Hi Everyone, how has your week been? Mine, quite honestly, has been another roller coaster. First full week of post-Easter holidays homeschooling and working, I’m noticing all my practices, resourcefulness toolkits and the adage of the teacher teaching what they most need to learn is all being put to the test on a daily basis!

I am finding myself dancing in and out of the box on an almost hourly basis as I work through even larger list of triggers that seem to be presenting themselves right now! I am trying my best to see it all as great practice for being even more mindful and resourceful. There are days when its really really hard and days when it’s a bit more easy, I'm sure you are finding the same! (Please do download our free App Realist - to help yourself and others if you need it)

Here in Singapore, since the end of January, we have been managing the transition to COVID19 season in all parts of our lives. I know everyone everywhere has been managing their own version of this! Each day brings an adjustment, increasing measures, schools closing, kids quarantined, home schooling, changes to jobs, not able to see loved ones, differences of opinion of how to manage what. It’s certainly been a fabulous stress test to everyone’s agility, creativity and self-management.

A few weeks ago I was on a Zoom call with Henrik talking about purpose and meaning – and I noticed behind him on his shelf was a colourful painting which said Pilot the Chaos… it really grabbed my attention and got me thinking about this statement.. Henrik subsequently told me that he had painted this himself which makes this post even more meaningful and thank you to him for letting me share his art in this article.

As I thought of that statement, the meaning of the word pilot came to mind:

Pilot – to test and learn / prototype / experiment / new things
Pilot – driver / navigator of an aeroplane (remember being in an aeroplane!! )

I really loved the idea that perhaps we can all be piloting the chaos right now. For me that means a few things

Some days all we can do is try our best to navigate and lead ourselves and others through the chaos and just survive safety together.
That we can pilot and try out new things during this chaos and stress test ourselves and our ideas for the future.
What we are unlikely to be able to do is change the chaos around us, so we might need to just make peace with that. We can, however, be pilots of the chaos to a greater or lesser extent and build some sense of structure and personal choice around how we respond.

“Develop a flight plan, then adjust regularly for turbulence.”

Keeping on with the flying theme (maybe I am missing travelling a little bit!) Often when we are designing engagements with our clients, my colleague Kenny and I will talk about developing a flight plan which gives confidence that we know where our clients need to get to and how they might get there. Then we talk about our need to be both personally and project plan wise be flexible, agile, experienced enough to adjust for moment by moment turbulence. Be that during a workshop or a longer-term consulting assignment.

As consultants, facilitators, coaches, we know how to handle a lot of the turbulence and unpredictability that comes up on client engagements, but we can’t possibly predict how every person in every situation or a whole organisation will respond to some interventions. Things come up, changes happen, COVID19 happens and we have to have confidence in ourselves and our client teams that when these things do happen we will still pilot the chaos, fly the plane through the turbulence and we can still get to the destination safely, even if its a bit bumpy.

This past 2 months has been a great ‘pilot’ for a new destination we are all in this great experiment. I’m sure everyone has their own version of this story, but this is what I’ve been reflecting on over past few weeks.

1. You can trust your own instincts and navigation.

Now is the time to really dial up your sense of purpose and meaning and live your values even more fully. These can be inner compass and guidance even more now. If you are not sure what to do or if something feels out of alignment with what you believe and who you are then trust that and inquire, what would be a response that I would be proud of in 5 years from now?

It’s also not the time to second guess your instincts, but it is the time to put a little bit of space between your instinctive response and your actions. I love the book and research of Dr Sabrina Cohen-Hatton's. She shares that when firefighters are having to make life or death decisions, often their first instincts are correct and in integrity but they don’t fully think through the unintended consequences of their choices so she devised these 3 questions for them, which I think can also help us all at the moment.

What am I trying to achieve right now? (connect to bigger picture)
What do I expect to happen? (assess perspectives)
How does the benefit (of my decision) outweigh the risk?

You can read more about her book here and a great interview between her and Dr Rangan Chatterjee on his podcast here.

