Olina took us through practical management. Under this broad topic, self-management was the main focus. Self-management encompasses a very broad range of skills, qualities, attitudes and experience, therefore two main areas was the focus for this lecture, namely

• stress management and

• managing your own emotions

 

The expectation that at the end of this lecture should be able to:

• identify tools and resources for successful self-management

•  Understand the importance of constructive attitudes to success in any field.

• evaluate and develop your emotional intelligence  

• Identify factors that prevent you from achieving excellence.

 

Last week CDB exposed us to various investment opportunities in Ghana through external orientation, as a would be entrepreneurs or entrepreneurs we can still explore some of the opportunities by reflecting on internal orientation which lead to internal creativity. That is coming out with something on our own to solve problems.

 

There are so many vacuum in our country that needs to be filled

Sources of ideas under internal creativity includes:

• Identifying trend;

• necessity;

• hobbies;

• Observing others deficiencies.

 

Under the external as the presenter said, we can get the ideas through the website of GIPC. In addition, we can read newspapers, trade journal; special magazines addressing particular interests- for example fashion; government agencies providing information of patents open to public use, etc.  After gathering all the ideas to set up the business to equip ourselves, we shouldn’t forget about stress that we will go through to achieve success.

 

In addition to our people skills. The law of entrepreneurship clearly state that 'the surest road to wealth is to start and build a successful business of your own. No one ever got rich working for someone else. Your products or service only need to be 10% better than your competitors to start you on the road to wealth'

 

Entrepreneurial stress.

 

There is no single definition of stress. Wagner and Hollenbeck (1992) defined stress as an unpleasant emotional state resulting from the perception that situational demand exceeds one's capacity and that it is very important to meet those demands. So it is a state that occurs when people are faced with demands that require a change. Stress is a universal human experience and is the result of demands which people meet in the course of life. It can be positive and negative, major and minor, pleasant and unpleasant, beneficial and harmful.  

 

As a positive influence, it can compel us to take action which will result in a new awareness and an exciting new perspective. Actually some people thrive on pressure because it helps them draw on physical and emotional resources to solve the problem at amazingly high efficiency levels. As a negative influence, it can result in feelings of distrust, anger, rejection and depression.

 

Stress can cause a lot of health problems such as headaches, insomnia, rashes, indigestion, stomach ulcers, high blood pressure with its complications e.g. Stroke. Apart from the health problems, it can also lead to low productivity and more seriously behavioural deviation ( especially in school- using few days to cover the entire semester/term work to write an examination).

 

Sources of entrepreneurial stress and how we can mitigate them.

It includes loneliness, immersion in business, people problem and need to achieve.

 

Loneliness- this occurs when an entrepreneur isolates himself from persons he can confine in. This isolation results from the long hours of work that prevent him from seeking comfort and counsel of friends and family members. They tend to isolate themselves from social activities.                      

Immersion in business- entrepreneurs always marry their business. They make enough money from their businesses and use some to partake in leisure activities, but they cannot take that exotic cruise, fishing trip or vacation because their business will not allow their absence. The long hours they work leave them very little time for recreation.                          

People problem- entrepreneurs must depend on and work with partners, employees, customers, bankers and professionals. Most experience frustration, disappointment and aggravation in their interaction with these people. They manage to get 'lazy' employees to meet their standard of performance.                          

Need to achieve-achievement brings satisfaction. Many entrepreneurs are never satisfied with their work no matter how well it is done. They become obsessed and seem to believe that if they stop or slow down, some competitors will come from behind and everything they have built will crumble.

 

Dealing with stress.

 It is important to point out that not all stress is bad. Certainly if stress becomes overbearing and unrelenting in a person's life, it wears down the body's physical abilities. However, if the stress can be kept within constructive bounds, then it could increase a person's efficiency. Members, the techniques that can help us to reduce stress include

• Acknowledging its existence

• Developing coping mechanisms

• Probing personal unacknowledged needs.      

