Topics: Communication

Leading through adversity

When the Soviet Union began to break up in the early 1990s, the Americans coined the acronym VUCA to describe the situation. It stood for:

  • Volatile
  • Uncertain
  • Chaotic
  • Ambiguous

It was a good way to describe how things felt to ‘Kremlin Watchers’ during those times and perhaps more widely understood today. A post-pandemic global recession, war in Europe, disruption to food and energy supplies, runaway inflation, rising interest rates threatening the viability of mortgages, and that’s before we talk about climate change!

If ever there was a VUCA world, this must be it. 

It’s easy to look at what’s going on and get distracted, worried or upset. As current or aspiring business leaders, part of leading through adversity is about knowing how to focus when times are tough. From my military background, there are two key principles we can apply to the business world that effective leaders should keep in mind in this type of situation.

Plan, prepare, and practise

During the 2020-2021 Vendée Globe non-stop around the world yacht race, the French sailor Kevin Escoffier was about 800 nautical miles off Cape Town when his yacht quite literally folded in on itself.

It sank in two minutes.

This race is for yachts crewed by just one person, so Escoffier was on his own. He had just 120 seconds to radio a message to his onshore team and get into his life raft with a grab-bag of emergency rations and a personal AIS beacon which transmitted his position to rescue crews.

Escoffier completed all these urgent tasks and survived. He sent the radio message, set up his life raft, grabbed his emergency rations and beacon. All in a frighteningly short time window.

This was no accident. Escoffier had planned for just such an emergency. He knew what he needed to do, he knew where to find everything and he practised his response many times.

Plan. Prepare. Practise.

These are the three Ps that can save your life when you’re in choppy waters and serve as a valuable template for how we can navigate a VUCA environment as business leaders.

When times are good it can seem pessimistic to be scenario planning for disruptions that are distant risks rather than immediate realities, but you will be grateful when it matters.

Don’t panic!

When things go wrong, you may want to scream, or cry, or punch the wall in frustration and those who advocate for “authentic leadership” can interpret this as being unfiltered with our personal emotional experience. However, in leadership as in life, there is a time and a place for everything. Sometimes our authentic desire to be professional and the best leader for our people may best be fulfilled by giving others confidence and support when they are concerned, rather than fully expressing our own vulnerabilities.

Another sailing story to illustrate the merit of this more stoical approach is personal to me. I can tell you in no uncertain terms how it felt captaining a yacht around the Mull of Kintyre in Scotland through a strong tide and bad weather. On the inside I was panicking that we were in serious trouble and angry at myself for leading my crew into a dangerous situation, but I needed to maintain my composure.

We were quite literally in stormy waters and the expression “worse things happen at sea” was providing very little comfort.

The crew were asking if everything was all right. I needed to be honest about the reality of the situation. It was important they knew to take safety seriously and generally be at a heightened state of readiness.  But it was also important for them to know that I had this under control, was confident in my ability to deal with the situation and that they could trust me and focus on the task at hand.

The very fact I am writing this now is proof that we made it.

Once we were safely back on land, I disclosed how I had been feeling at the time and reflected on some things I thought I could have done differently. I believed that was the right time and place for me to share my vulnerability with my crew.

As a leader in business, when you’re in metaphorical stormy waters, your people will look to you. When times are tough, it is vital to be honest about the realities of the situation. Your people want to know what’s going on and it builds trust. it is also important how you convey your emotions. If you’re panicked, flapping like a windsock, they will rightly have cause to worry. Only now they’re not just worried about a bad situation, they’re also worried about whether you’re the right person to lead them through it.

It’s all about the context

The common theme for both these principles is context. We plan, prepare and practise for situations that are not current but are important for us to know how to manage when the time comes. How we lead is also contextual. There are times to be authentically emotional and honest and there are also times when a display of confidence and in yourself and others is what is needed. Balanced leaders understand the context and how to respond.

The meeting after the meeting

Have you ever been in a position where an investment committee finished, where the paper was good, the discussion was serious and the decision was made? And, then, the team (understandably) moves on.

