CHAPTER 14
Management Development for Well-Being and Survival: Developing the Whole Person

Rosemary Maellaro and J. Lee Whittington

University of Dallas, USA

14.1 INTRODUCTION

The very competitive global environment and attendant economic pressures experienced by organizations today make managing especially challenging (Whetten & Cameron, 2002). Lawler’s (2000) new millennium prediction that the business environment would become increasingly complex has materialized in the form of a boundaryless economy, worldwide labour markets, instantly linked information and agile new organizations. Accordingly, increasing amounts of competitive pressure has shifted to the management ranks in organizations. Hence, the creation of healthy work environments that flourish in these challenging, stressful times is a priority because the one competitive advantage that remains and becomes even more important in the current business environment is an organization’s employees.

One way an organization can protect the significant investment in the human resources that provide a competitive edge is to be intentional about improving the overall well-being of their managers. Increased well-being allows managers to strike a healthier balance between their work and personal lives and thus better allocate their time, focus and energy to myriad demands made on them by all of the things that have to be done (Mariotti, 1998). Overall well-being has both physical and mental components and ‘it’s about feeling positive and having enough energy to be productive at work and to enjoy non-working life’ (O’Reilly, 2006, p. 22).

As the line between work and home has become blurred by our ability to communicate and share information 24/7, the work day has expanded and now often intrudes into the home lives of managers (Mariotti, 1998). Therefore, it is important that organizations help managers develop the skills that are necessary to manage their personal lives as well as their work lives. While this approach may initially appear to be altruistic on the part of the organization, it is, in fact, imperative for the organization’s success. Lack of balance between work life and personal life can cause burnout, low productivity, dissatisfaction and stress-related illnesses at all levels of the organization (Wiley, 2006). Developing the whole person by addressing all aspects of managers’ lives can yield positive outcomes for both organizations and individuals.

This chapter focuses on management development for the purpose of increasing the overall well-being of leaders, using the manager’s whole-life model as a framework. The manager’s whole-life model implies a broader perspective for management development in contrast to a narrower perspective. Rather than emphasizing career and work development to the exclusion of a manager’s family, personal, spiritual and community life, the model places career and work in the context of overall life development. The underlying dynamic for the model is a cooperative, win-win strategy as opposed to a competitive, win-lose strategy.

What follows in Section 14.2 is an examination of management development within the context of today’s organizations as complex, open systems. Section 14.3 provides a general overview of the manager’s whole-life model, a brief description of its components and the rationale for using it to frame management development for well-being. Section 14.4 focuses on developing managers in the personal arena and addresses the importance of self-awareness for managers, how emotional intelligence can enhance personal development and preventative stress management techniques for managerial well-being. Section 14.5 proposes an agenda for management development programmes that can effectively cultivate a person. It also addresses the topics of interpersonal skill development, career development, learning to lead from strengths and servant-leadership as a redefinition of what it means to be a leader today. Section 14.6 discusses the need for managers to ‘stay alive’ amidst the chaos that is organizational life in the twenty-first century and addresses the final three components of the whole-life model: family, spiritual and community.

14.2 MANAGEMENT DEVELOPMENT WITHIN ORGANIZATIONS AS COMPLEX OPEN SYSTEMS

The dominant organizational paradigm remains wedded to scientific management theories which reflect a philosophy that remains committed to a need for control and prediction. This need for control reflects our need for safety and our fear of the unknown and being at the mercy of someone or something (Keene, 2000).

Rapid changes over the last several decades have brought us a global economy, increased competition, quantum improvements in our ability to share information instantaneously and the growing diversity of the population and the workforce. Because we cannot fully understand a system without constantly considering the forces that impinge upon it (Katz & Kahn, 1966), we must leave behind our conceptualization of organizations as closed, rational systems. Open systems theory provides a much more dynamic and adequate framework for understanding and managing organizations because it acknowledges that environmental influences have a major impact on the effective functioning of the organization as a complex social system. An organization must find and obtain needed resources, interpret and act on environmental changes, dispose of outputs, and control and coordinate internal activities in the face of environmental disturbances and uncertainty. This embodies the definition of an open system, one that must interact with its environment to survive and therefore continually change to adapt to its environment if it is to remain a viable entity (Daft, 2001).

Managers are typically trained to equate equilibrium and harmony with success, while, in reality, organizations are capable of spontaneous change. Managers may participate in these changes, but have little or no control over such changes, so it is imperative for their success that they develop a capacity to adapt and live creatively with those changes (Stacey, Griffin & Shaw, 2000). Accordingly, the notions of nonlinearity, randomness, complexity and chaos that are natural, legitimate, necessary and inescapable aspects of reality (Goldstein, 1994; Merry, 1995; Stacey, Griffin & Shaw, 2000; Wheatley, 1999) must be integrated with the old command and control methods for managing organizations – that is, the order, certainty, predictability and regularity that managers are taught they should attempt to impose in organizations.

The environment facing today’s organizations has become increasingly dynamic and more complex. This has implications for the organizational structures – they must become more organic to adapt to these challenges. But these changes also have implications for the nature of managerial work. Adaptive problems are contrasted with technical problems in the work of Heifetz (1994; Heifetz & Linsky, 2002). Technical problems are familiar, they have been dealt with before. Thus a solution is known and can be applied. Alternatively, adaptive problems present a challenge that has not been encountered before. Understanding the problem requires learning and the solution must be learned as those who are facing the problem work through it. In a stable and certain environment, the manager is the locus of control who has the answer and instructs the organization to apply known solutions. In complex and dynamic environments, the leader must facilitate adaptive work as the organization learns its way to a solution. Therefore, as the environment continues to become more complex and turbulent, managers will find themselves confronting adaptive problems more frequently and will be able to succeed only if they can learn quickly and apply that learning to unpredictable, rapidly occurring new situations (Daudelin & Hall, 1997; Heifetz & Linksy, 2002).

14.2.1 Management Development Programmes

Management development is an ongoing process of learning, growing and changing to enhance people’s skills and/or knowledge. In the United States alone there are more than five million managers and management development is provided to qualify managers for their jobs and/or to upgrade their positions (Pace, Smith & Mills, 1991). Management development is one way to design and build healthy, vital work environments. Management development may be undertaken by an individual manager or by the organization, or it may be a shared responsibility.

Management development has been defined in many ways and is used by different organizations for various reasons. Some of the most commonly cited reasons by organizations for implementing management development programmes include: building managerial interpersonal skills; developing individuals for increased responsibility; increasing management productivity; augmenting the pool of promotable management employees; and providing increased opportunities for women and minorities (Rothwell & Kazanas, 1993).