                                                     

Whether we own our businesses or working for someone, we can still deal with stress by employing the following ways.....                                      

• Networking to relieve loneliness-one way to relieve the loneliness of running a business is to share experiences by networking with other business owners. The objectivity gained from hearing about the triumphs and errors of others is itself therapeutic.

• Getting away from it all- holidays, vacations or short breaks are the best antidotes to immersion in business. People normally return from holidays with fresh ideas

• Communication with subordinates- entrepreneurs with close contacts with employees, personal touches, granting flexible hours, small loans (till pay day) enjoy productivity and high output from employees.      

•  Delegation-implementation of coping mechanisms requires implementation time. To gain time, the entrepreneur has to delegate tasks. Entrepreneurs find delegation difficult because they think they have to be at the business all the time, and involved in every aspect of the operation. But if time is to be gained for the alleviation of stress, then appropriate employees need to be trained for effective delegation.

 

 

According to Lao-Tzu, to conquer others is strong; to conquer oneself is mighty. Let us look at the meaning of the word people skills. People skills are a combination of good interpersonal skills (being able to work well with others) and intra-personal skills (being able to manage one's own attitudes and emotions). People skills are now critical to success in a wide range of careers. They are important to the modern economy as are knowledge, information and technical skills. As members of this fraternity, we need intra-personal skills to help us to manage our feelings, responses and actions, so that we are able to function at our best. The intra-personal world has the most profound effect upon our responses, our thinking, our behaviour, our views of ourselves, our feelings and our achievement. It touches upon what is closest to our hearts and being. It is especially, the arena of the emotions. When we work with emotions, we can expect to feel emotional at times. Most of us can find this quite challenging, and so there is temptation to shy away from developing intra-personal skills. If we try to avoid any issue where emotions may be involved, it can mean we do not get to the heart of the issue, and so do not achieve all we could. On the other hand, when we understand more about ourselves, know our own triggers, and develop our emotional intelligence we are more able to manage every situation we enter.

 

Emotional intelligence and how to evaluate our emotional intelligence.

Emotional intelligence can be simply explained as how we manage our feelings. Or what we do and what we think that affects our ability to cope, manage and succeed. It involves:

• knowing the appropriate feelings for the circumstances

• experiencing the appropriate feelings for the circumstances

• expressing feelings appropriate to the circumstances

• making opportunities to express feelings that cannot be expressed fully in the original circumstances.  

 

activities

 

Please answer all the questions under each activity with the following scale-

• always true,

• usually true,

• occasionally

• true,

• not true, d

• don't know.

 

ACTIVITY ONE-Emotional management (self)

 

• I know which emotions I am experiencing

• I am aware of my emotions

• I know what triggers different kinds of emotion in me

• I can respond without being overwhelmed by emotion

• I can be assertive rather than aggressive or passive whilst feeling emotional.

• I allow myself to feel small or vulnerable at times

• I am aware of how my feelings are affected by people around me

• I reflect upon my feelings

• Irregularly talk about my feelings to somebody I trust

• I  cry if I need to                                                                        

 

 ACTIVITY TWO- Emotional management (others)    

           

• I know which emotions other people are experiencing

• I allow others to express what they feel is right for the circumstances

• I can be assertive when other people are being aggressive, passive or emotional

• I speak to other people about their feelings

• I take responsibility for my own feelings when other people are feeling emotional

• I am comfortable when others cry if they need to

• I am aware of how my feelings affect the people around me.

• I allow other people feel small or vulnerable.

• I understand when other people withdraw from a situation in order to experience their feelings.

• I am aware of how I let other people's feelings affect my performance.                                                                                      

 

 ACTIVITY THREE- Emotions in action

   

• I feel comfortable even when people disagree with me.

• I can feel angry without taking it out on others

• I can accept criticism without getting angry.

• I am able to remain positive even when the situation looks gloomy.

• I can admit a mistake and apologise.

• I will speak out for what i believe is right.

• I can make decisions and act upon them.

• I can let myself feel emotions without taking a drink, cigarette, drug, or comfort eating.

• I can identify when my behaviour is unreasonable and stop it.

