It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas

This Bing Crosby classic is one of my favourite festive songs. 

That single line conjures up images of traditional things like Christmas trees, tinsel, mince pies and log fires. But it’s used a little sarcastically in the Molloy household as well. All harmless and tongue-in-cheek but, when the commercialism and pressure becomes a bit too much during the festive season, we sing it under our breath to lighten the moment. When you have been rammed by yet another trolley battling the bulging Tesco aisles or are arguing over the single cellotape roll wrapping presents, one of the family will strike up singing ‘It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas’ and you can’t help but giggle. It lightens a stressful moment and helps us cope and keep smiling.

So, whilst it actually is looking a lot like Christmas, we all know of course that this year will be a far cry from what we are used to.

Everyone has been impacted in different ways, but it’s fair to say it’s been a unbelievably tough year for all on some level. Families are facing difficult personal decisions about whether to meet up with their loved ones at Christmas or remain apart. My single son, who is in our bubble, is coming to stay with us for few days and also my brother for a small family get-together, but I know its going to be a tricky juggling act, especially for large or blended families.  And my heart especially goes out to those who have lost loved ones this year. They will be mourning and missing them, but not even able to collectively grieve their absence together over the Christmas break.

People have been especially trying to find meaning this year.

I just loved a story on Facebook about a teacher’s lesson to school children on happiness, caring, and teamwork. She brought balloons to the school, told her pupils to blow them up and write their name on one. After the children tossed their balloons into the hall, the teacher moved through the hall mixing them all up. The kids were given five minutes to find the balloon with their name on it, but though they searched frantically, no one found their own balloon.
 
Then the teacher told them to take the balloon closest to them and give it to the person whose name was on it. In less than two minutes, everyone was holding their own balloon.

The teacher said to the children, “These balloons are like happiness. We won’t find it when we’re only searching for our own. But if we care about someone else’s happiness…it will ultimately help us find our own.”

The last ten months of the pandemic have been full of people caring about someone else’s happiness and going above and beyond to help and care for them. I’ve seen so many examples of this from people who work here, who have been helping others find their ‘balloons’ by the bucket load! And there are lots of touching stories about helping others at Christmas too. It’s wonderful.

There are too many lovely examples to list, but I was so struck by Sheila Bekoe’s story about delivering food and other basic products to struggling BAME families in north Manchester. Sheila’s efforts are marvellous, but so too your generosity in donating items in huge numbers having read her story. I’m also aware some of you have been volunteering at foodbanks, like Shakiel Khan, from our home treatment team in Rochdale. Donations are pouring in from Shekiel’s whole team too for the foodbank.

And we’ve got teams going to great efforts to give patients a special Christmas. Staff at The Meadows in Stockport, for example, have collectively raised over £400 through a raffle to buy festive extras for patients on Rosewood Ward. Our Tameside and Glossop early intervention team has been supporting lots of local causes; collecting clothing, sleeping bags, selection boxes, toys, and food. Then there’s the Healthy Young Minds Oldham team who have set up a reverse advent calendar, so they bring in items for a local foodbank. The list goes on. This is the true spirit of Christmas.

Some say that life will never be the same again, that we’ll forever be haunted by the tragic loss of life, suffering, mental anguish, diminished economic prosperity, and so much more. On the other hand, what’s unfolded as a result of this pandemic is a reawakened sense of life’s meaning and purpose, recognition of our hidden strengths, and willingness to tap into our core goodness and generosity.

But as I have said many times before, to help others, we must look after ourselves. I know many of you are working over the Christmas holiday period, but please all make sure you have some time for yourselves if you can. It’s been a tough year and everyone is tired. So, it’s perfectly OK to veg out on the sofa, slob in pyjamas or gorge on mince pies. Whatever floats your boat. We all need space to relax, recharge, and recuperate.

Thank you again for everything you are and everything you do. Wishing you a lovely break.

Claire

You can follow me on Twitter @ClaireMolloy2

Compassionate leadership requires courage

The subject of compassionate leadership has been on my mind this week. Following the Board’s session with Professor Michael West that I talked about in my last blog, we had a follow up discussion to consider how we can best support compassionate leadership and good team working across our organisation.

It’s a myth that you cannot be compassionate and strong. Compassionate leadership requires courage. The courage to listen to tough messages from those we lead. The courage to explore understanding of others challenges and have our own interpretations challenged.