But then, later that day, one line from the meeting comes back to you. A challenge that was raised but not really explored. A moment when the room got slightly too eager to agree. Nothing dramatic, just a faint sense that the conclusion arrived a little too neatly.

Most experienced investors know this feeling. It matters more than people like to admit.

Formal process is important. Meetings, papers and clear decisions all matter. But some of the best judgement in investing happens after the official discussion has ended. That is when people reflect on what really happened in the room, rather than what the minutes say happened.

This is useful because investment decisions are never driven by analysis alone. They are shaped by status, fatigue, group mood, time pressure and the natural desire for closure. Teams can have a sound process on paper and still make decisions in conditions that are less robust than they look.

Sometimes a meeting produces real clarity. Sometimes it produces relief. It’s important to recognise that those are not the same thing.

The question worth asking afterwards is not “Was the decision right?” That often cannot be known for some time. The better question is “Was the decision made well?” Did the discussion sharpen the issue, or just settle it? Was dissent properly tested, or merely noted? Did the team become more precise, or just more comfortable?

This is where mature investment cultures have an edge. They do not treat the formal process as sacred simply because it is formal. They make room for a second layer of judgement. Not endless reopening of decisions, but honest reflection on how the decision was reached.

That can lead to practical improvements. A position may still be taken, but at a smaller size. The monitoring may become tighter. A team may realise that the thesis is fine, but the quality of challenge was weak. Or a manager may simply notice that the room was being influenced by the confidence of one person more than the substance of the case.

None of this is soft. It is part of decision hygiene.

In investing, process is not just what sits on the page. It is also what happens in the room and what lingers after people leave it. Investors who pay attention to that tend to build better judgement over time. They are not just analysing opportunities. They are analysing the quality of their own thinking.

That is usually worth the extra five minutes.

Calibration, not conviction

In investment management, conviction is often treated as a defining virtue. Strong views, decisive language and visible confidence can create momentum in meetings and reassurance in uncertain markets. In a profession built around judgement under ambiguity, that confidence in conviction can be valuable.

Investment culture therefore tends to admire conviction. There is a reason for that. Markets do not reward endless caution, and many good ideas feel uncomfortable at the point of purchase. 

Yet conviction and quality are not the same thing. The more important skill is not simply having conviction, but knowing when it is warranted, how strongly it is warranted and what action it should translate into. 

In short, it is calibration, not conviction, that should be an investor’s goal. 

Calibration means matching confidence to reality. It is the discipline of knowing how much you should believe, how much uncertainty still sits around the case and how that should affect position size and timing. In practice, that is a more useful skill than simply sounding assured.

In fact, many investment mistakes are not caused by weak ideas. They are caused by too much certainty wrapped around decent ideas. An investor may be broadly right about direction, but wrong about the strength of the edge, the timing, the downside or the amount of capital the idea deserves. That’s a calibration problem.

This is where investing becomes more than just having opinions. It is not enough to think something is attractive. You also need to ask: how attractive is it, how clear is the edge, what could go wrong and what size of position does that justify? Those are less glamorous questions, but they are usually the ones that protect returns.

Good investors tend to be more precise here than dramatic. They do not confuse confidence with quality. They ask what must be true for the thesis to hold. They think about what would weaken the case. They notice when they are reacting to price rather than evidence. And they are more comfortable than most with saying, “There may be something here, but the edge is not strong enough yet.”

That last point matters. In many teams, “no edge” sounds timid. In truth, it is often a sign of maturity. Knowing when not to force conviction is part of the job.

Over time, the investors who last are usually not the loudest. They are the ones who repeatedly align belief, sizing and behaviour with the actual quality of the opportunity in front of them.

Conviction has its place. But in the long run, calibration is what makes it useful.

Harnessing healthy conflict for team growth

Healthy conflict: Defined

Healthy conflict enables teams, with many perspectives and opinions, to debate and challenge viewpoints openly. When effectively managed, healthy conflict can then help generate innovative ideas and be a constructive way for groups and individuals to problem solve effectively. While it may involve disagreements, healthy conflict can encourage motivation, drive progress, and ensure issues are addressed without personal animosity.

