Show Your Fear, It’s What Your Team Needs Most Right Now
You Killed My Mushrooms
We did a top-to-bottom house cleaning today as a family. It was nice to be able to do something that was in our control and feel a tiny sense of accomplishment together. While clearing some stuff off a mantle, I accidentally knocked down a plastic cup filled with water and what looked like some twigs and a couple dried mushrooms. My daughter immediately burst into tears which caught me by surprise, as she would usually get mad not sad when I messed up her stuff.
I sat by her and held her as she cried uncontrollably, clearly devastated by what had just happened. Eventually, she told me that she had found those mushrooms while walking in the park and had been taking care of them, hoping to bring them back to life with water and love. I still didn’t understand why she had such an uncharacteristically intense reaction, but I apologized profusely and we hugged for a long time.
Later, my wife pulled me aside and reminded me that the “death” of our daughter’s mushrooms was probably impacting her more deeply because of all the scary stuff she’s been hearing about COVID-19. While a 7 year old may not be able to filter out her fears, we grown ups often do, and I started to wonder about all the fears related to COVID-19 that I must have suppressed over the past couple weeks.
What Am I Afraid Of
As the COVID-19 crisis unfolded, Ultranauts was in the fortunate position of already being 100% remote, so we didn’t have to change our operating model. We had also recently closed a round of Series A financing so we had a healthy cash balance to work with. Still, we acted immediately to give our team additional flexibility and job security, and cut back on expenses to give the company plenty of runway in a downturn.
I thought I managed the situation fine as a CEO. I engaged the leadership team and board early, took action quickly and decisively, and communicated clearly and transparently. I projected confidence and compassion, just what the team needed, or so I thought.
I didn’t feel fear going through the past couple weeks, but thanks to my daughter and those dead mushrooms, I tried to surface the fears that I knew I must have buried somewhere. Fear for my family, especially my 80 year old mom. Fear for my friends and colleagues, some of whom are immune compromised. And yes, fear for my company, which is doing fine right now but might not be OK in a catastrophic scenario that we failed to consider.
What Your Team Needs Most
As a CEO or anyone leading a team, transparency and compassion are absolutely critical in times of crisis, but so too is vulnerability.
Its vulnerability, not compassion, that signals to your team that it’s safe and that they belong. And now more than ever before, what we all need to feel is that we’re in this together, and that we’ll take care of each other.
So go ahead, show your fear, it might just be what your team needs most right now.