The core of our discussion of management development as a means of increasing well-being in the organization is based on its definition simply as ‘an attempt to improve managerial effectiveness through a planned and deliberate learning process’ (Rothwell & Kazanas, 1993, p. 5). Our general focus will be on management development not only as a way to enhance the well-being of managers, but also as a means of improving the organization’s ability to effectively respond to environmental change. In other words, our position is that management development need not be viewed as a zero-sum game. We believe that management development can be a win-win proposition – one that balances the economic goals of the organization with social goals that address the needs of individual managers as well (Friedman, Christensen & DeGroot, 1998).

The historically predominant view of organizations as static and closed systems led to management development programmes that typically are organization-specific. Such programmes have been rooted in functional rationality and have the conscious intention of equipping managers with explicit knowledge, skills and abilities to fulfill roles and attain goals that have been predetermined (Garavan, Barnicle & O’Suilleabhain, 1999; Kuchinke, 1999). As such, this approach is deterministic and uses universal, linear notions of cause and effect to provide managers with the tools they believe they need to predict the future, choose strategies and control activities. The goal has been to create a state of equilibrium, consensus and conformity that were associated with organizational success (Stacey, Griffin & Shaw, 2000).

The problem with this approach to management development, however, is that today’s organizations do not behave as mechanistic systems and are more accurately viewed as open systems that continuously interact with the external environment (Buhler, 2000). As such, they are complex, adaptive systems in which ‘work life is more complex, uncertain and anxiety-provoking. Under these conditions information is incomplete, ambiguous and the consequences of actions are highly unpredictable’ (Aram & Noble, 1999, p. 321). The long-held belief that managers are able to control organizational outcomes is no longer viable. These factors all contribute to managers’ stress levels, making well-being at work more difficult to achieve.

To be more effective, new management development programmes must be based on principles that do not leave managers with the illusion that they are in charge and in control when, in fact, they are not (Stacey, Griffin & Shaw, 2000). Given the permanent white water of contemporary organizational reality, the critical element in managerial development may no longer be the acquisition and mastery of specific skill sets; rather, effective management development programmes will be aimed at developing managers who are capable of delivering successful organizational adaptation and renewal (Garavan, Barnicle & O’Suilleabhain, 1999). This is not to imply, however, that individual managers should sacrifice their personal growth and engage in development activities solely for the benefit of the organization. The goal is to develop the whole person, one that is better equipped to succeed in personal arenas as well as the workplace.

Inherent in this approach to management development is the notion that the organization and individual managers both play key roles in the process. For its part, the organization must create a culture that is characterized by clear and consistent openness to experience, encouragement of responsible risk taking and willingness to acknowledge failures and learn from them. It must become a learning organization.

A learning organization is one that embodies the following traits (Senge, 1990):

  • Personal mastery – individuals within the organization are committed to their own life-long learning and continually strive to increase their personal levels of proficiency in areas that they value and are able to see reality objectively.
  • Mental models – the deeply held assumptions or generalizations that influence how people view the world and prepare to take action.
  • A shared vision – a set of guiding principles and practices that unite people in pursuing lofty goals for the organization.
  • Team learning – individuals are learning more rapidly as members of teams that develop extraordinary capacity for coordinated action.
  • Systems thinking – the ability to see the connection between issues, events and diverse data points to integrate them into a whole greater than the sum of its parts.

Learning organizations are healthy organizations that are characterized by generative learning, also called double-loop learning, as opposed to the adaptive, or single-loop learning that characterizes most organizations (Ar-gyris, 1991; Argyris & Schön, 1974). Adaptive learning results in self-sealing behaviour that discourages the generation and expression of alternative views or negative feelings. This is based on the beliefs that we live in a win-lose world, rational behaviour is most effective and the public testing of assumptions is intolerably risky.

Generative learning, on the other hand, emphasizes continuous experimentation and feedback in an ongoing examination of the very way in which organizations go about defining and solving problems. It promotes learning and growth by relying on valid information, free and informed choice, internal commitment to the choice and constant monitoring of its implementation. Noteworthy properties of this type of organizational learning are its ability not to be self-sealing and its tendency to permit progressively more effective testing of assumptions and progressively greater learning about a person’s effectiveness rather than attempting to protect people in the organization by covering up difficult issues.

14.3 THE MANAGER’S WHOLE-LIFE MODEL: FIVE ARENAS OF LIFE

When managers go to work each day, they do not bring with them only that part of themselves that is needed to perform their job. They bring a whole person. Even though all facets of the person are not engaged in the workplace, other aspects of a person’s life have an impact on an individual while at work. This notion of partial inclusion stems from the fact that the entire individual is not required for the individual’s designated role in the organization. Roles at work stipulate behaviours, which imply that only a psychological slice of the person is needed to perform his/her duties, yet the organization brings within its boundaries the entire person (Katz & Kahn, 1966). Each individual member of any given organization is also part of many other systems (family, church, social organizations, schools, etc.), however. The significance of this is that their behaviour in one organization most likely will be impacted by the many other segmental commitments they bring with them from participating as members of these other organizations.

There is a growing trend to recognize managers and employees as whole beings, not mere factors of production. The concept of well-being extends beyond the organization and the non-work arenas of life may well affect occupational well-being. Borrowing from Sherman and Hendricks (1989), our view of well-being transcends the work arena and also includes the four non-work arenas of life shown in Figure 14.1. This whole-life model emphasizes each of life’s five arenas. Well-being is a function of balance of time, commitment and the investment of emotional energy in these five areas of life.

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Figure 14.1 The manager’s whole-life model: five arenas of life.

Managers who define themselves in terms of these five arenas have greater self-complexity (Linville, 1985). Linville’s (1987) self-complexity buffering hypothesis suggests that individuals with high levels of self-complexity are buffered from distress and strain when a stressful life event occurs in one life arena. According to Linville, when an individual’s self-worth is based on their total self-concept, stressful events in one life arena are not as devastating. Individuals whose self-worth is dominated by only one role or arena are more likely to experience higher levels of distress when a stressful event occurs in that arena. While Linville’s (1985) notion of self-complexity argues for the relative independence of the areas in life, we have argued for recognition of the interdependence.

More recent views on leadership development also support this concept. Friedman (2006) believes that development programmes should not be limited to improving skills that are needed only in the workplace. He suggests that organizations develop the whole person to create what he calls total leadership. He proposes that management development models emphasize performance in all domains of life and that synergies across work, family, community and self be leveraged to produce more meaningful overall results. He contends that the work and personal lives of managers can be aligned rather than being viewed as in conflict with each other.

Occupational health psychology (OHP) focuses on the design and construction of healthy work environments (Murphy & Cooper, 2000; Quick, 1999a, 1999b; Quick & Tetrick, 2003). OHP is concerned with both the physical and the psychosocial, interpersonal design features of the work environment in order to manage the health risks that these design features may present. OHP is, therefore, a science of design aimed at creating opportunities for employees to grow, develop and strive to maximize their intellectual and physical potential free from unreasonable and/or unnecessary psychological risks.