Why healthy conflict is useful

Having multiple opinions and diverse perspectives can help teams find the best solutions to problems and issues – helping them become more productive. As a result, high performing teams are able to move forward far more quickly, because they actively seek out those differing opinions – never shying away from them.

Conversely, poorly performing teams will stop asking questions, and therefore not be able to identify all possibilities and solutions on the way to achieving aims. As a result, if a team eschews and avoids conflict, they can never be as high performing as they potentially could be.

At first, encouraging conflict and debate may sound counterintuitive. Surely a team that never argues just gets on with the job in hand with no drama? That won’t be the case, though, as the opposite of conflict is not sheer, blind agreement. When it comes to teams, the opposite of conflict is, in fact, disinterest, detachment and distance.

Healthy conflict on the other hand shows passion and drive. When both are present, they help create a stronger team that is motivated to achieve its aims and targets.

The art of healthy conflict

Encouraging conflict does not mean doing away with sensitivity and empathy. It is possible, and essential, to keep conflict healthy by striking the right balance – a feat not as daunting as it sounds.

While it may seem hard at first, it is entirely feasible by leveraging the trust and connections between team members. A team’s social glue should provide a cushion which enables everyone to explore differences. It will offer comfort and confidence to explore issues, while also allowing a team to depersonalise any challenges thanks to pre-established mutual understanding.

Directing conflict with purpose

Team members must also remember to focus on the issues at hand to ensure that healthy conflict prevails. Maintaining focus relies on another condition for a high performing team: clarity of vision and alignment. These must absolutely be kept in mind so that every team member can understand what any debate is trying to achieve. It also ensures that debates do not drift into other areas, potentially causing a disagreement to become a far bigger beast than it needs to be.

The difference a leader can make here is vital – in any team. Sporting teams are a great example. After a loss, the instinct might be to blame a player for a missed pass or forgotten set play. While these issues need discussion, it’s equally vital for a captain and team members to avoid spiralling into listing all of a person’s weaknesses. Doing so becomes demoralising for them and could potentially foster a toxic atmosphere.

Nurturing healthy conflict with Goldcrest Partners

The benefits of healthy conflict are therefore far-reaching, but it can be tough to move a team from one that nervously voices opinions to actively seeking out better ways to work.

It’s important to remember that conflict cannot be artificially engineered – in fact, trying to do so makes the conflict far more likely to descend into personal clashes, moving away from any debate based on the issues at hand. Plus, also remember that conflict is not the end in itself, merely a route to greater clarity.

Goldcrest Partners can help leaders introduce healthy conflict into their teams more effectively. We have worked with countless teams before, helping them work towards a more efficient way of identifying solutions to problems. Through constructive debate, teams evolve into a closer knit circle, with an enhanced alignment. With our support, teams are thus much better placed to become high performing, by leveraging their differing perspectives and opinions, as opposed to simply agreeing to keep the peace.

Framing the question before seeking the answer

Anyone who has worked in financial services long enough will be familiar with the moment where a share’s price is substantially down and its guidance has been cut. The obvious question then asked is: “Is this now a buying opportunity?”. 

While understandable, that question is often the wrong starting point.

Because, while it pulls a team straight towards action, it assumes the price move is the main event and that the task is to decide whether to respond. A better question might be: what has actually changed in the economics of the business, what has not and is the market now misreading that reality?

That may sound like a small difference. But it’s not. In investing, the way a problem is framed shapes the quality of the thinking that follows. A poor frame can push people towards speed, false certainty or the wrong evidence. A good one slows the rush just enough to make sure the team is solving the right problem.

This matters because many investment debates go wrong before the analysis has really begun. People can disagree intelligently, yet still be answering different questions. One person thinks it is a valuation issue. Another thinks it is a quality issue. A third thinks it is about management credibility. The discussion sounds lively, but the framing is unstable.

