3 Ways to Work Positive in a Mutiny
Jul 30, 2023
How do you react when your teammates mutiny at work? Dig their heels in and say, “Ain’t gonna do it. No way. No how.”
My mentor, Ed Friedman, had a fourth positive work culture truth: have the emotional stamina to persist in the face of mutinies.
Anxiety drives teammates to look short-range. That narrow focus creates fear. Fear catalyzes mutinies. They revolt in fear and march off in all directions at once.
So with a mutiny going on, how do you have the emotional stamina to persist?
Here are 3 Ways to Work Positive in a Mutiny:
Access Emotional Stamina
You have more strength within you than you realize. Think back over previous experiences when anxiety surrounded you, short-sightedness afflicted your vision, and fear paralyzed you. Your teammates disengaged.
If you remember it without a heart attack, congratulations! You survived it. That experience matured your emotional stamina.
Access it as you recall it. Sense it welling up inside.
Employ it to face your current situation.
Advance with Persistence
When you access your emotional stamina, you are equipped with the jet fuel that drives your success engine—persistence.
How many times have you said to a friend, “Hang in there!”?
That’s persistence. You call when they fail to answer your email. You mail a card when the call back is non-existent.
Your emotional stamina is strong enough to keep you moving forward toward your goal. You are equipped with persistence.
Persist and hang in there like an old, rusty fish hook.
Avoid Mutinies
You’re ready to contribute to a positive work culture when your emotional stamina fuels your success engine with persistence. Your last challenge is to avoid those teammates who would roll you under the bus just to cover their own anxiety, short-sightedness, and fear.
The way to Work Positive and avoid mutinies is to starve them out. Avoid giving any of your emotions or thoughts to the Eeyore Vampires who say, “It can’t be done” and would suck you bone-dry of positive energy.
Attention is your most valuable emotional and mental asset. Divert all of your attention away from mutinies. Focus on how well you separated yourself from the anxiety, your deep commitment to the goals beyond the horizons that everyone else sees with the courage to define yourself within the community. These successful experiences turbocharge your emotional stamina which fuels your persistence.
Observe the mutiny. Don’t participate in it.
Access your emotional stamina, advance with persistence and avoid mutinies as you Work Positive and create a culture that increases productivity and profits!
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