OHP has three design dimensions: the work environment; the person; and the work environment–family system interface. First, the work environment dimension devotes attention to psychosocial aspects of work. This dimension addresses the issues of work design, organizational culture, corporate policies and procedures related to personal actions, families and due process. Control, uncertainty and conflict are parameters of particular interest within this design dimension (Landy, Quick & Kasl, 1994). Second, the person dimension requires attention to cognitive, moral and human development, as well as to skills and abilities required for the demands of a competitive or stressful work environment (Whetten & Cameron, 2002). Third, the work–family interface dimension addresses the manager’s non-work life arenas shown in Figure 14.1. While the family is of particular concern in this regard (Piotrkowski, 1979; Quick et al., 1994), the community, spiritual and personal arenas are important as well (Seta, Paulus & Baron, 2000).

A relatively new concept known as work–family enrichment theory suggests that participation in roles at work and at home can have positive additive effects on physical and psychological well-being. Individuals who participate in satisfying work and family roles have been known to experience greater well-being than those who participate in only one of the roles or who are dissatisfied with one or more of their roles. In much the same way that a diverse financial portfolio protects an individual’s financial well-being from poor performance in a particular type of investment, participation in multiple social roles can buffer managers from distress that may originate from one particular role (Greenhaus & Powell, 2006).

The manager’s whole-life model in Figure 14.1 provides a useful framework for implementing management development programmes that address the OHP’s dimensions of healthy work environments and encourages active engagement in multiple life roles. The whole-life model suggests interdependence, not complete independence, of the personal, work, family, spiritual and community arenas that comprise an individual’s life. It advocates well-being and balanced investment in all five arenas.

Development in the personal arena is increasingly viewed as critical to a manager’s overall success. Unless and until an individual has developed a keen sense of self-awareness, has increased his or her emotional intelligence and gained the ability to effectively manage his or her own stress, it will be more difficult to successfully supervise and lead others to high levels of business achievement.

Development in the work arena focuses on honing skills that will enable managers to operate more effectively in complex organizations, better serve their employees in guiding them to attain organizational objectives and effectively manage their own careers.

The spiritual arena includes the cultivation of a relationship with God or a higher power, as enhanced by personal efforts in prayer, meditation and study. The community arena suggests the need to be involved in the community, with the intent to serve others. The family arena emphasizes a manager’s responsibilities to spouse and children. It also addresses obligations to siblings and parents, which is becoming a more prevalent issue as the parents of many workforce members are ageing and require more care.

The size and relative importance of each arena varies by individual manager. For example, problems in the work arena may spill over into the family arena, or the reverse may also occur, which can be problematic (Kabanoff, 1980; Quick et al., 1994). Therefore, as we focus primarily on management development in the personal and work arenas, sensitivity to the interdependence of a manager’s five life arenas is important.

14.4 DEVELOPMENT IN THE PERSONAL ARENA

The personal arena includes a person’s emotional and innermost life; that is, the private world of the self (MacDonald, 1985). This private world can be viewed as our essence and the ordering of this arena in life provides an anchoring stability around which the other life arenas may be structured. Management development in the personal arena provides the foundation for development in the other four arenas. Organizations that facilitate development in this arena find that their managers are more personally engaged in their work, exhibit a greater commitment to helping others succeed and are better prepared to contribute to achieving the overall goals of the organization (Lash, 2002). Additionally, managers who are more engaged in their work are better able to cope with job stress (O’Reilly, 2006), which further contributes to their overall well-being.

Finding the point of balance between all things that managers want to accomplish with their career, family, friends, community and other outside interests is as much an issue of choice as it is of time. Balancing work and life for greater overall well-being is not simply a matter of where and how managers spend their time; it involves making choices about what is important to them and aligning their actions with those values (Gurvis & Patterson, 2005). The process of aligning life choices with core values naturally begins with self-awareness.

14.4.1 Self-Awareness

Management development is much more than simply learning the latest leadership theories or management skills. Leaders must experience self-growth first in order to achieve outstanding results for themselves and their organizations (Lash, 2002). Self-awareness is a broad concept that concentrates on the image that an individual has of him/herself, how well that is aligned with their personal values and whether or not that image is accurate in comparison with how others perceive that individual (McCarthy & Garavan, 1999). Whetten and Cameron (2002) contend that the knowledge managers possess about themselves is a critical component of management capability. ‘We cannot improve ourselves or develop new capabilities unless and until we know what level of capability we currently possess’. They go on to note that, ‘Considerable empirical evidence exists that individuals who are more self-aware are more healthy, perform better in managerial and leadership roles and are more productive at work’ (p. 57). Others have claimed that effective leaders are those that have a congruent sense of self (Nichols, 2008) and who exhibit integrity, people acumen and trust-building behaviour (Stein & Book, 2001). Because these traits all stem from high levels of self-awareness, we believe that increasing managers’ self-awareness must be the first step in management development programmes. Self-awareness provides the cornerstone for building personal success, while a deficit in self-awareness can be debilitating both to a person’s personal relationships and career (Goleman, 1995).

The goal of self-awareness for managers is to gain an understanding of what is important to them, how they experience things, what they want, what they feel and how they come across to others – essentially to understand what makes them do what they do (Weisinger, 1998). The process of increasing self-awareness therefore is essentially an inner journey (Lash, 2002) that can be accomplished through careful introspection, or with the help of assessments by others. Various standardized inventories are also available to assist with self-analysis (Roe & Lunneborg, 1990).

Weisinger (1998) suggests that increasing self-awareness does not necessarily require long hours of psychotherapy; what is needed is ‘some serious thoughtfulness and the courage to explore how you react to the people and events in your life’ (p. 6). He recommends the following steps for managers who wish to work on increasing their self-awareness:

  • Examine how you make appraisals. These are the various impressions, interpretations and expectations that people have about themselves and others. By tuning into this inner dialogue, managers can become more aware of how their thoughts influence their feelings and actions. Additionally, by seeking information about how others make appraisals, managers will then be able to compare their appraisals and alter their actions if necessary.
  • Tune into your senses. It is through the five senses of sight, sound, smell, taste and touch that people receive information about their worlds. It is critical, however, to clearly distinguish between sensory data and appraisals, as our judgements about ourselves, others and any given situation can act as a filter to the senses.
  • Get in touch with your feelings. Feelings are the spontaneous emotional responses people have about their interpretations and expectations. Feelings are often denied or ignored because getting in touch with them can be difficult. While acknowledging feelings can cause discomfort or distress for some people, doing so is a key to understanding why people behave the way they do. It is important to deal with feelings as they occur and then move on so negative feelings do not fester. Additionally, it is impossible to effectively manage feelings that are not acknowledged.
  • Learn what your intentions are. Determining what their desires are, particularly in the short term, can help managers become more strategic in their actions. Once again, this may be a difficult task because apparent intentions are often confused with hidden agendas. True intentions are more readily identified when people use their behaviours as clues, trust their feelings and are honest with themselves.
  • Pay attention to your actions. While the preceding suggestions deal with internal processes, this one addresses people’s overt actions. This is an important distinction in that others can also observe behaviours, yet may interpret them in any number of ways. In this case, it is the nuances or the unconscious actions (for example, speech patterns, body language and nonverbal behaviour) that can provide valuable clues to underlying attitudes and behaviours rather than broad, obvious actions (such as walking, speaking, etc.).

