I’m successful but mega stressed
March 2008, I was promoted to lead a department (with sub-departments) with over 300 people, in charge of Global Projects. I was happy, I loved the opportunities and challenges and apparently, I was good at it. But I was stressed, tired and exhausted. I wanted to be excellent in what I do and value the trust received, but also reduce the stress.
Sound Familiar? Successful but stressed!
Solution – I need to work on my skills and improve how I do things, learn about time management, prioritization, delegation, communication, relationship management, this would for sure help me a lot to reduce my stress and continue to be successful.
What has changed?
Certain things become easier and I was getting better, but still stressed and exhausted. “It must be something different that needs to change”, was my thought.
Looking at my schedule it was clear, I had different roles and I switch between them back and forth. Also clear each role had different requirements and situation changed fast and require adaptation. Ok, but what needs to change?
Looking for solutions
I looked for support in my books and asked friends that had a similar mindset. It was great to get advice and how to implement them, but it didn’t work for me. Today I know because it was their solutions, their insight, their look at a problem – it simply worked for them.
If you ever asked yourself who am I as a leader, why am I stressed, why others are doing better? My single advice to you – Silence the outer world and start looking inside.
You know best what works for you, you have the intuition to know what is best, because you are unique!
I needed to find my truth, my way! I knew there was something wrong and I had the will to change it. Fast forward, 12 years later I can say self-awareness, was the crucial step, starting my change, at work and in private.
Today I still feel stress but it does not burn me, today I feel stress but I react differently to it, I feel stress but also found peace with it. Today most of the time I’m calm.