You can be a compassionate leader and still take difficult decisions, manage performance and make radical changes. But a compassionate approach is about consulting, listening and compromising when it’s in the best interests of others. It’s by releasing people’s motivation and creativity through compassionate leadership that we can ensure commitment to purpose and performance.

Professor West talks about compassionate leadership being about paying attention - ‘listening with fascination’, where we are really present and not thinking about what we want to say. It’s about listening to understand, not listening to reply, and it helps us to move forward, progress, alter our behaviour and become more self-aware.  

Compassionate leadership is also about showing empathy and putting ourselves in somebody else’s shoes; and finally it’s about helping – finding a meaningful response or action.

But it can be tough to help others when you yourself are at your limits. We’ve all chosen to work in the public sector, thereby actively choosing to be part of a sector that is there to help and care for people. Our desire to be compassionate is not in question.

But how can leaders help a team with burnout when they themselves are burned out? Staff shortages, ever increasing demands and the current climate can all lead to chronic excessive workload across every layer. Other work difficulties and personal circumstances can also pile the stress on, and the evidence shows that if people are under consistent pressure for a long period of time then this is harmful in so many ways. As the saying goes “You can’t pour from an empty jug”.

In the Board, we talked about three areas of potential focus during our session this week.

Firstly, how we model compassionate leadership for others, as it starts with us. We need to be constantly mindful of our values and display our expected behaviours in our day-to-day conversations and actions. And we need to check how we are doing with you, for example through 360 feedback to see where each of us needs to improve and grow. One of the things we are also introducing is reverse mentoring, so we have an opportunity to hear how it really is for our staff with protected characteristics.

We also talked about how we support our leaders and teams. We need to continue to identify where pressure is greatest and do all we can to reduce chronic excessive workload. This second wave of covid has really taken it out of people, and many staff were already under a lot of stress and strain before the pandemic turned our world upside down. Some services are under-resourced, others are going through complex transformation and corporate services are being redesigned. People are frazzled and worn out.

So, we need to make sure the Niche work, which shows where we need more funding, feeds strongly into the refresh of the Greater Manchester mental health strategy, the supporting investment plan and in our local contract negotiations for next year. And even where it is difficult to solve some of these long standing issues, we need to encourage conversations about chronic excessive workloads.

Managers often feel that if they initiate the conversation they have to do something about it. We might not have a magic wand to solve all of the issues immediately, but we still need to listen and see if we can help. Burnout is never a failure, we are all susceptible to it and our environment can precipitate it. We’re all in this together and even listening and being heard about how hard things are can help.

We are also going to develop a clear leadership strategy across our organisation that makes our aspiration for compassionate leadership explicit and includes the actions we will take to promote this. Every team should experience some form of team development at least once a year and we want to develop what’s on offer to you, from general to bespoke development.

We’re already rolling out a big leadership development training programme as part of our new clinical and operational leadership redesign, and this will include compassionate and effective team leadership and management. We also need to promote the importance of a ‘home team’ approach with shared objectives, regular supervision, time for reflection and mutual support.

And when I talk about ‘teams’, let's not forget student placements within this. I know one of the challenges during covid is sustaining the support and preparation for students, but they are ‘essential workers’ and supporting them to meet their learning outcomes is a vital part of our work.

The final area the Board discussed was about the importance of having time for reflection. It can be really hard to take time out when there is so much to do, with more tasks piling in. But we need to encourage people and teams to have a space for reflection, as well as informal catch-ups. Reflection is about careful thought. It give us a valuable opportunity to pause amidst the chaos, untangle and sort through observations and experiences, consider interpretations and create meaning. This becomes learning.

The communications team was telling me about starting every Friday meeting with a fun ‘how are you feeling’ picture scale. The picture montages range from different animals in wacky poses (last Friday was hamsters) to celebrities in emotional snaps from joy to despair. They said that the picture they choose is sort of irrelevant, it’s a fun catalyst to help everyone open up about how they are feeling and how their week has been. I think I’m going to introduce this into our execs meetings!

Positive leadership is about optimism and humour, as well as compassion. So, we need the fun and the enthusiasm as well as the empathy and kindness.

I loved a recent tweet from Jaco Nel, one of our consultant psychiatrists and chair of our disabled employees network. It said, ‘When you’ve had a difficult week and you feel you have failed. Reflect and remind yourself of all the things you have achieved. We’re human and can’t be perfect all the time. Have a good weekend’.

A wonderful message.

Best wishes

Claire

You can follow me on Twitter @ClaireMolloy2