Lack of self-awareness is often the reason that some really intelligent people sometimes fail miserably in organizations (Noel & Dotlich, 2008). When managers do not understand who they are and the impact they have on others they will find it more difficult to gain the respect and trust of the people they must work with and through to achieve organizational goals. Once managers attain increased self-awareness, however, they also can realize several other benefits that contribute to their overall physical and emotional well-being. They will act in ways that are more congruent with their real selves, their behaviour will become more flexible because they are acting in the here and now rather than in response to old feelings and they will be able to more directly pursue their goals as they gain greater clarity about what they want – out of life in general and out of work more specifically (Segal, 1997).

14.4.2 Developing Emotional Intelligence

It would be remiss to address self-awareness without recognizing that it is a foundational component of emotional intelligence (EI), which has played a considerable role in management development programmes of late. EI has been defined in numerous ways, but its essence lies in the notion that ‘rational thinking involves emotions and that the two cannot be separated’ (Caruso & Salovy, 2004, p. 195). It is the ability to be aware of one’s emotions and intentionally use them to guide behaviour and thinking in ways that enhance outcomes (Weisinger, 1998).

Many scholars and practitioners have come to believe that increased EI can provide managers with a critical edge in the work and family arenas (McCarthy & Garavan, 1999). Daniel Goleman (1995), who is largely responsible for introducing the concept to the business world, argues that IQ accounts for only about 20% of a person’s success in life and that the rest can be accounted for by EI. Caruso and Salovey (2004) believe that EI can provide managers an edge in building loyalty and commitment among employees. As they point out, ‘If you examine current theories of leadership or descriptions of trusted leaders, it is clear that emotional competencies . . . may play at least as important a role as technical competencies and industry knowledge, perhaps even more so’ (p. 196). They also describe how higher levels of EI can contribute to a manager’s ability to adapt and survive in today’s complex organizations: ‘A person functioning in amorphous situations marked by rapid change needs to be able to form strong teams quickly and efficiently, interact effectively with people, communicate goals and obtain buy-in from these self-directed, autonomous groups’ (Caruso & Salovy, 2004, p. xvii).

As noted above, self-awareness can help leaders better understand the implications of their own thoughts, feelings and intentions, as well as the feelings of others. This is a central aspect of the motivational mechanism of transformational leadership (Sosik & Magerian, 1999). Yet self-awareness is only one of four domains of EI, which also includes self-management, social awareness and relationship management (Goleman, Boyatzis & McKee, 2002).

Self-management

What you don’t recognize, you can’t manage. If you aren’t aware of what you’re doing, why you’re doing it and the way it is affecting others, you can’t change (Stein & Book, 2000, p. 55).

Once managers gain sufficient self-awareness, they can progress to the self-management domain of EI. Contrary to what some may believe, self-management does not involve stifling one’s feelings; rather it is about understanding them in an effort to make situations more favourable and taking charge of one’s thoughts and visceral reactions to behave intentionally (Weisinger, 1998). Managers with strong self-management competencies are able to establish an environment of mutual respect as they consider the needs of others while calmly asserting their own needs (Segal, 1997; Sosik & Magerian, 1999). They are transparent, optimistic, flexible in adapting to changing situations or overcoming obstacles, have high personal standards that they strive to achieve, recognize and eagerly seize opportunities and effectively manage their disturbing emotions and impulses (Goleman, Boyatzis & McKee, 2002).

The ability to effectively manage stress is an integral aspect of self-management and will be addressed in a separate section later in the chapter.

Social awareness and empathy

The primary competency within the social awareness domain is empathy, which is the ability to tune into and read the thoughts and feelings of other people – that is, to see the world from their perspective – while not losing sight of one’s own separate emotional experience (Stein & Book, 2000; Segal, 1997). Goleman, Boyatzis and McKee (2002) describe empathy as a type of ‘social radar’ that allows individuals to sense and understand the felt, yet unspoken, emotions of others. The goal of empathy is to convey understanding of what other people are going through without taking on their feelings, agreeing with their point of view, or attempting to fix things (Segal, 1997; Switankowsky, 2000).

Some managers who confuse empathy with sympathy are reluctant to show empathy because they fear it will make them appear weak and vulnerable. Empathy, however, is not sympathy. Whereas empathy is about truly listening to another person in an effort to see the world from their perspective and understand their feelings without getting involved in them, sympathy is more reactionary and often involves personal identification with another person’s feelings and the assumption of their pain (Norris, 2004; West, 2006). Another important distinction between the two concepts is that in showing empathy the self is merely a vehicle for understanding and does not lose its own identity. On the other hand, sympathy reduces rather than enhances self-awareness because it is concerned more with communion than accuracy (Switankowsky, 2000).

The ability to show empathy can be a decided advantage for managers. Empathy requires a person to make an effort and actively engage with others, which can help managers get to know their employees and understand what motivates them. This forms the basis for trusting relationships that, in the long run, contribute to the well-being of both parties. Goleman (1995) referred to empathy as ‘the fundamental people skill’ and says that ‘people with empathy are natural leaders who can express the unspoken collective sentiment and articulate it so as to guide a group toward its goals’ (p. 97).

Showing empathy is similar to Lundin and Lundin’s (1994) notion of healing managers. They suggest that organizations need to build trust by directly confronting feelings and emotions in the workplace. Healing managers help others grow emotionally and intellectually by evoking the spirit and values of an organization committed to creating a caring, humane and compassionate work environment. Healing managers forge the emotional pathway to healthy relationships.

Relationship management

An organization exists as a result of the relationships of its members (Stacey, Griffin & Shaw, 2000); therefore positive interpersonal interactions are critical for organizational as well as individual well-being. The ultimate objective for developing EI competence in managers is to enhance their ability to establish and maintain effective interpersonal relationships. Technical skills remain as core job requirements, but a lack of good interpersonal skills negatively impacts job performance and personal well-being (Centko, 1998).

Managers with high EI are more likely to be successful in managing relationships because they possess awareness that allows them to accurately analyse relationships and adjust their behaviours accordingly, they manage their emotions effectively to make interpersonal interactions more productive and they are able to connect meaningfully with others with their empathy skills (Weisinger, 1998).

