Marilyn Rosa-Green  00:00

It doesn’t mean that we’re taking away all the other projects, or that we are directly managing stress. But we are managing stress and how we regulate the emotions because we’re changing the way that we’re performing, or that we are viewing all of the things that we need to do by simplifying down to one main goal that you want to accomplish in the the next three to four months.

Catherine McDonald  00:38

Hello, and welcome to this episode of the Lean Solutions podcast, my name is Catherine Macdonald, and I will be your host for today. Today’s topic is a really interesting one. We are going to be talking about the pressure paradox, and for anybody who doesn’t know what that is, we have a great guest who I’m going to introduce in a moment, and she’s going to talk to us about the pressure paradox, because she, I will let her explain it all, because she knows about it far more about it than I do. And but before I bring my guest on, Marilyn, I’m just going to talk through her bio so that you know who Marilyn is. Marilyn Rosa Green is a licensed professional counselor and executive coach who helps high-performing manufacturing and operations leaders break the cycle of overthinking and self-doubt that pressure creates? She spent years leading HR and safety on the floor of fast-growing manufacturers like Hormel Foods and Kettle Cuisine as the strategic partner to the people running production before building her own coaching practice and her work on the pressure paradox is what we are going to focus on today. So, Marilyn, this is very exciting. I can’t wait to hear all about it. How are you doing? Welcome to the show.

Marilyn Rosa-Green  01:52

I’m doing great. I’m so excited to to speak with you, Catherine. Can’t wait to dive into

Catherine McDonald  01:57

it. Tell us a little bit more about the pressure paradox. I’m sure everyone is dying to know what is it we’re going to talk about, and is it something that you came up with yourself?

Marilyn Rosa-Green  02:05

Yeah, I like to think I like to think that that I have. I think the the paradox its name is really interesting to me, and in working in manufacturing, it’s a constant level of pressure, and it is a pressure that is exciting sometimes. I think it’s it drives a lot of high performing leaders, and I think it’s almost like necessary to the nervous system sometimes, like down to the wire type of thing, and and that can be really dynamic, and also it can be really exhausting. So the pressure paradox-it’s something that I have been specifically working on with clients and coaching because it is a pattern. It really-it comes down to where the same drive that makes a leader excellent under pressure becomes the thing that quietly stalls them when the pressure is gone, or when something feels unfamiliar. Right? They they they have this feeling of lack of confidence, or maybe a bit of doubt. Right? Because they’re super confident when they know something really well, or they they’re used to doing it. And then it’s quite the opposite when something is unfamiliar, and so the leader who executes great in a crisis is the same leader who cannot seem to start the thing that actually really matters most to them. Whether it’s on the production floor or outside of it, they stall, and so those both of those behaviors are coming from the same belief underneath.

Catherine McDonald  03:44

It’s like the the the emotion, the the emotion of caring so much actually gets in the way.

Marilyn Rosa-Green  03:51

Yeah, yeah, for sure. I think it’s an emotional thing, but I I think it’s it’s very it’s not a conscious effort at all, right? It’s not even sometimes something that they’re very well aware. It’s like a blind spot, right? It’s just something that that you do. So it’s quite reactive. I do think that sometimes we do justify, right? The leader will justify, you know, thriving in this pressure paradox because that’s all they know, right? And because things are working. I mean, the numbers are being met. The projects, you know, the the new product is being launched like flawlessly. Like they put out the fires at the end of the day. Like, okay, they’re going home, and it’s like they can take a breath. That all right, we wrapped up a crazy day, but it was successful. There’s a lot of justification around that.

Catherine McDonald  04:49

This pressure, paradox pressure that you explain so well, it makes sense because it’s almost like the stress, the burnout happens almost before. Other people see it. It’s happening inside the person slowly, and then suddenly it just gets too much, and a person just leaves. Or you know that that’s generally even that’s how we’re losing such good talent because we don’t see it coming. Because if we saw it coming, we try and do something about it because we want to hold on to our talent. But this build up inside just often results in in something that we just don’t see coming. So, what are the signs? How can we look out for this pressure building? And how can we? How can I suppose people help themselves? And how can other people help the people who are going through this?

