By its very nature, business and the entrepreneurship journey can be very stressful for the entrepreneur, their staff, and their families. Many reasons contribute to this stress and thus learning, accepting and coping with stress becomes a skill every entrepreneur needs to master.
It is a fact that the business landscape even for established entities is volatile and this volatility is a major contributor to stress-related issues among the business community; thus begs the question, how do you cope with stress as an entrepreneur?
Stress like joy and anxiety are emotions and all emotions are not self-creating, thus they are equally also not self-resolving. Cognizant of this we must also realize our bodies are not storage units; rather we are processing units that receive and output. With this in mind, we must allow ourselves to process emotions and release them by correctly identifying the emotion, allowing ourselves to feel it, interrogating it and finally releasing it without becoming it. By allowing ourselves to feel the emotion, then only can we process and deal with it.
When dealing with stress in the business world, we must acknowledge that we live in a VUCA world. VUCA is an acronym that stands for volatility, uncertainty, complexity, and ambiguity. Each of these elements individually and collectively sum up the entrepreneur’s stress and pain areas.
Volatility denotes a changing world, one that is unpredictable in nature. Uncertainty mirrors volatility in that it clouds the immediate and long-term visions making decisions harder to make and reducing the entrepreneur to short-term weekly or monthly plans as opposed to longer-term planning. Complexity on the other hand is brought about by the maze of difficult options one has to go through before arriving at a decision. Here any misstep and or indecision may be costly and or detrimental to the business. Finally, ambiguity is brought about by either lack of clarity or awareness that results in the entrepreneur being overwhelmed by the choices he has to make.
For many entrepreneurs, navigating this VUCA world thus is destabilizing making us anxious by sapping away our motivation and leaving us feeling overwhelmed. The average entrepreneur today is constantly trying to learn new skills as they firefight and this ripple effect mostly ends in wrong decision making. This emotional hullabaloo takes a mental toll on the entrepreneur and it will also manifest in the internal culture and home life. A stressed boss more often conveys that stress to his employees and given that he can’t separate himself from his home life, the stress too will be felt at home.
How does one navigate in a VUCA world?
Cognizant that turbulence is in the entrepreneurship DNA, as an entrepreneur thus you need to be able to deal with emotions in bite-sized chunks by breaking them down and managing them in bits and pieces.
To deal with uncertainty, you need information; consult or surround yourself with experts who can break down information in a way you can understand it. Timely and accurate information helps remove uncertainty in your decision-making.
Moving from complexity to clarity, the entrepreneur needs to polish his communication skills. Armed with information, the entrepreneur can thus communicate to his team effectively by relaying information that either needs to reassure them, guide them or paint the reality of the big picture. In short as an entrepreneur, do not shut down; own and communicate the clarity that your team needs.
Ambiguity affects the organization’s agility and thus to transition as entrepreneurs we must think outside the box; the entrepreneur and his team must be able to focus outside their functional areas. This demands the organization also opens itself up to employee suggestions and feedback as this helps in building consensus, and creates ownership and camaraderie. Allowing everyone to chip in allows for the organization to make increased but informed and calculated risks.
Even with the above information, many entrepreneurs are caught up between resisting and embracing change and the emotions that come with it. Typically the ones resistant to change do not acknowledge, accept or adjust ultimately failing to adopt as this resistance blinds their vision and outcomes. Those that embrace change often become resilient; and by building the capacity of their systems to absorb disturbance brought about by change, they navigate the environmental impact better and more successfully.
Leader’s strategy for resilience
As an entrepreneur, your mental health is affected by your biological and psychological health and your social well-being. Thus one must learn how to live in a VUCA world using the acronym LIVING.
- Love- do you feel accepted and appreciated, do you have self-confidence and self-belief, how is your self-esteem, how well do you protect those around you and are you willing to let go of things that bring you down by setting boundaries and letting go of toxic clients for example?
- Identity– who are you as an entrepreneur? Is your business changing you, are you becoming the person you dreamt about, etc.?
- Values– What things guide and anchor you down?
- Inconclusive– accepting that you do not have all the answers and being able to live with this fact.
- New normal– we live in a dynamic world and everyday new realities dawn on us. Since the pandemic working from home and online banking became part of the new normal. Being able to accept and adapt to these realities is critical for every entrepreneur.
- Gratitude– being appreciative and thankful for every milestone; grateful people are happier and more accepting thus able to deal with adversity better.
Should you wish to learn how to effectively manage the complex interplay of emotions within the realm of business, Springboard Capital embodies this emotional cushion that you and your business require. Our internal culture is built around a functional and supportive structure that ensures we remain a cohesive and reliable unit for one another and our clients. We also offer various loan products such as Business Loan, Emergency Loan, Asset Financing, Salaried Loan, Loan against Logbook, Import Duty Financing or Title Deed Loan, to help grow and manage all operations. Contact us today at 0700 944 444 or WhatsApp us through the button below, or email us at info@springboardcapital.co.ke.
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Article based on Mueni Wambua’s BizSmart Webinar Presentation –Mueni is an Authenticity Coach, a Grief Recovery Specialist as well a Pastor. She is the founder of the Anavah Healing Centre which seeks to create safe spaces for healing conversations. She is a certified Trauma Specialist having gone through an international training that is aimed at equipping counsellors with skills and techniques to help those
dealing with issues of trauma, grief and the effects of these on their mental health.
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