14.4.3 Preventive Stress Management and Health Psychology

Work-related psychological disorders and distress have been among the 10 leading occupational health risks in the United States for more than a decade (Sauter, Murphy & Hurrell, 1990). There are a variety of contributing factors for such health risks, including the corporate warfare manifested in mergers, acquisitions, downsizing and bankruptcies, which has come with increasing competition (Nelson, Quick & Quick, 1989; Thurow, 1993). Based on the translation of the epidemiological and public health notions of prevention into a stress-process framework, preventive stress management was developed as an organizational philosophy for leading and managing organizations to enhance health while averting distress in the workplace (Quick et al., 1997). Two of the guiding principles of preventive stress management are especially relevant to managers interested in creating healthy work environments.

  • Principle 1: Individual and organizational health are interdependent.
  • Principle 2: Leaders have a responsibility for individual and organizational health.

The first principle calls for managers to enhance their own health and well-being because they make important contributions to the health and well-being of the organization as a whole and are important role models for their employees. Organizations cannot maintain vitality and productivity when the individuals throughout them are distressed and in varying degrees dysfunctional. Hence, management has a responsibility for individual and organizational health (Principle 2). As managers develop their own health, they should do so considering the personal, family, spiritual and community arenas of their lives, because parenting, community involvement and recreation have positive benefits for their functioning in the work area (Kirchmeyer, 1992).

Within the preventive stress management model, Quick, Nelson and Quick (1990) found that chief executives who managed stress in a healthy manner varied substantially in the prevention methods each found personally most effective. However, all were found to be self-reliant in the way they formed and maintained a social support network of professional and personal (e.g. family, spiritual and community) relationships (Quick, Nelson & Quick, 1987). Furthermore, a study of the US Navy’s top 140 major weapon system managers found that such social support constituted an effective prevention method for reducing burnout associated with perceived environmental uncertainty (Bodensteiner, Gerloff & Quick, 1989).

Goodness of fit

The person–environment fit theory of stress concerns the interaction between person and environment dimensions, thus offering a point of departure for understanding the flexible fit dynamics required in OHP (Edwards & Cooper, 1990). The three design elements of OHP operate interdependently, not independently. Goodness of fit is an important element in a design process. Hence, blaming distressed victims or workplaces for health problems is of little value when design modifications in one of the other design dimensions may solve the problem. The principles of preventive stress management imply a shared responsibility for health at work and imply joint problem solving to enhance healthy human potential in organizations. The notion of goodness of fit between the person and the work environment suggests the potential for no-fault problems and the need to mould each. The work environment, the person and the family all must have degrees of flexibility. Hence, the need for a flexible fit among the three design dimensions. Quick et al. (2001) recently used dynamic effect spirals in proposing an isomorphic theory of stress that extends person–environment fit theory and the goodness-of-fit concept. An isomorphic theory refers to a dimension-specific extension of person–environment fit theory and focuses attention on corresponding characteristics in the person and the environment. The isomorphic theory proposed by Quick et al. (2001) brings attention to the dimensions of control, uncertainty and interpersonal relationships. Further, the theory suggests that through mutual, dynamic accommodations along each dimension, goodness of fit and healthy levels of stress can be achieved.

14.5 DEVELOPMENT IN THE WORK ARENA

As the very nature of organizations has changed dramatically, so too have the competencies that are necessary for effective management of those organizations. Human and social systems can no longer be understood by reducing them to the sum of their ever-changing parts (Merry, 1995); therefore, the knowledge and skill bases that have defined functional managers over recent decades are no longer complete. To meet the challenges of global competition and chaos in the world of work, more critical to management success are the capacities of adaptability, flexibility, open-mindedness and self-reliance (Quick, Nelson & Quick, 1990; Weir & Smallman, 1998). Thus, the topics addressed in management development programmes aimed at increasing managerial competence must be modified accordingly.

Merry (1995) notes that humans are social animals who need to interrelate with others to work, produce and ensure the necessities of life. ‘To ensure these relationships, there must be a measure of certainty, order, regularity, predictability and some degree of stability and steadiness in the way people behave toward each other’ (p. 19). While many organizations and individuals try to ensure this through control and domination, the New Sciences suggest that chaos and order are fused in such a way that they cannot be disentangled (Merry, 1995). The paradoxical view of organizations as complex systems, however, has not been widely adopted by managers in organizations today. Stacey, Griffin and Shaw (2000) deem this to be the source of stress and anxiety for many managers, in that they believe that life should not be paradoxical and that they should be able to find solutions to the problems that paradox creates and experience another thing, which is the reality of chaos.

The central role of managers in organizations is changing from one of attempting to reduce and control uncertainty to one of being able to live creatively with it (Stacey, Griffin & Shaw, 2000). One way managers will be able to make this transition will be to learn how to operate within a systems thinking mindset, one that requires them to think in terms of the whole system, realizing that this whole is greater than the sum of its parts and understanding the nonlinear nature of those systems while also being able to discern underlying patterns.

It is also crucial that management development programmes focus on developing managerial capabilities needed to function effectively at the edge of chaos, tolerate ambiguity, produce business results under unpredictable circumstances and deal productively with constant change.

14.5.1 Managerial Interpersonal Skills

One competency that remains constant as a source of employee well-being is the need for managers to develop and maintain healthy relationships within the organization (Quick, Nelson & Quick, 1990). A surprising number of otherwise intelligent and technically qualified individuals unnecessarily fail in management positions because of limited interpersonal competence. Many have not succeeded in management positions because they were unable to establish and maintain the type and quality of relationships with others that would have enabled them to achieve both personal and organizational goals. This can have a decidedly negative impact on the well-being of these managers, in addition to the well-being of their employees and ultimately on the success of their companies.

While the ability to establish and maintain mutually beneficial, productive interpersonal relationships with coworkers and employees can be enhanced as managers work on increasing their emotional intelligence as discussed above, management development programmes must also offer opportunities that are dedicated specifically to developing interpersonal skills. Professor and consultant John Hayes has had experience working with managers who are considered to be technically and professionally competent, but who are not as successful when it comes to achieving organizational goals and efficiently accomplishing tasks with a minimum of unnecessary disruption. He notes,

The distinguishing factor between these and more successful managers appears to be their level of interpersonal competence. Those who pay attention to interpersonal relationships and who, when necessary, are able to consciously manage the way they relate with others seem to be much more successful in terms of achieving their goals (Hayes, 1994, p. vii).

