10 Days of Maybe
In June of this year I had a cancer scare. The ultrasound showed a 4.2 cm nodule on my thyroid. Gulp. That is big. Way TOO BIG! I felt scared and powerless - two words that are awful on their own and horrendous when put together. Thankfully, I was one of the lucky ones and got the results I longed to hear. Benign follicular nodule! I am beyond grateful.
There were 10 days in between the ultrasound, my biopsy, and getting the results. 10 long days of waiting and not knowing. 10 awful days of maybe.
Maybe everything will be ok. Maybe it won’t.
Do I have cancer? Maybe.
Will I be laughing about this one day with Jim…remember the time I had that cancer scare? Maybe.
Maybe sucks sometimes. It is also familiar. All of us have all lived in the land of maybe more than once. Organizational changes, loss of a job, a new manager, new job, new project, cancelled project, not to mention crazy world events…all of it drops us into temporary ambiguity about what’s next.
And so, today’s topic is dedicated to one strategy that surprised me in how well it helped me navigate the space of maybe. The inspiration comes from personal experience, but don’t worry, I’ve included some useful ways you can apply it to your world at work too. After all, the whole purpose of sharing these Occasional Musings is to spark a new thought or action that helps you strengthen (or start exercising) your leadership muscles. Consider this your cue to warm up and stretch - no need to risk an injury! This strategy takes some effort and energy, but the results worth it.
For many of us, heavy ambiguity equals threat. Our brains crave certainty and without it, fear can grip us. This reaction is rooted in our survival and can be very powerful. We fight, flee, or freeze because of that fear. Fear was behind me not telling anyone at first about my thyroid issues. It was my version of “freeze”. If I don’t say it out loud, I don’t have to look at it, and it will just go away. Temporary relief was all that strategy gave me by the way, and very temporary at that. All my fears simmered and eventually exploded back to the surface. It wasn’t pretty, just like that Yellowstone geyser.
Covered in the muck and debris of my fears getting the best of me, I decided to embrace a counter intuitive method I sometimes use with my coaching clients when they are overwhelmed with fears and can’t figure out a way to move forward. I call it catastrophe planning, but you may have also seen it referred to as inversion thinking. The exercise is rooted in the notion that the way to manage all those runaway fears is not to run. Instead, turn around and look at them. List them. Really map it out. Let yourself feel the feels, imagine the worst-case scenario to its conclusion, and ask yourself the big scary questions.
In my case, it meant asking questions like, what if I have cancer? What would treatment look like? How would it affect my family? My work? And the dooziest of doozys, what is my biggest fear here, for real?
As you start to explore your catastrophe scenarios, there is one thing I cannot emphasize enough: the value of this exercise is in the answering. Just listing your fears and big daunting questions is not enough. Answering them is what bears much needed fruit. Take proper time for this piece. My own results yielded some much-needed outcomes:
It helped confront and define my fears, making them less abstract and overwhelming.
I now had a plan, plus contingency plans on top of those plans. All of this increased my sense of control.
When I really looked at them, some of my worst-case scenarios weren’t as catastrophic as I imagined. Did you know thyroid cancer is often beatable and very survivable? I didn’t.
A surge of creativity was an unexpected but welcome gift. It was triggered by looking at one of my biggest fears: Why am I here and what kind of mark do you want to leave? If the answer is to make a positive difference in this world, then I better get cracking. Whoosh! Fresh ideas about my life and business started to flow.
What could this process look like at work? The beauty of this strategy is that you’ve likely already done it before. Premortems are a prime example. When I was on the Overwatch team several years ago, way before the game was launched, the amazing Ray Gresko did his version of catastrophe planning with both the production and leadership teams. He made it fun and silly, pretending ‘future you’ was calling ‘present-day you’. Imagine a decrypted, craggily voice saying…
“Hey, it’s me, Future Julie. I’m broken and tired and our project failed. What went wrong? What mistakes were made? Tell me how this happened and save me!”
The result was a list of all the things the team could do NOW to avoid such a catastrophic ending. Inversion thinking at its best! The process identified obstacles, named the fears, and plans were built to ensure success. There was also the added bonus of the team feeling more control over its destiny. Establishing a sense of control, no matter how small, is one of the best ways to manage all those maybe-related fears.
Let’s dig a little deeper. Below are some prompts you can experiment with and see how catastrophe planning can help you or your team.
Step 1: Pick your specific “maybe” and define the problem. In my case it was, what if I have cancer? In a team scenario it might be something like, what if we can’t figure out a way to come together as a team and ship this new feature that’s been promised?
Steps 2-5: Ask yourself and/or your team a series of questions.
FEARS
Solo Exercise: What am I most afraid of regarding this situation and why?
Team Exercise: What are our biggest fears/concerns about this project/initiative and why?
IDENTIFY FAILURES
Solo Exercise: What could cause my worst fears to come true?
Team Exercise: What would failure look like for us in this scenario? What would it look like if we failed completely?
LOOKING INWARD
Solo Exercise: What am I currently doing that might contribute to this negative outcome? What current habits, mindset, and actions might be counterproductive? How can I reverse these actions or behaviors to prevent the worst-case scenario?
Team Exercise: What specific actions, behaviors, or decisions could contribute to our failure? What are we currently doing that might be hindering our success? How might we prevent these failures from happening?
LOOKING OUTWARD
Solo Exercise: Who can help me understand and address these fears?
Team Exercise: Who can we involve or consult to obtain different perspectives?
Step 5: Pause and Assess. It is worth taking a pause at this stage and quantify the risks to the extent that you can. For example, what is the likelihood of each scenario? Any metrics that we can track to help create an “early warning system” for ourselves?
Step 6: Identify Actions
Solo Exercise: What small steps can I take now to feel more in control? What longer term plans would help my situation?
Team Exercise: What small steps can we take now to improve our situation and move toward more successful outcomes? What longer term plans will help our success?
There you have it. I encourage you to experiment with this process in whatever way might serve you best. If you are feeling a little afraid to do so, good! That’s usually a clear sign that you should proceed. Feel the fear and do it anyway, my brave leader!
Also, I can’t help but throw out a challenge because there are especially big benefits of doing this exercise at work. The next time uncertainty looms in your project or company, gather your team for a catastrophe planning session. You might be surprised at the clarity and creativity that emerges from facing your fears together. Confronting our 'maybes' head-on can transform fears into fuel for growth, and that my friends, is often a catalyst for powerful break-through moments. And isn’t that what we are all chasing each day?
One last note. That oversized nodule on my thyroid hasn’t gone anywhere (yet) and this month there are more appointments to determine next steps to deal with it. My fears are still there, but I have names for them now and ‘maybe’ doesn’t seem so scary. I have a plan. I have support. And ultimately, I feel more in control thanks to some catastrophe planning.