Marilyn Rosa-Green  05:37

Yeah. So I want to I want to slow down just a little bit here, and I want to dive into some of the stuff that you said about burnout and and those kinds of things, and not seeing it coming, because that is true. And I think also there are very very well self aware leaders that can see can see the signs right, and so perhaps they don’t burn out.

Speaker 1  06:06

Perhaps

Marilyn Rosa-Green  06:07

they don’t until something happens, either at work or on their personal life. So, for example, it major layoffs. You know, it could be that someone maybe in their team that’s been there for a long time has passed away, right? Or it could be that they’ve moved on to another company, and then they have to restructure the entire team, and all these sort of strategies and hopes that they were planning around having that key member there. They have to just redo everything. So it’s kind of having that feeling of the the rug pull from underneath, or something on their personal level, something that really is unfamiliar territory, something that’s like a surprise, a shock in a way, and it’s kind of making them question, you know. If I want to really, I I’ve been, you know, I’ve been ignoring all of this for a while, you know. And the leader tells themselves, okay, I I I can see that I can’t continue to sacrifice all of this because they were willing to do it for themselves, but they’re not willing to have this other person go through it as well, or or they’re sort of, you know, in in a state of confusion in a way, which is very unfamiliar because again, the self awareness has been there, but now they’re questioning, you know, how do I balance all of it. How do I continue to manage this pressure when I have to make changes, and there’s resistance to making that change because that’s what they’ve known.

Catherine McDonald  07:52

How do we distinguish between what’s just maybe healthy ambition and what is becoming unsustainable? That that might be hard to figure out even for a self aware person because they might just look at themselves and say, “I’m ambitious. I need to go through this. They they might they might just explain it away.

Marilyn Rosa-Green  08:10

Yeah, for sure. That’s such a really good point because that is one of the the words that I hear a lot. Oh, that’s I that’s not facing me. Like that’s I’m not one of those people. I’m just really driven. I’m just really ambitious, right? And they explain it away for sure. I think that there’s there’s a few things where they can’t really argue with the evidence. Like if it’s a sometimes is that those signs of burnout that maybe they don’t quite emotionally feel it, or they explain it away, but they go to the doctors and realize that they have high blood pressure, or they’ve gained some weight, or they can’t seem to get a good night’s sleep. You know, they’re experiencing symptoms of anxiety, but they’re not accepting that that that’s what it is. Right? It could be also someone is pulling you aside and saying, “Hey, like, do you need a beat? Like, I’ve noticed, I’m noticing some things, some some changes. You know, we were on in the boardroom. It seemed like you snapped, and and they they’re kind of shocked. Like, oh, well, didn’t you feel the way I felt? And and everything seems very intense. Like the feelings are very heightened, and that’s because they’re they’re more reactive now because they’re not recovering enough, right? They’re not managing that level of stress.

Catherine McDonald  09:35

We’ve started talking about how these people behave in the workplace, behave in meetings, and and how they’re viewed by other people, right? So, then Marilyn, talk to me a little bit about how much responsibility is on the person and how much responsibility is on the organization to shape the systems, the culture, the behaviors to be supportive. You know, to prevent maybe the pressure paradox causing problems in in in. Company. So, what? Where does that balance lie?

Marilyn Rosa-Green  10:04

As a as a consultant, I’ve I’ve done it both ways. I have worked with the teams, and then I have also worked only with the leadership team, and then I’ve also worked in combination. and And I have to say, everybody has to be on board. It can’t just be one designated group for for it to really impact the organization as a whole. And I want to be I want to be clear that yes, to to make really like great organizational level change and have it be sustainable, you have to have key people from different parts of the organization and really bought into this, right? And I also want to say that just because you’re not able to do that doesn’t mean that you can’t change how the pressure affects you on an individual level, or even with your own team, and I’ve worked with companies that they have this very typical in food manufacturing multiple shifts, first, second, third shift, right? And the culture on say the day shift versus the evening completely different, completely different. They’re making the same product. They have about the same headcount. They have all of it is basically on paper is the same. What is so different? Well, their plant manager or their superintendent, the person who’s in charge, their entire aura, the way that they lead, the way that they build relationships with their employees is completely different, and so the way that they carry the pressure, right, the way that they manage their stress leaks over to the team. Yes, it it it it definitely is more effective if everybody is involved, and yet I I want to provide some hope for the listeners here. That just because you can’t get everybody on board doesn’t mean you can’t change the way you control what you can control, right? And in counseling, we call this the circle of control. And so we, you know, we identify what things we have control over and what things we cannot. And there’s a lot of frustration. You know, if you if you can if you’re listening to this, if you consider yourself a high achiever, a leader, and managing you know many many people, that it can be really frustrating when you’re operating at a fast pace and other people around you are not catching on as quickly as you wish they would. That’s very frustrating, and so this can be really helpful in acknowledging that it takes time and it takes the right people to be bought in, and yet you can still make changes from today to next week.