• I can manage my emotions under pressure.         

 

 Scoring your responses.

 

For each item on the above sets of questions, allocate to yourself the following scores:

Always true (4);

Usually true (3);

Occasionally true (2);

Not true (1);

Don’t know (0).  

                                                                          

Emotional management (self):

Score-------------                    2. Emotional management (others): Score------------3. Emotions in action: Score-----  Total score------------                        

 

 Interpreting your scores    

 

• 75-100: if your answers are accurate, this suggests that you have a sophisticated approach to emotional life. You seem capable of managing your own emotions as well as coping with the emotions of other people. Your emotional intelligence should provide you with an asset in almost any situation.                                      

• 50-74: this is a good score. If your evaluations are accurate, you have a very good foundation for developing your emotional intelligence further. Emotional intelligence further. Emotional intelligence is an asset in most situations so this very much worth doing.              

• 25-49: this reasonable score. It suggests that you have lots of room to develop your emotional management skills. If your evaluation is accurate, you would benefit from making emotional self-management a priority area.      

• 0-24: if your evaluation is accurate, you may have a real challenge on your hands. There may be many areas of emotional intelligence in which you excel that are not covered by this activity.

 

On the other hand, you may really feel that the emotional world is rather a tricky one. You may feel that people misunderstand you or your motives much of the time. You are not alone if you feel that. However, it is not necessarily a very comfortable position to be in. The good news is that emotional intelligence is an asset that can be developed.

 

This may sound easy. However, your reflections above may have indicated to you that emotions often get in the way of a rational interpretation of a situation. They tend to prevent us from working towards the best or most constructive solution to the issues. In general, people tend to over-express their feelings ( excessive anger, distress etc) or to bottle up their feelings in order to cope. Different circumstances permit a different level of expression.

 

We need to consider such matters as:

• what response will lead to the most constructive outcome?

• how will other people respond?

• what are other people's needs??

 

WHERE Do the Unexpressed Feelings Go?                                  

Whilst it is important to know what we feel and to acknowledge our feelings, there are times when it is not appropriate to express all of what we feel. There are numerous ways that unexpressed emotions make themselves felt. Members we should identify which responses seem to be most typical of your own. You would be a very remarkable person if you made none of the following responses.    

               

DISPLACEMENT- the emotion is ignored and sneaks out when not expected, usually when you experience a similar emotion later. E.g, you say nothing when you are irritated several times during a morning and then snap or shout at somebody for something very minor later on in the day. Many people are not aware of what they are feeling, yet their feelings may be all too evident to the people around them.        

 

DISPROPORTION- this often goes hand in hand with displacement. When you express an emotion it should be proportionate to the situation. Disproportionate responses are noticeable when quite small things that do not seem to affect other people provoke a strong reaction in you. A small event may lead to tears, shouting, anger, violence, insults, or extreme distress.        

 

DISTORTED THINKING- unexpressed emotions can eat away at people, leading to distorted thinking such as:

• believing there is no solution or way out of a problem.

• exaggerating how bad things are.

• over-generalising: judging everything from one or few examples.

• focusing on the negatives: seeing only what went wrong, and judging a situation only by what was not perfect.

• all or nothing thinking: if i can't have this then i don't want anything.

• rationalising: finding a reason for doing what you want to do or for not doing what needs to be done.

• exaggerating one's own role in events, so as to see oneself as very incompetent, bad, unkind or blame for everything that went wrong.    

 

ACTIVITY FOUR  

                     

We are all capable of distorted thinking from time to time.

• which of the above methods do you use when you are not feeling good about yourself or your work.

• what kinds of situations prompt you to distorted thinking?

• what benefit does the distorted thinking give you in the short term? Bear in mind that if you didn't feel it was giving you something, you wouldn't do it.

• how does the distorted thinking stand in the way of achieving your goals?

 if something has been building, unexpressed, for a long time, it is usually advisable to speak to a counsellor. They can help you release the emotion in a manageable way.

