You are tapped to turn around an underperforming organization with a history of bad leadership. Because you are a welcome replacement for someone who destroyed morale, you fully expect to achieve impressive results quickly. After all, people who felt consistently ignored, underappreciated, disrespected, or even abused by your predecessor will applaud your clear, inclusive approach and be excited to get to work, right?
Not necessarily — as plenty of thwarted new leaders can attest.
I base this assessment on years of working with talented and normally optimistic people who — hired in the wake of a toxic or absentee leader — became exasperated by their inability to improve an organization’s results or internal dynamics. Most anticipated it would take a bit of time to win their new workgroup’s trust, but they never expected to be consumed with internecine conflicts, unable to reach consensus on priorities, or blocked repeatedly when attempting to introduce obviously beneficial changes. Successful in the past, they are baffled by their inability to make progress in a new setting.
In reaching out for advice, many of these leaders have already concluded that something is wrong with individual group members and want guidance about how to either change or replace them. When the challenging people are staff members, the conversation often starts with a request to understand termination policies or the official process for reorganizing. In the case of tenured professors, the new leader asks about performance-improvement plans and options for moving individuals to other academic departments.
As an organizational consultant and a former campus administrator for three decades, I understand the long-term impact of poor-quality leadership and the value of trauma-informed management. When administrators in this predicament seek out my advice, I first invite them to reframe their approach. “Instead of focusing on what’s wrong with these people,” I say, “why don’t we consider what might have happened to them?”
New leaders need to consider the possibility that people in an underperforming department, school, administrative unit, or institution have experienced workplace trauma that is impeding their ability to be personally and collectively effective. “Trauma” can seem like a very loaded word. When we think of workplace trauma, what often comes to mind is an unexpected or tragic event — such as an office shooting, on-campus suicide, racist act, sexual assault, environmental disaster, or even the unexpected revelation of a leader’s pattern of financial or sexual misconduct. Those are extreme forms of trauma but not the only kind.
I favor the straightforward definition of the term that I recently read in a Harvard Business Review article, “We Need Trauma-Informed Workplaces,” by the workplace consultant Katharine Manning. “Trauma,” she wrote, “is an emotional injury that affects performance and well-being.”
Fortunately, in the last two decades or so, higher-education workplaces have become more sophisticated in their handling of traumatic events — mobilizing internal crisis-response teams, providing access to mental-health care, encouraging peer support, engaging in recovery rituals, and deploying other strategies designed to bring people “back to normal.” There’s been increased recognition that these incidents, left untreated, can compromise long-term organizational effectiveness and lead to a range of cognitive and behavioral symptoms that include insomnia, anxiety, interpersonal conflict, social withdrawal, an inability to concentrate, and hypervigilance.
Unfortunately, colleges and universities are less likely to have established standards or resources for supporting the recovery of those traumatized by neglectful or abusive leaders. This is true even though poor-quality leadership can have an enduring impact on workgroup performance and resilience and on people’s mental health.
As a result, it is often up to new leaders to figure out how to move their new workgroup forward.
If you are a new leader who has inherited a wounded workgroup, it may be tempting to declare, “It’s a new day; let’s put the past behind us.” Please don’t do that. Instead, aim to create a bridge from your group’s difficult past to a better collective future. That begins by creating space for processing and listening. Those who have been traumatized by a past leader often need to explore and reflect on what happened, how it felt, how the experience continues to affect them, and what they need to move forward. Most important, they need you as the new leader to listen to what they say and acknowledge what they experienced.
When you inherit a fractured or fragile team, you also need to consider whether your leadership approach is likely to support the group’s growth or exacerbate existing trauma. Hint: If you have a hands-off or a command-and-control style, things are unlikely to go well. To be effective, you will need to use trauma-informed leadership practices.
What does that kind of leadership look like in action? It happens to look a lot like the kind of good leadership that should be demonstrated in all settings, regardless of whether trauma has occurred. Here are some ideas — inspired by generally accepted principles on trauma-informed care — that you can put into practice in your new role:
- Cultivate safety. Ensure that everyone in your workgroup feels both physically and psychologically safe. Consider whether workspaces need to be reconfigured to make people feel protected. Jointly create organizational values as well as group agreements about how people will work together. Establish norms about respectful behavior. Take personal responsibility to deal with unproductive conflict as soon as it emerges. Be direct but kind when giving feedback.
- Practice trust and transparency. Share as much information as possible. Explain the factors you will consider in making decisions. Honor your commitments. Be consistent in your approach. Have one-on-one conversations that are focused on faculty and staff members as people, not just as employees. Ask for advice. Admit when you are wrong.
- Encourage collaboration and peer support. Help people get to know one another. Sponsor communities of practice that bring together people with similar interests, concerns, and responsibilities. Form committees and project teams that do not include the usual suspects. Encourage cross-disciplinary workgroups. Make it clear that everyone is essential for organizational success. Model collaborative behavior and partnership building in your own work.
- Promote empowerment. Speak about, and demonstrate, your commitment to “voice” and “choice.” That means: Encourage people in the workgroup to speak up. Ask for recommendations. Carefully consider new ideas. Explore multiple options. Engage in shared decision making. Discuss options.
- Acknowledge that everyone has a different lived experience. Seek to understand how group members’ identity, experience, and history influence their thinking, perceptions, and needs.
- Take care of yourself so you can take care of others. Recognize that self-care and a strong support network are critical for your own personal resilience. Leadership can be hard and lonely. Be sure to nurture your own relationships. Eat lunch. Have fun. Take breaks. Get some sleep.
People are often surprised that taking over from a bad leader can be much harder than following an admired one. That’s because bad leaders often create psychological damage that is hard to undo. Be prepared to hear stories about credit stealing, public humiliation, broken promises, veiled threats, and mercurial behavior. Don’t be surprised by expressions of bitterness or lingering anger over the fact that the bad leader was allowed to stay for so long.
In addition, mediate your expectations about how quickly you will be able to make progress. You may be met with more cynicism than excitement. Don’t take it personally if no one volunteers to help you reimagine the curriculum. Don’t be frustrated when your idea for an exciting new collaboration is shut down. Be patient when participants in an important meeting are either silent or combative. These are all signs that your people have been subjected to an unhealthy work culture and it may take them months or years to recover.
Finally, fight the urge to blame individuals for being problematic. Yes, you should expect them to work together productively. But you also have to acknowledge what they have been through and focus your initial efforts on creating a work culture in which they finally feel seen and safe.