The best investors are often better at this than they first appear. They are not simply cleverer analysts. They are careful about naming the decision. For instance, is this a broken thesis, a temporary dislocation, a cyclical reset, or a better business now available at a more sensible price? Each one demands a different type of evidence, a different holding period and a different level of conviction.

There is also a behavioural point here. Under pressure, people like to collapse uncertainty quickly. When markets move and prices gap, the team feels the need to have a view. But urgency is not always a sign that the decision is ready. Sometimes it is just a sign of discomfort.

A useful discipline is to pause and ask a few basic questions before the debate gets going. Questions such as: what are we really deciding? What would have to be true for this to work? What type of opportunity is this? What evidence would tell us we have framed it wrongly?

In investing, better decisions often begin with a better question. It’s not over-complicating the job. It is doing the first part properly. That is easy to say and surprisingly hard to do. But when teams get it right, the rest of the discussion tends to improve with it.

Connectivity: the catalyst for team brilliance

Connectivity is the ability and want to connect to other teams. It acts like a bridge which facilitates collaboration and helps share thoughts to the wider company to achieve common goals. Being able to reach out across silos, to work together, allows for the efficient flow of information and resources so a company can better react to opportunities and challenges. 

The importance of connectivity

Having these kind of connections is important for both strong relationships within a team as well as reaching out beyond it. A high performing team will be able to leverage those strong bonds to take leaps forward to generate new ideas and forge lateral connections to achieve goals.

High performing teams will also understand that within a business, a team’s output is likely to have dependencies on others. If a team cannot connect well and use those dependencies to their advantage, it makes it nigh on impossible for the team to reach its full potential.

That’s because a team is rarely a finite being. It is only perhaps a sports team which operates within a strict framework of rules that only needs to concern itself with its own performance.

Put a team within a commercial context, demanding interaction with people from the wider company or from outsiders, then forging connections elsewhere becomes essential as nurturing relationships across the organisation is never just a nice-to-have. It’s the linchpin for a team’s ultimate success. For instance, in a school, teachers and management teams need to work in tandem and in conjunction with one another, but also with outside stakeholders, such as the council or healthcare professionals.

There will undoubtedly be some individuals that are better suited to building those external connections, while for others forging bonds comes less naturally. That’s not to say, though, that connectivity is just a task for team members who are able to build social capital.

To encourage less gregarious members, leaders should emphasise that connections, within a commercial remit, are not just built by networking or socialising. They are also built upon collaboration and a rapport formed through sharing tasks and experience. Collaboration, in fact, is arguably the most crucial way to strengthen connections between teams and has the potential to be the strongest route to building a team’s reputation for the better.

Forging connectivity with Goldcrest Partners

It can be tempting to fall into the trap of thinking that connectivity is a forced connection forged through self-promotion, a means of shirking responsibilities, or a platform for idle chitchat. Instead, it’s about genuine intent, steering clear of leveraging undue favours or engaging in conduct that undermines team objectives.

Avoiding these traps can be difficult to do, while connectivity can also be a hard condition to master for your team. Generally speaking, motivating a team to work well with others is tough because, at first, those potential connections may appear to have little present benefit. However, high performing teams will be able to see that all relationships can be leveraged in the future to gain value. Even weaker social ties can be advantageous. They may be a little more transitory in nature, but at the right time they can open up immense potential.

At Goldcrest Partners, we see connectivity as a condition that fortifies high performance teams. That’s why we work closely with leaders and their teams to encourage them to see that building connections with others can be so useful – ultimately improving productivity over the short and the long term. Connections are where collaborative brilliance is forged and can help a team, and the wider company within which it sits, hit its goals and targets.

Senior executive coaching for a COO with a broadening remit

The Brief

The client was a COO at a US-based high-growth asset manager whose scope of responsibilities expanded from the US to Global functions at a time of significant technological, operational and organisational change. The mandate was to turn around the underperforming non-US functions that were critical to organisational success.