Catherine McDonald  12:54

the The talk about well being these days, I have to say, I get very frustrated by the conversations and by the write write ups on well being because it still talks organizations still talk about how they’re in in essence outsourcing well being how they’re you know sending people on training how they are you know bringing yoga classes in they still talk about it externally, so I still think that internally is where we need to focus and really look at the behaviors of leaders and managers, like you said earlier, as role models here to influence well-being. So where where do you see the pressure paradox being dealt with, even as part of well-being strategy these days?

Marilyn Rosa-Green  13:40

For sure. So I I run a workshop called the internal audit, and you know, in manufacturing, we have to be audit ready. You know, we have to be just anytime someone walks through the door, we want to make sure we have everything absolutely squeaky clean and perfect. And so the internal audit, in the terms of pressure paradox, it’s really quite quite just an individual process, right? Of looking inward, and how how practical can that be in leadership in an organization? And it really comes down to the pattern. What is it the thing that triggers you, and what story you create when you’re being triggered, and then how do you how how do you recognize that as a pattern? Like where does it repeat, and why is it happening? What’s the belief underneath that? And once you see that, you know you’re you’re really able to to make decisions in a much clearer way. So how do we bring that into an organization that where we can really impact culture? And I think you’ve said it very, very well. Is that it can’t be externally. It can’t. We can’t be pointing the finger to everybody else. You know, it’s not someone else that triggered me. You know, I was triggered by some. Because of whatever, so in the same way we can look at or an organization that if you are pointing at oh well I’m missing this so I’m going to bring this training in we’re going to continue to look outwardly instead of looking inside and how do we do that we look at policies policies many many times do not match the vision of the company. If a company wants to act or you know wants to be concerned more about well-being, they really have to integrate that value into their policies and their practices. And so you can’t say that you value well-being and then not create emotional or psychological safety around conversations when someone needs to take a long term absence because of their mental health. Like you can’t, you can’t, you have to be, you have, you have to be aligned with your values. And so, if you really do value that, then you have to look inward and what is happening. What are the things that you’re doing as an organization that are not really aligned with the things that you’re saying that you’re caring about? And it really comes down to the people. How are you taking care of your people? How are those values being embodied in what you do to support your employees, and so I think that’s great. You know, having you know a yoga class, all of those things are are great. But usually that’s a one day thing. You know, I used I used to when I worked in HR, I used to run a lot of these you know initiatives, and it was great. But then everybody forgot about wellness after that, and it it just left us feeling like, well, I guess it’s not that important. I guess we need to go back on the line and worry about that. And so, how can we embody that value into how we hire people, how we discipline, how we you know work on performance reviews. How do we keep that in mind so that it’s not necessarily that it’s it’s not about whether it’s employee centered. That’s not what I’m saying. It’s about a balance between what the organization cares about, and then how do we translate that value into the way that you know we hire, train, develop, and care for employees, and encourage them to do that for themselves? Because you can’t hold employees’ feelings and solve all their problems. That’s not what I’m saying at all, and back to kind of that influence that you talked about is, you know, that’s that’s I think that’s where my my clinical training meets the executive coaching because as as much as you know I talk to my my my clients and and and coaching and these leaders they just want an answer? Tell me how to solve this. But we really need to get to the root cause.

Marilyn Rosa-Green  18:06

And sometimes these problems are not really a matter of how the leader is leading. You have to take responsibility, you know, as a leader on what you hold. But then, what’s your employee to hold? What’s their part? And I think the influence comes in encouraging them to figure that out for themselves as well. Because eventually, I mean, if you’re a leader and you’re not mentoring and you’re not wanting to build other leaders, then that’s that’s a lonely place to be.