Simply helping managers gain knowledge about interpersonal competence is not enough, however. As Boyatzis (1982) contends, ‘It is usually not the lack of knowledge but the inability to use knowledge that limits effective managerial behavior’ (p. 4). Therefore, organizational management development programmes must address the acquisition of knowledge and skills in the area of interpersonal competence; knowledge is a necessary first step, but by itself it is not sufficient for changing leadership behaviour (Georges, 1988; Whetten, 1983). New knowledge must be put into action (McDonald-Mann, 1998).

As an initial step in this process, organizations must determine the particular skills that differentiate individuals who establish and maintain successful interpersonal relationships within their own organizations from those who do not. This is because this concept is often unique to an organization’s culture and because it is difficult, if not impossible, to find a consistent meaning of interpersonal competence. It has been defined variably by scholars and practitioners as interpersonal skills, people skills, soft skills, communication skills and relationship skills in very general terms. Although specific interpersonal skills are rarely delineated, one study (Maellaro, 2008) determined that there were 11 specific interpersonal skills that were most preferred by those who hire managers. These were: empathy, assertiveness, collaborative bargaining, political acumen, giving feedback, asking probing questions, reflecting on what others say, diagnostic skills (to identify problems in groups that may be hindering productivity), intervention skills (to effectively resolve performance issues), preparing information for employees and presenting it in a credible manner.

14.5.2 Career Development

Career development enhances management development while encouraging individual and organizational health. This process constitutes an important part of the individual–organization exchange relationship. Individuals look to the organization to provide a series of meaningful, satisfying work experiences and organizations expect high levels of performance and commitment from individuals to whom they provide opportunities. Career development consists of the actions individuals take, alone or with the aid of others, to manage their careers in specific ways (Quick et al., 1997).

Successful career development efforts can encourage the health of both managers and organizations, although a demanding career may also have adverse effects on a manager’s family investment (Kirchmeyer, 1992). For individuals, career development serves several functions. It increases self-efficacy by building in opportunities for growth and success. In addition, sound career choices can decrease strain. For the organization, inattention to career development can have dysfunctional consequences. Poor performance, low commitment, low job satisfaction and high turnover rates can result from the frustration that employees experience in conjunction with poorly managed careers. Career development can best be considered a joint responsibility for individuals and organizations.

Key components of career development

There are two key components of effective career development (Greenhaus, 1987). One is the process of self-analysis that provides information about individual strengths, weaknesses, interests and abilities. The insights gained by managers in the inner journey taken for development in the personal arena can readily be used for purposes of career development as well.

The other key component is environmental exploration, which includes an analysis of opportunities available to the individual. This activity has become increasingly challenging in today’s organizations because of the flattening of organizations, downsizing and the elimination of many middle management jobs. Career paths in organizations are no longer feasible because of the increasing pace of change (Dalton, 1989). Nevertheless, individuals must develop information about the role requirements of particular jobs that they envision filling.

Good self-analysis and opportunity analysis lead a manager to form a strategic career plan, which should be placed in the context of an overall balanced life. The concept of a career as a series of upward moves may no longer be realistic in light of the radical organizational changes afoot (Thurow, 1993; Waterman, Waterman & Collard, 1994). Careers may need to be reconceptualized as a series of lateral moves with attendant breadth in skill acquisition, a perspective very consistent with a developmental view for management. Organizations should not relinquish their roles in opportunity analysis in the face of such challenges. Instead, they should be as honest and forthright as possible with individuals about their futures. Self-analysis and opportunity analysis are reciprocally related and are both essential to forming a strategic career plan. Extensively relying on one process without sufficient attention to the other will produce incomplete career development.

Alternative sources of career development support

Career development support may come in the form of self-help, counsellor assistance, organizational programmes and career planning courses (Gray et al., 1990). Organizations can take some initiatives and can provide opportunities for managers to undertake others.

Self-help Individuals can engage in career development pursuits on their own. The self-exploration that they undertake as part of the development in their personal arena can be a part of such activities, whereby they assess their values, interests, skills, work preferences, strengths and weaknesses. By learning as much as possible about themselves, individuals can begin to develop meaningful career goals and strategies for achieving the goals. In addition to self-exploration, individuals can conduct library research on careers of interest or contact organizations of interest and ask for published materials. Another alternative is the informational interview, which has the advantage of learning the perspectives of others who have insights about potential career strategies. While self-help avenues of career development have the advantage of low cost, they require significant investments of the individual’s time.

Counsellor assistance A second career development source is engaging the assistance of a career counsellor or consultant. While universities provide such services at relatively low cost to students, counsellors in private practice provide these services for substantially higher fees. Most counsellors take a comprehensive approach to career development, combining individual assessment with opportunity analyses. A typical approach uses both standardized instruments that focus on job interests, career maturity and abilities, along with in-depth interviews. The advantages of using counsellors or consultants include the interactive feedback provided to the individual and the expertise provided by the counsellor. Two potential disadvantages of this approach are its cost and the danger of the employee forming an unhealthy dependency reliance on the counsellor.

Organizational programmes Many organizations have their own programmes for career development that integrate individual career planning with human resource planning and the development of succession plans. By creating career paths that encourage individual growth and development, organizations ensure a supply of talent to meet their future staffing needs. Career development programmes in organizations may include newcomer orientation, job rotation, goal setting, mentoring, assessment centre evaluations and management training. These efforts all work to strengthen the individual–organizational relationship.

Career-planning courses Universities or professional associations often offer career-planning courses. One advantage of such courses is the information exchange between individuals and their fellow students and instructors. This exchange provides several points of independent feedback and provides opportunities for considerable interaction. Typical courses include readings, lectures, standardized tests, cases, individual and group experiential activities and guest speakers. In summary, there are several sources of career development support and a variety can be used to achieve maximum benefits.

Value added to the workplace

Career development encourages individual health by providing individuals with opportunities to learn new skills, acquire more knowledge and work toward achieving their full potential. By providing and developing goals and direction, it can reduce the anxiety and frustration that individuals may experience without a guiding force behind their careers.

For organizations, the value of career development is that it helps identify training needs, staffing opportunities and undiscovered potential talent in the workforce. It forces an organization to look ahead in terms of its human resource needs and to proactively develop individuals who can meet those needs. Career development also serves an important communicative function within organizations. It conveys a message to employees that management believes individual well-being and organizational well-being are linked and that investing in the long-term developmental activities of employees ultimately pays off in organizational health.

14.5.3 Learning to Lead from Strengths

Many leaders find themselves burned out because they spend an inordinate amount of time on activities that are outside their zone of competence. Leaders who are able to sustain effective leadership have discovered the importance of channelling their energy into those arenas that are closely aligned with their giftedness and passion. This is difficult because leaders have a natural desire to prove themselves in everything they do. This is often rooted in a need for achievement. While this is certainly an important trait for leaders, this orientation may in fact be detrimental to leaders and their organizations if it is not disciplined by a focus on the leader’s core competencies. Many leaders allow their time and emotional energy to be consumed by tasks that are outside their zone of competence. This drains leaders’ physical and emotional energy and detracts from their ability to make the greatest contribution possible to the organization. According to Stanley (2003, p. 21), ‘the moment a leader steps away from his core competence, his effectiveness as a leader diminishes. Worse, the effectiveness of every other leader in the organization suffers too’. According to Stanley, the solution is for leaders to lead from their strengths and to ‘only do what only you can do’.