The Engagement

A Goldcrest coach with considerable experience working in the asset management industry engaged with the client for an initial 12-month term to support the individual with the challenges that came from the change in role. A series of 1:1 meetings gave the client the opportunity to talk things through, evaluate options and plan decisive actions to resolve a variety of issues. These included managing up, communicating with a globally dispersed team, elevating the competency of direct reports, changing the organisational design and having difficult conversations in an environment of resource constraint and some friction with adjacent functions.

The Outcome

The client reported that they valued the objective perspective brought to the conversations and the measurable outcomes achieved in the business. The engagement was extended for another 12-months to continue the benefit, both personally and professionally.

The power of networks

We all know people in organisations who just seem to be really well plugged in and good at making things happen. So what is it about them?

Working at an asset management firm some years ago, I met Fiona, an investment director on a fund desk.

It wasn’t her job to connect with people or help them out but she enjoyed it and was good at it. She became known as a person who could help you to move things along.

What is a network node?

Fiona was a network node. An unglamorous term for someone so brilliant and so generous with her time. A network node is, in this case (because there may be other definitions in the world of computer science), an individual who holds many relationships and through whom informal influence and communication can flow.

All organisations have people like this and sadly, particularly in financial services, the value that they bring is not always fully appreciated. Often it is not until they leave an organisation that people notice that it is harder to get things done.

When you lose network nodes from an organisation, you’re not only losing the technical competence they bring, you’re also losing all that connectivity.

Companies which fail to recognise the value and keep hold of their network nodes become less effective. In times when so many of us are hybrid working, these people are more important than ever. Informal engagement becomes critical to building the kinds of relationships that make this mode of working viable for organisations, productive for teams and personally satisfying for individuals.

Match what you know with who you know

All companies benefit from informal human networks. When times are good and growth is fast the networks stretch beyond the formal organisational design until it catches up.

When times are tough and an organisation is contracting, efficient adjustment for lost network nodes is vital to retain internal connectivity and corporate knowledge and invaluable to reach outside of the organisation to find new perspectives to help solve the problems.

On a personal level a network has many benefits to offer. More than half of people still get jobs through network connections. A good network enables you to access expertise and information that you likely otherwise would not have. It can give you a degree of influence, perhaps a profile or reputation in your industry that could benefit your future career.

At Goldcrest Partners we do not believe it is necessarily about attending networking events, which can (let’s be honest) feel a little self-conscious and superficial. Rather maintaining a healthy network is an evergreen social activity for the mutual benefit of all parties. Because, after all, a productive and long-lasting network connection is always a two-way street.

How to talk about mental health at work

After what we’ve all been and continue to go through, it’s perhaps no surprise that mental health issues have increased dramatically in recent years.

The fact that mental health is more of a high-profile talking point now than ever before is a good thing. It is helping us shed the stigma around the topic and brings it into focus as a challenge we should engage with proactively.

Like the old BT advert said, “It’s good to talk.”

But like all pieces of advice, on closer reflection, the wise answer most often seems to be, “It depends.”

Talking about mental health challenges in a trusted and confidential relationship can be a huge part of getting the support needed to manage and hopefully overcome any issues.

However it is important to understand our personal limits when discussing others’ mental health with them.

This may come across as counter intuitive, so allow me to explain.

Know thyself

Personally, I sometimes feel at a disadvantage when discussing mental health issues. I can sympathise but not empathise, because I am lucky enough to have never really experienced anything I would describe as a mental health challenge.

Despite my career in the military, I have never experienced PTSD. I don’t often feel stressed. I have never battled with depression or anxiety. I don’t often let obstacles get me down. When I do feel stressed, I am able to put things in perspective and bounce back reasonably quickly.

However, by recognising this about myself it helps me understand how I can and cannot help others. I can still be a great resource and support to those who are struggling but am better off leaving the more nuanced conversations to the experts.

Stiff upper lip

The reason I welcome the increased profile of mental health issues is that in Britain our social conventions have not always invited the necessary conversations around the topic.