 

Managing personal distress when one wants to manage personal distress ABC model can be employed to deal with the situation. It helps to analyse the sources of the stress. It separates the core of the issue from the beliefs and attitudes that then amplify the problem. This makes it easier to find a solution or way of coping, keeping the core issues in perspective.                      

          A=activating event: what happened that led to the emotional distress              

          B=Beliefs: what beliefs contribute to the emotional distress?  

          C=Consequences: e.g anger, illness, inability to work, difficulty getting down to work or concentrating.                

          D=Dealing with it: what action will you take to manage the situation.

 

 

Managing change, confusion and uncertainty of the day.

Under this topic too, we will take our last exercise to get better understanding. For each item, allocate to yourself the following scores.

Always true (3);

usually true (2);

occasionaly true (1);

not true (0).                        

 

ACTIVITY 4- Approaches to change

                                     

• I enjoy change

• I look for the opportunities in new situations and circumstances.

• I feel comfortable meeting new people.

• I am confident about coping in new surroundings.

• I welcome new perspectives on an issue or problem.

•  I ask people for feedback.

• I can change my plans at the last minute without feeling stressed.

• I can study reasonably well in a wide range of circumstances.

• I enjoy starting new projects.

• I will work early or late at short notice.

 

Reflecting on your score      

• 24-30: this suggests that you have a very strong and positive approach to change. What beneficial characteristics does this enable you to bring to study? How would this be of benefit in a work context? Do you look for change at the expense of continuity?                                

• 16-23: this suggests you have a positive approach to change. What beneficial characteristics does this enable you to bring to study? How would this be of benefit in a work context?                                    

•  8-15: this suggests that you have an ambivalent approach to change. You can be positive about change. What benefits could you gain from developing a more positive approach?                

• 0-7: your score suggests a strong preference for continuity. You may need to be creative to find work and circumstances that enable you to maintain this level of continuity. It may be helpful to talk through your resistance to change with a counsellor. What disadvantages does your resistance to change bring you? Is there one area where you could develop greater flexibility?

 

Today, things move quickly and change is the dominant pattern. It is expected that we will continue training in new skills throughout our lives and it is likely that most of us will have several jobs, probably in diverse locations. Change inevitably brings uncertainty and depending on what else is going on in our lives, we each manage this differently. There may be some kinds of change that you always welcome and others that cause distress.  We can still cope with change. Let us provide answers to the following questions and see how we are coping with change.

• what kinds of change do you find easiest to accept and cope with?

• what kinds of change do you find difficult to cope with?

• what actions do you take to help you manage change so that you are better able to cope with those difficulties?

 

You may find it helpful to consider the ABC model.

 

When we feel uncertain or confused, we lose our sense of equilibrium. Naturally, this makes us want to find our balance again. The temptation is to act too quickly, rushing in to find a solution so that we feel better. Often, this leads to hasty action which limits our possibilities. Although; it may feel uncomfortable, it is important to learn to experience the feelings of discomfort and to sit with them for a while, whilst we find out more about the situation.

We need to:

• acknowledge the feeling of discomfort or anxiety.

• allow ourselves to wait before rushing into action.

• find help and support if we need it-talking to somebody can help.

• find out more about the idea or situation that challenges us.

• aim to understand what it is that we find so challenging-and look for potential opportunities.

• consider our options, preferably within a problem solving strategy.

• act when we have weighed up the options.                                      

 

Let us once again reflect about this and see how we were able to manage uncertainty some time ago.

• what kinds of uncertainty have you been faced with recently?

• what was your response?

• in retrospect, do you think you could have managed this uncertainty differently or more constructively?

• did you look for any support in managing this uncertainty? If not, what stopped you?  

• what could you do to improve the way you manage uncertainty?

 

In conclusion, our intra-personal life is a rich source of information for us. It is one of the most important and valuable information that we always need to know. We cannot know enough about the inner life of our mind. The knowledge we gain about ourselves and how we can best manage our own attitudes and thought processes will enable us to optimise our performance in any walk of life.

Thank you for your attention.

God bless AR, God bless You