack of awareness, less capacity for emotional intelligence, less careful communication, and less tolerance for mistakes.
Leadership impacts
A leader’s behavior has a ripple effect on those around them. When leaders focus on encouraging others, it positively inspires and engages their team. On the other side, depleted leaders are more likely to have a negative ripple effect, which can leave others feeling discouraged and potentially disengaged.
Strategies to positively energize and encourage others
Sharing positive relational energy and encouraging others are core aspects of acting as positive leaders. An article in Positive Psychology describes positive leadership as: “Positive leadership encourages, empowers, and energizes people, whereas negative leadership drains, discourages and demoralizes them.”
1. Build your vitality
Uplifting and invigorating others first requires that you have the energy to do so. Foundationally, it begins by building your physical, psychological, emotional and spiritual vitality to have an abundance of energy to share with others. Prioritizing your well-being every day is how you get your main source of energy to promote your vitality.
2. Choose to share your positive energy with others
Leaders high in vitality must choose to share their positive relational energy with others to positively energize them. To start, bring awareness to the importance of sharing your positive energy. Next, consider how to incorporate positive leadership behaviors in interactions with your team. Examples include but are not limited to:
- Actively listen with a focus on the other person
- Be open to feedback and responsive to it
- Build trust
- Motivate others to be at their best
- Celebrate the accomplishments of others
3. Express gratitude to others
Caring for and showing gratitude is core to positively energizing and encouraging others. Relational energy without care for another person isn’t very effective. Make space every day to reflect and write down what you are grateful for about yourself and your team members. Proactively express your appreciation and say “thank you” to others in one-on-one or team meetings.
How others feel in a leader’s presence matters and impacts their leadership ability. It is not enough for leaders to be highly vital to lead at their best; they must choose to share their positive energy with others, which creates a positive ripple effect throughout their team and organization.
