The last episode of Women Taking the Lead was a celebration of 5 years of the Women Taking the Lead podcast and, in that episode, I also covered some ways to begin to relieve the stress you are likely experiencing because of the COVID-19 pandemic. You are dealing with the work and lifestyle changes, as well as the uncertainty around your future health and finances. It’s a lot. It’s a lot, and for some of you, you need to face that fact that you’re not going to have the same level of focus and productivity. Not without making some changes. Stress weighs on you and, from what I’ve seen and talked about with my clients, most of the stress you experience goes unacknowledged. Try this stress test Time yourself walking or running a half a mile. Once you are finished, note your time and take your pulse. Notice the pace of your breath and how much you are sweating. On a scale of 1-10, how do you feel after doing that half mile? Note how long it takes for your heart rate and breathing to return to normal. Now pick up a 15-pound weight and time yourself repeating whatever you just completed, the half mile walk or run. Once you are finished, note your time and take your pulse. Notice the pace of your breath and how much you are sweating. On a scale of 1-10, how do you feel this time? Note how long it takes for your heart rate and breathing to return to normal. The difference between the first and second half mile walk/run is the impact COVID-19 is having on you. It is like carrying around an extra 15 pounds on your shoulders. And yet, if you’re like a lot of leaders I’ve been talking to lately, you’re aghast at how tired and unfocused you are about midway through the day. It’s no wonder, you’re carry extra weight around with you, all day! But what if you’ve been training and conditioning yourself to carry around an extra 15 pounds all day, even if you didn’t have to? That’s what people who want to stay in peak physical shape do? They educate, develop and train themselves to endure more physical stress than they would experience on a day-to-day basis. As a result, when they are required to do more physical labor they perform and recover more quickly than those who have not been training. The same goes for mental and emotional stress. If you have been educating, training and developing yourself to handle more stress than you would typically encounter on a day-to-day basis, when something like a pandemic comes your way, you are better able to handle it.   Crisis Leadership Assessment I’m now going to focus on leaders and the conditioning of leaders. There’s a lot you can learn from this current crisis to improve your leadership skills and the skills of those that you lead as well. I want you to ask yourself honestly, how prepared were you to handle this crisis? For those of you who lead leaders, how prepared were your leaders to handle this crisis? I hope once you’ve gotten past survival and recovery modes you and your organization take the opportunity to analyze the performance of your leadership and identify where the gaps are, so you can identify who needs more training and coaching. This is not to come from a place of judgment, we’ve all had our own leadership missteps as we were developing as leaders. The information I’m about to give is to make it easier to identify those who may be crying for help but can’t bring themselves to speak the words. That person might be you or someone you know. Here are some of the symptoms of a leader who is not prepared for a current crisis. They stopped communicating. They ignored messages they found too overwhelming to deal with and only responded when prompted a second or third time. They also may not be responding because everything feels urgent and they are unable to rank what needs to be done in order of importance. Most leaders ready for a crisis will typically have a template response such as, “I have received your email and I am currently working on a plan to respond to our current situation. I