'Prevailing wisdom says difficult thoughts & feelings have no place at office'

At the second edition of the digital ‘Women Achievers Summit and Awards 2021’ held on 2nd July, Dr Oumaya Akbil B. Belakbil, Doctor of Clinical Psychology delivered a keynote on the topic, “Emotional Agility a Key Skill to Achieving Success Facing Change.” 

Belakbil started the session with her presentation on increasing mental stress during the Covid-19 pandemic. She said emphasised that one cannot really talk about being "stress-free" in the present day and age. Instead, the focus should be on what could be "stress-friendly." "There are a lot of different psychological functions that are taken place, and one of them which we call is emotional agility," she added. 

“As I work with my clients, I can observe a broad range of emotions as I listen to them sharing how their lives have been upside down since the outburst of Covid-19. Some are embracing what is ahead, and others feel the grief for what our normal lives used to hold for us. The forecasts give us an outlook that makes it seem that normal will be gone for an extended period of time”, she added. 

Talking about enhancing emotional agility, Belakbil mentioned three factors that the current situation is mainly rooted -- beliefs, experiences and assumptions. "As we can’t change the circumstances, being able to adjust our frame of reference and to choose how we react to this situation is where our personal power lies. This is something that really applies on every single level of our daily lives," she pointed out.

Speaking about the effect of modern psychology on one’s belief system, Belakbil said, “Modern psychology underlines how our belief systems impact our own abilities and potential fuelling our behaviour and predicting our success.” She mentioned Carol Dweck, a psychologist whose theory focuses on the power of beliefs, both conscious and unconscious. 

Belakbil also addressed stress as a radar when she said: “Stress can be a sign that we are doing things of value, and a lack of stress can be a sign of boredom, atrophy, and disengagement. It is often during the times of greatest growth and learning that we experience stress, and many of life’s joys are also stressful”. 

Belakbil added, “All healthy human beings have an inner stream of thoughts and feelings that include criticism, doubt, stress, and fear. That is just exactly what our minds need to do. That is the job they are designed to do. I believe that every woman will say that is exactly what we do”.

Belakbil mentioned that emotional agility is both a practical set of tools and a means of building resilience. She said, “It’s a pathway where individuals can stop ignoring or being beaten by their stress and learn to become more comfortable with feeling uncomfortable.” 

Belakbil further added that the prevailing wisdom says that difficult thoughts and feelings have no place at the office: Executives, and particularly leaders, should be either stoic or cheerful; they must project confidence and damp down any negativity bubbling up inside them. But that goes against basic biology. All healthy human beings have an inner stream of thoughts and feelings. Being an emotional agile leader is being able to be mindful of those feelings and thoughts, recognize them, make sense of them and use them to achieve his/her goals. Not dismiss them. 

She concluded her session by saying, “Accessing mental health is not due to gender disparity, it is more due to not accessing because of the lack of means.”