A Crucial Aspect of Leadership: How Positivity can improve Performance

Anger won't get you to your highest levels of performance. Positive emotion will. - Chris Voss

Even though Chriss Voss is the top FBI Hostage negotiator, his statement holds true for leadership too.

Negativity builds walls and resistance, triggering our defense mechanism and making us more cautious around negative people. Positivity does the opposite. With positivity we connect and people can perform as a team to achieve the next level of their performance.

For leaders, it is essential to cultivate an atmosphere of positivity in the workplace as they act as multipliers. I wrote about it before and I say it again: When people in leadership positions possess a negative mindset, they tend to bring others down, while positive leaders lift others up. With this multiplier effect, people in leadership positions shape the company culture. Their mindset is extremely important!

Spreading positivity certainly does not mean that everything is supposed to be all sunshine and rainbows. The workplace is a place where diverse characters, temperaments, and motivations meet. Some may be ambitious and others may not, some may be more agreeable while others enjoy a good debate. There will be conflicts and negative feedback and bad mood from time to time. However, maintaining an overall positive attitude can help navigate these challenges. With a negative person, a conflict is more likely to escalate, with a positive person the conflicts may be addressed in a more constructive and productive manner.

A few 𝘃𝗲𝗿𝘆 𝘀𝗶𝗺𝗽𝗹𝗲 hacks for more positivity to start right away:

✦ Show appreciation

✦ Be kind, approachable & listen

✦ Make it a habit to share positive news more often

✦ Enjoy your job as people will recognize how you feel about it

✦ Appropriate humor

✦ Smile

✦ Help others

👉 As simple as they may seem, they tend to fade away as office politics come into play and time becomes very limited. The complex hack for positivity is being a good leader which has been discussed in previous posts and will be part of future posts.

I recommend implementing an assessment process for individuals being recruited for leadership positions to evaluate their overall positive outlook on life. This criterion is crucial as it significantly influences their work environment and can have substantial implications for both the company's success and the well-being of its employees. For the employed leaders ask a simple question such as “What do you do to cultivate positivity in your leadership style?” and go from there as many will not have an answer to this.