2. Balance your knowing with completely not knowing what to do.

This is an unprecedented time, where no one has a rule book or knows how long this will go on for, when it will end, what the consequences are, what the damage will be, what the gifts will be. We all have so many questions, with very few answers. So, try to be as humble as you can be when you don’t know what to do or even when you are convinced you do know what to do. This is a great time to check, validate, ask questions, ask for advice and opinions from your team, your colleagues, your friends.

“Show your strength in your vulnerability of not knowing.”

You may never have been through COVID 19 season before, but equally you do know quite a lot of stuff. The balance of this time is trying not to be too attached to the ‘expert’ in you who believes you are 100% right.

Anytime I have thought I am right in the last few weeks, as if by universal lesson, a few hours or days later, I’ve realised maybe I’m not as right as I thought in that moment. I’ve had to changed my position or perspective. If your organisation, like many, has aspirations to be agile, have a growth mindset, lead for today and tomorrow – this is a perfect time to be role modelling agility, growth mindset. Having conversations that start with… I don’t know the answer yet… I know we have it within us to figure this out, we just haven’t yet… Even just adding a ‘yet’ to the end of your sentences opens our minds up to possibilities and more shared conversations.

3. People need you to take the next right step, not be perfect right now.

Imagine a pilot who is not sure quite what to do but has an instinct to get this plane into a landing spot somewhere even if it’s not where he or she imagined. You need to get that plane safely landed even if you subsequently have to make another choice or decision. So, once you’ve asked the questions, checked out some perspectives, you need to decide and act and probably quite quickly.

To quote Princess Anna from Frozen 2 (take my inspiration from everywhere 😊), what you can do at the moment is the next right thing. Don’t burn out your own energy or that of those around you taking too much time to make perfect decisions or choices. The great thing about deciding is, you can always make a new decision once you have more information. What I’m noticing is decisions I did or didn’t take a few weeks ago are completely irrelevant the week after because so much is changing so fast. The lack of action keeps us stuck and feeling out of control, so just do one or two small things to move forward, one or two next best steps.

And most importantly….

4) Remember to look after yourself, especially if you are a first responder for your organisation or family…

Although we may all be feeling increased stress and juggling a lot right now, we are likely not all putting ourselves in frontline contact with COVID19 and putting our lives at risk on a daily basis. I have much gratitude and admiration for all of our doctors, nurses, refuge collectors, grocery workers and the many more people keeping the lights on for all of us and their selfless work.

Even if we are not on the front line in that regard, many leadership roles are performing first responder roles at the moment. People are looking up to us to make decisions, look after them, help them emotionally and mentally and need us to be stronger than ever, when possibly we don’t feel very strong ourselves.

Remember this is a crisis, it’s not business or life as usual. As we get told in safety announcements on a plane, please do put your own gas mask on before helping others. You cannot fully support others if you are not doing this for yourself.

So please do not over work because you feel guilty or grateful, you deserve to still switch off and take care of yourself perhaps even more so during this crisis.
Be conscious of / try your best to partition home and work from each other, even more so whilst working from home.
And when all else fails, go back to the basics – sleep more, eat well, exercise, read, talk to someone about how you are feeling, get support from friends, family – be it physical or virtual.
Don’t set your expectations for yourself or others too high right now. We are all creating a new normal right and handling a lot right now as leaders, parents, home schooling, virtual citizens and just fellow human beings going through a shared experience, even if we might all be in different boats.

So, as you come into this week, I’d love to leave you with a couple of reflections…

How can you pilot the chaos this week with new ideas or new navigation?
What do you need to do to put your own gas mask on first more this week?
If you have a bit more gas in your tank and some reserves, how can you help others this week?
How might your values and purpose be even more important at this time? Click here to complete your free Barrett Values Assessment if you are not sure of your values.

Love to hear how you are all doing and as always please do drop me a note if I can be of any help or support at this time.

Best wishes and stay safe and well, Carla x

Piloting the chaos and leading ourselves through the crisis