Overcoming this tendency to spend time and energy on activities outside the zone of competence requires a leader to identify and lead from his or her strengths. The most effective leaders are able to do this and then delegate those activities that are not core competencies to others. While this principle seems obvious, resistance to implementing this is reinforced by factors within the leader and within the organization. Many leaders are insecure and uncomfortable relinquishing control to others. Therefore, the thought of handing over any activities, even those they do not enjoy, is difficult for some. Often a leader’s insecurity or ego prevents them from admitting a lack of competence.

Even when a leader is willing to admit this vulnerability, the members of the organization may resist such a delegation because of their implicit leadership theory (Lord & Maher, 1991) and expectations of the leader. For many, the leader is expected to be the person who always has the answers and solution to the problems faced by the organization. Yet, as the operating environment becomes increasingly dynamic and complex, the nature of the task facing the members of the organization moves from technical to adaptive (Heifetz, 1994; Heifetz & Linkskey, 2002). Adaptive problems require the leader to facilitate adaptive work and give the work back to the people who actually have the problem.

Stanley (2003) identifies five obstacles that keep leaders from being able to reframe their role and to lead from their strengths. First, leaders often strive for balance. While we strongly endorse leading a balanced life, within the work arena the most effective leaders should strive for a focused approach by leading from their zone of strength and competence and delegating other activities. The goal should be to have a focused leader and a balanced organization.

The second obstacle is the leader’s inability to distinguish between authority and competence. All leaders have authority over areas in which they have little or no competence. This obstacle is reinforced by the leader’s own self-perceptions and the followers’ expectations as we discussed earlier. However, leaders must realize that exercising authority and becoming involved in areas outside their competency will hinder and may even derail projects. This over involvement may also demotivate those employees who are competent in that area (Stanley, 2003). This may also be complicated by a leader’s inability to distinguish between competencies and noncompetencies. Many leaders suffer from a halo effect and assume that their competencies in one area spill over into areas in which they are not competent. Overcoming this obstacle will require leaders to engage in honest self-assessment to discover their strengths and their weaknesses. But discovery of weaknesses is only the first step. The leaders must then be willing to be vulnerably transparent and admit the weaknesses and delegate to others.

The ability to admit weaknesses and delegate to others may be a difficult step because of personal insecurity. The difficulty of doing this may be exacerbated by feelings of guilt. Leaders may resist delegating tasks they don’t enjoy or in which they lack competence because they assume the task would be equally unpleasant for others. Yet, a leader’s weakness is often a strength for others and delegation allows that person to develop and make a more significant contribution.

The final obstacle is the leader’s unwillingness to invest in the development of others. According to the servant-leadership philosophy (Greenleaf, 1977), one of the primary tasks of the leader is to develop others. When a leader refuses to delegate, they are denying prime developmental opportunities for their followers. This limits the capacity of the follower (and over time the entire organization) and fuels the misallocation of the leader’s strengths and focus. Thus, failure to use delegation as a developmental tool reinforces a cycle of depletion and burnout.

14.5.4 Redefining the Leader’s Role: Servant-Leadership

The willingness of a leader to view his or her primary task as a developer of others may require a transformation of the manager’s mindset. We believe that the philosophy of servant-leadership provides a useful framework for this transformation. In this section we will describe the philosophy and practice of servant-leadership. In doing so we emphasize the fact that this is a philosophy, a mindset, not another set of traits or behaviours. While behaviours certainly flow from the philosophy, authentic servant-leadership flows from a deep, internalized set of beliefs and values. Any attempt to merely behave as servant-leader will be perceived an inauthentic and result in the loss of trust and credibility associated with pseudo-transformational leadership.

The recent growth in the interest of this perspective on leadership can be traced to the work of Robert Greenleaf (1977). Greenleaf, in turn, identifies Herman Hesse’s (1956) A Journey to the East as the source of his idea of the servant as leader. In his book, Hesse tells a somewhat autobiographical story of a journey taken by a band of men. The story centres on Leo, who accompanies the group. Leo performs a variety of menial chores and sustains the group with his spirit and songs. When Leo disappears, the group falls apart and the journey is abandoned. Years later, Leo is discovered to be the leader of the Order that had sponsored the journey. Greenleaf offers Leo as the prototypical servant-leader. Leo was the leader of the journey throughout, yet was servant first. This servant-first attitude was rooted in Leo’s deepest convictions. Leadership was bestowed externally by others upon a man who was first a servant by nature. According to Greenleaf (1977), the servant nature of Leo was the real man and because this servant nature had not been granted or assumed, it could not be taken away.

For Greenleaf (1977, 1998), the servant-leader is servant first – an attitude that flows from a deep-rooted, natural inclination to serve. The conscious choice to lead comes after the desire to serve. Greenleaf distinguishes between those who would be ‘leader-first’ and those who are ‘servant-first’. In fact, for him, these two are extreme types that form the anchors of a leadership continuum. The defining difference between the two is the concern taken by the servant-first to make sure that others’ highest priority needs are being served. This distinction is captured in Greenleaf’s (1977, pp. 13–14) ‘test’ for those who would be identified as servant-leaders:

The best test and most difficult to administer, is this: Do those served grow as persons? Do they, while being served, become healthier, wiser, freer, more autonomous, more likely themselves to become servants? And what is the effect on the least privileged in society; will they benefit, or, at least, not be further deprived?’

Greenleaf’s legacy has been perpetuated by the work of The Greenleaf Center for Servant-Leadership. Spears (1998, p. 3) summarizes servant-leadership as a leadership that ‘emphasizes increased service to others, a holistic approach to work, promoting a sense of community and the sharing of power in decision making. At its core, servant-leadership is a long-term, transformational approach to life and work – in essence, a way of being – that has the potential for creating positive change throughout our society’. According to Spears, servant-leadership is manifested through 10 characteristics: listening, empathy, healing, awareness, persuasion, conceptualization, foresight, stewardship, commitment to the growth of people and building community.

Servant-leaders demonstrate a deep commitment to listening intently to others. Through listening, the servant-leader identifies and clarifies the will of his or her followers. This commitment to listening helps the servant-leader to understand and empathize with others. While perhaps rejecting behaviour or performance, the servant-leader accepts people for their inherent goodness and unique design. The acceptance that flows from empathy and a commitment to listening provides the potential for the servant-leader to ‘help make whole’ those with broken spirits and emotional hurts.

