We now know that emotions affect not only what people do but how they do it; emotions play a role in how we think and how we behave.

Emotional resilience is defined by Geetu Bharwaney, author of the international bestseller Emotional Resilience: Know how to be agile, adaptable and perform at your best as: the ability to choose the thoughts, actions and feelings that enable us to perform at our best at personal, team and organizational level.

This is highly relevant today in a business world of great volatility, uncertainty, complexity and ambiguity. Even bosses are not able to predict what business changes will unfold in the coming year.

So what can a manager do to help their staff be emotionally resilient?

1.   Be aware of your own emotional resilience strengths as a manager – rate yourself on the 6 essentials – self-worth, self-control, mood, empathy, caring, understanding (you can download a free e-chapter here and work through a self-reflection if that would make it easier for you to rate these skills.

2.   Use this understanding to identify where your own management style needs more emotion-based skills (shifting, problem-solving, expression, group empathy and dialogue) in order to gain results in four areas (connection, influence, energy and thriving).

3.   Understand the emotional resilience strengths and challenges of each staff member and invest time and energy in mentoring to grow their abilities – e.g. if someone displays signs of low self-worth, then you may need to affirm them as individuals so that they grow more confidence in their role; if someone is hasty in their decision-making, you may have to help to develop more control.

4.   Introduce the emotional resilience framework to your team members to help them take a good look in the mirror and work out what they need to develop more in order to be highly productive this year.

Emotional Resilience: Know how to be agile, adaptable and perform at your best, is available now, published by Pearson