Find the full transcript at yourfuturerealized.com/15.
When you’re running your organization’s Operations, there’s always work to do. It is hard to stay on top of everything without getting bogged down just stomping out fires every day.
I often think of a story about a cook in a busy restaurant who was frustrated by the constant mess in the kitchen. He complained to a Zen master: “The kitchen is filthy! They never clean up.”
The Zen master told him: “If you want a calm kitchen, calm your mind.”
Your environment can reflect your inner state. If you want a more harmonious experience, you need to flip the script and begin by creating peace within your mind.
In this episode, I’ll share tips on how to calm your mind so you can focus and boost your operational agility.
Episode 15 – How to Lead Operations Without Losing Your Cool
When you’re running your organization’s Operations, there’s always work to do. It is hard to stay on top of everything without getting bogged down just stomping out fires every day.
I often think of a story about a cook in a busy restaurant who was frustrated by the constant mess in the kitchen. He complained to a Zen master: “The kitchen is filthy! They never clean up.”
The Zen master told him: “If you want a calm kitchen, calm your mind.”
Your environment can reflect your inner state. If you want a more harmonious experience, you need to flip the script and begin by creating peace within your mind.
In this episode, I’ll share tips on how to calm your mind so you can focus and boost your operational agility.
Find the full transcript at yourfuturerealized.com/15.
Hello Ops Execs!
Addressing Mental Health as an Operations Exec
Lately, I’ve been thinking about how often operations leaders tell me how busy things are and it sounds something like this at least four out of five times:
- I’m swamped.
- I’m drowning in emails.
- I’m stretched so thin.
- I’m slammed!
- I’m up to my eyeballs.
- I’m overwhelmed.
- It’s insane here.
- It’s been a crazy week.
- It’s a madhouse.
It’s not hard to notice how often being ‘busy’ equates with physical and mental unwellness.
Feeling like you’re pulled in too many directions leads to stress and anxiety. So does neglecting basic needs like sleeping, eating well, exercising, and having fun. (And yes, having fun is a basic need!).
It all can add up to feeling disconnected and like you’re losing control of your life. A little mindfulness can go a long way to create a better experience for yourself.
Also, casual use of exaggerated language like "it's insane" can trivialize serious situations. Plus, it reinforces harmful stereotypes. We all need to be conscious of the words we use.
The bottom line is that there's generally too much to do and not enough time or resources to handle them all, right?
It's not likely that things will settle down such that you never feel stressed. But you can become more relaxed and boost your operational agility.
The Link Between a Calm Mind and Operational Agility
At first glance, a calm mind might not seem that valuable in operational agility. Your brain prioritizes tasks based on how urgent they appear, as part of the ‘fight or flight’ response.
Plus, your brain is always seeking immediate gratification. So, completing tasks makes you feel good. This creates a positive feedback loop that encourages doing more and more tasks.
But completing tasks quickly doesn’t always create the best results. It also fuels the stress and anxiety that come with trying to do it all at once.
And studies show that stress can negatively impact cognitive function. Chronic stress can even affect the brain’s structure and function, making it difficult to think clearly and make good decisions.
So, back to “If you want a calm kitchen, calm your mind”. Keeping your cool inside helps you think better and respond more effectively on the fly. And that creates a stable, productive atmosphere for your team.
This is why when clients ask me to help them figure out how to get more done, step one is about strategies that help calm the mind.
From Chaos to Calm: Strategies to Calm Your Mind
So here are two things you can do to calm your mind. The first is for immediate relief; the second is a longer-term solution.
Immediate Relief: The Strategic Pause
When you notice you’re losing your cool in the middle of the chaos, first, well actually, that’s excellent! I’m not joking. Probably the hardest part of chilling out when you’re all worked up is getting to see yourself clearly.
And in that moment when you see what’s going on with yourself, you have choices:
1. You can just keep doing exactly whatever you’re doing amidst the chaos. Or,
2. You can take a few deep breaths. Step away from the situation for a second to pull yourself together. I don’t mean run away from it, that is not the intention. You can even do this internally, silently, without moving a muscle.
Victor Frankl said ‘Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom.’
Making a little space in your mental process makes room for fresh perspectives that may be more effective. At the very least, the deep breaths can alleviate a bit of stress.
Long-Term: Carve Out Alone Time
A few years ago, Harvard Business Review analyzed the time management habits of 27 CEOs. They were looking for patterns and best practices for being an effective leader.
They found that CEOs spend a significant amount of time, about 28% of their work hours, in ‘uninterrupted alone time’. This allows them to perform better than those who don’t have that practice.
Many also have specific and regular routines for self-care. They include things like meditation, exercise or simply disconnecting from technology. Habits like these allow you to keep your cool and make smarter choices when things get bumpy.
I’ll leave you with this question: How might you create a new boundary around your time, so you have space for a calmer mind?
You can’t stop the chaos, but you can change the game.