Awareness refers to the discernment that servant-leaders possess that enables them to evaluate the ethical dimensions of a situation from an integrated, holistic and value-based position. This principle-centred (Covey, 1990) awareness allows servant-leaders to operate from an inner serenity that does not require reliance on positional authority to influence others. Thus, servant-leaders use persuasion rather than coercion to make decisions and exert influence. Servant-leaders also demonstrate an ability to conceptualize and to use foresight.

Conceptualization and foresight are closely related. Conceptualization refers to the servant-leader’s capacity to look beyond the day-to-day details in an effort to encompass a broader perspective. Foresight refers to the ability to foresee the likely outcome of a situation using lessons from the past and the realities of the present. Former TDIndustries CEO, Jack Lowe, Jr, believes that a failure of foresight is an ethical failure (Whittington & Maellaro, 2006). The leader must anticipate the future and prepare the organization and its employees to adapt to the challenges presented by the ever evolving environment.

The final three characteristics are rooted in the servant-leader’s other-centred orientation. Stewardship refers to the fact that the servant-leader is holding his or her organization in trust for someone else and serving the institution for a greater good that transcends any agenda centred on the personal advancement of the leader. This other-centred orientation also manifests itself in the servant-leader’s commitment to the development of others. Because they view others as having intrinsic, as opposed to instrumental, value, servant-leaders use the power of their positions to nurture the personal, professional and spiritual growth of their followers.

Finally, servant-leaders seek to build a sense of community among the members of the organizations they serve. Given the guidelines provided by Greenleaf’s ‘test’ and Spears’ view of servant-leadership as one that promotes a sense of community by emphasizing service to others and the sharing of power in decision making, we expect that servant-leaders will demonstrate behaviours that facilitate the growth of others while respecting their dignity and autonomy. The focus on others will manifest itself in listening, showing empathy, providing support through resources and encouragement and creating an environment where people are free to develop their full potential.

14.6 STAYING ALIVE

The complexity of contemporary organizational life creates a great deal of stress on those who lead those organizations. In this section we discuss several aspects of a plan for personal well-being that can help the leader ‘stay alive’ (Heifetz & Linskey, 2002). According to Heifetz and Linskey, leaders sometimes bring themselves down by forgetting to pay attention to themselves. The leaders become consumed by the cause and ‘forget that exercising leadership is, at heart, a personal activity’ (p. 163). In the midst of the challenge, the adrenaline is flowing and leaders forget that they are vulnerable to the limits of physical and emotional capacity.

In order to stay alive in a leadership role, a leader must learn to be aware of and manage his or her own hungers. Recovery programmes have long advocated the HALT principle: never get too hungry, too angry, too lonely, or too tired because these situations create a heightened vulnerability that can diminish a leader’s ability to act wisely. Managing these hungers requires self-awareness and personal discipline.

While self-awareness and personal discipline are important, too often leaders are blind to the toll the role and its expectations are having on them. Every leader needs to cultivate an inner circle of people who are willing to help the leader maintain balance and proper boundaries. Heifetz and Linskey (2002) refer to these people as confidants. Confidants provide a safe place where a leader can say everything that is in his or her heart without the need to script or edit the raw feelings and emotions. These are people who can put a leader ‘back together again’ when they have just lived through a Humpty Dumpty-like falling off the wall (Heifetz & Linskey, 2002). Confidants provide a unique perspective because they care about the leader as individual and may or may not be devoted to the leader’s cause. They can listen intently and objectively. Confidants are people who tell the leader what he or she needs to hear. They provide information and insight that a leader may not want to hear and will not be able to hear from anybody else. Reciprocally, confidants can be confided in without concern that the leader’s revelations will spill back into the organization. Leaders must cultivate confidants and allow them into their lives if they are to run the leadership race with endurance.

In addition to managing hungers and cultivating confidants, a leader must also create a readily available sanctuary (Heifetz & Linskey, 2002). A sanctuary is a designated place where the leader can withdraw for reflection and renewal. A sanctuary is a place that provides emotional and physical security and allows the leader to suspend the stress of the workplace. Creation of sanctuary requires the discipline to structure schedules and routines so that the benefit of the sanctuary is not lost in the busyness of the leader’s life. The form of the sanctuary may vary. It could be a jogging trail, a garden, or a special room that provides the quiet and solace needed to have a quiet time for reflection and renewal.

14.6.1 The Family Arena

The family arena emphasizes a manager’s responsibilities to spouse and children, yet also includes obligations to siblings and to parents. Planning and budgeting for household management requirements, spending significant time with children and continuously cultivating one’s spousal relationship are all activities associated with the family arena. Family demands appear to be related more strongly to psychological distress for women than men because women may take more responsibility in the family arena than do men (Baruch, Biener & Barnett, 1987). The reverse appears to occur for men, with work demands related more strongly to psychological distress (Seta, Paulus & Baron, 2000).

14.6.2 The Spiritual Arena

The spiritual arena includes the cultivation of a relationship with God, as enhanced by personal efforts in prayer, meditation and study, as well as involvement in a community of like believers. Internalized, intrinsic and individually active religion has been associated with less illness and better physical health (Mclntosh & Spilka, 1990).

14.6.3 The Community Arena

The community arena suggests the need to be involved in the community, with the intent to serve others. A manager’s spiritual and secular communities may or may not overlap. Community suggests the need for healthy interpersonal attachments for the purpose of social support. Secure interpersonal attachments may exist in the work, family and community arenas, while a secure transcendent attachment to God exists within the spiritual arena (Quick et al., 1995).

14.7 CONCLUSION

Even though the nature of organizations has changed dramatically in recent years and the nature of managerial work has had to change to remain aligned with modern organizations, leaders and managers are still viewed as central to an organization’s success and as the key to overall employee well-being (Hernez-Broome & Hughes, 2004). It is imperative that organizations and individuals work as partners to maintain the physical, mental and emotional health of managers so they will be able to effectively guide and develop the efforts of their employees in the attainment of business goals and objectives.

Management development programmes have evolved as well and the goal of the new conceptualization is to develop ‘whole leaders’. A whole leader is one who is more fully developed in all of life’s arenas – personal, work, family, spiritual and community. A whole leader possesses intellectual ability and technical expertise, self-awareness, interpersonal proficiency and leadership know-how to balance the needs of employees with the requirements of the business and has the ability to take care of him/herself well enough to stay alive amidst the chaos they continually encounter. If organizational management development programmes can facilitate the development of whole leaders, the overall well-being of their entire workforce will be more likely.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

The authors wish to express their appreciation to the original authors of this chapter, Paul B. Paulus and James Campbell Quick, from The University of Texas at Arlington. We are grateful for their research and insights on management development and well-being, which provided a substantial foundation upon which to build and share our views.

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