Put it down to the traditional ‘stiff upper lip’ mentality, perhaps. But, whatever the cultural factors, it seems to me there are a couple of practical reasons why we shy away from these conversations:

• We might not be familiar with expressing and handling emotions out in the open which can impact our confidence to do so.

• We don’t know where the conversation will lead or what to do about it.

Often this type of uncertainty and discomfort can motivate us to withdraw just at the moment we could be helpfully proactive.

3 Skills to boost your confidence around mental health

Step 1: Listen

Learn how to be a good listener.

This won’t be the first time you’ve heard this advice and that is because listening is possibly the most important skill we are not taught at school. Plenty of public speaking but not so much public listening.

I find this really difficult because I am an extrovert and I tend to fill empty space with noise. I have to work hard to get comfortable with the gaps and the pauses.

In that sense, I have to work hard to genuinely listen to others. I have to consciously and actively listen and avoid the temptation to jump in.

Often, when a conversation goes silent, I become uneasy. Yet I am sure that the person I’m talking to actually values the fact that I’m giving them space to think and feel through what they want to say.

I believe that when a colleague or employee finds the courage to raise a mental health issue with us the very least we can do is give them our full attention.

If I can do it, you can.

Step 2: Know what to do when you don’t know what to do

This is true of any problem to some extent, but never more so than in the case of mental health.

When someone comes to you to talk to you about the stress they’re under – or that they’re depressed – what we must be really careful to avoid is trying to fix them.. We could end up doing more harm than good. Pointing them towards the appropriate resource within your organisation is often the best thing to do.

Increasingly organisations have nominated ‘mental health first aiders’ who have some relevant training and are able to offer short term help while connecting the colleague with HR and more sustainable external professional support.

Step 3: It’s an ongoing process

Mental health problems do not go away overnight and need to be managed in the broader work context. Awareness and sensitivity are key to enable recovery and support ongoing wellbeing.

It is also important to manage our own resources and be careful not to take on too much of the emotional burden of colleagues. If we do that’s not good for anyone.

Take the opportunity to develop your listening skills, your emotional intelligence, and your resilience to be more capable and confident about mental health.

Click here to find out more about Mental Health Awareness Week.

Challenge and support in the workplace

Did you ever have a teacher at school who influenced you? Maybe even changed your life?

When I reflect on conversations with the people I have trained, coached or just met along the way in my time as a leadership developer, I notice how often an inspirational teacher from school is fondly remembered.

In any performance environment, knowing when and how to challenge or support people is a vital leadership skill and I can think of few professions which know more about how to do this well than teaching.

For some of us it is natural to want to stay in our comfort zones. As we mature and grow, we learn how to be more comfortable with pushing ourselves. Being stretched and challenged is uncomfortable for all of us initially, a bit like yoga or weight training, but with practice we get better and it becomes a habit.

I spoke recently with Louise North, Principal of Framlingham College, for her perspective and she described that when she started her job, she noticed the school was doing an amazing job at supporting and nurturing pupils – but that there was room to challenge them more.

“The school had a reputation for kindness and niceness, but we weren’t actually challenging the children to reach their full potential,” Louise said. “Kindness is not the same as accepting mediocrity – it’s just the opposite.”

Louise encouraged the teaching body to challenge the students more, giving them the confidence to do so with her support. She also encouraged the staff to be honest with parents about their children’s performance and to work together to motivate pupils more. It all served the goal of enabling children to reach their full potential within a supportive environment.

So, if this is the task at hand, how can we do it well?


Challenge and support

How can we define what it means to be challenged or supported at work? How, as leaders, can we try to achieve that same level of balance as the inspirational teachers of our childhoods?

A leader can challenge by questioning the status quo, looking for continuous improvement and keeping things moving. A leader can also support by checking in often with their team, encouraging everyone to participate and offering coaching where needed.

These are behaviours where we may have a natural preference to do one or the other and it takes self-awareness, emotional intelligence and developed skill to read the situation and respond accordingly.

The best leaders are able to both support and challenge, in the right way at the right time for the best results.