Catherine McDonald  18:39

Yeah, and that’s where good coaching comes in. Good coaching isn’t about giving people all the answers. It is about helping people to resolve things for themselves. So absolutely, cannot control like that’s really old traditional style leadership, control and command. The leader steps in and sees a problem. Ooh, I’ll solve it. You know that’s my job. But it’s so different now. It’s just not like that. And as you said, the real job of a leader is to develop the people around them to be able to critically think for themselves and solve problems. So yeah, absolutely agree with that. So just can you give us Marilyn just any examples of somebody who was feeling this pressure paradox and who was able to do something about it? So have you worked with somebody or seen somebody who has able been able to maybe turn that around for themselves.

Marilyn Rosa-Green  19:25

Yeah, I think one of the things. So this this is an executive who has been in the role for about about a year and a half or so, and about a year year and a half, and they were quite capable for to to to step into this role at all. And when when I started working with them, I think the the belief underneath was sneaking in. You know, was very kind of in the back of his mind. Well, am I really? Ready for this, like you know, I I sort of I’m so grateful for the opportunity, but I just can’t believe. And so, you know, they were really trying to do more, to do everything, to make sure that you know they were changing the policies, that they were you know rebuilding the team, that they were really supporting the the board’s you know vision for this person’s role, and and they were just going going going and going and sort of recreating this level of pressure that wasn’t quite there, but they were creating it for themselves, right? And so, when I started working with them, we unpacked that and realized that you don’t have to do more to prove that you’re capable of being in that role, right? That what we need to do in the next three to four months is really quite the opposite: do less or be more focused, rather focus on this the main thing, and then everything else that you do around that. So simplicity, and that was very refreshing because it doesn’t mean that we’re taking away all the other projects or that we are directly managing stress, but we are managing stress and how we regulate the emotions because we’re changing the way that we’re performing or that we are viewing all of the things that we need to do by simplifying down to one main goal that you want to accomplish in the the next three to four months, and everything that we designed was around that, right? And how do we get to focusing or breaking down that one goal? You know that that’s a process that we go through in coaching of recognizing, you know, what are all the things that you’re doing and why, and then how do we do what really matters? How do we focus on who really matters in a way that’s energizing and that you are not consistently rejecting or resisting, so that you don’t continue to put it off, to put it aside, you know, so that you can embrace it, and it’s it’s those micro actions again towards that one thing and focusing on that,

Catherine McDonald  22:23

I’m sure so many people would benefit from your coaching and from having that space to really work things out. Because oftentimes that’s what, in my view, causes the pressure. It’s this lack of clarity. It’s lack of it. You know, everything builds up, whether it’s emotions or thoughts, and it’s lack of time and space, and maybe support to get all those out of your head and untangle them and move forward. So you sound like you’re doing amazing work, Marilyn, and well done. And I really hope more people contact you because I think you can add such value bringing this into whether it’s people or teams or organizations, I definitely would advise people to just give you a call and talk about what you can offer. So, on that note, how can people contact you? And I believe you also have an offering that you’d like to share as well.

Marilyn Rosa-Green  23:13

Yeah, for sure. So, if you are interested in learning what your pattern is, if you listen to this episode, and it resonated what we talked about feeling that pressure and kind of being pulled into two different directions. And whether you are avoiding something or putting something aside because it doesn’t feel familiar, or maybe you’re redoing, you know, a task or or redoing or double checking your employee’s work because you don’t feel like it’s it’s ready to go, and then it’ll focus on you, or it would expose you in any way. If you want to learn a little bit more about that pattern and what believe is under that, take the pressure paradox assessment, and I reply to that personally. It’s a very comprehensive breakdown of that pattern and that belief, and what those behaviors look like, and it provides clients and people just a lot of clarity. You can find that assessment on my website at MarylandRosaConsulting.com. Right at the top, there’s a button that says “Take the Pressure Paradox Assessment.

Catherine McDonald  24:26

Excellent, Marlon. It’s been absolute pleasure. It’s a fantastic topic. We could probably talk about it all day long, but we are so delighted to have you on the show. And for everybody listening, thank you very much for listening. And we will see you next time on the Lean Solutions podcast. Bye for now.