Whether in the boardroom or the living room, our past follows us. It impacts our relationships. It affects our spirit. It trickles down into everything we do, and if we’re responsible for leading others, any negativity we carry can damage our employee relationships. It can destroy companies.
Margaret Graziano has a solution: ResponseAgility™, a framework she developed that teaches leaders how to regulate their emotions and shift their communication style. Though seemingly simple, it can reshape toxic workplace culture by transforming productivity and employee satisfaction.
Her work is grounded in neuroscience, human consciousness research and validated behavioral science. She developed her techniques after her toxic upbringing began to impact her career trajectory. Today, as founder and chief executive officer of KeenAlignment, she helps leaders reshape their work environments by going inward and shifting the way they engage with their teams.
SUCCESS: Why did you choose to pivot from your career as a recruiter?
Margaret Graziano: My family home was a home that had two parents. One was a raging addict, and the other was pretending that nothing was wrong.… I had to learn to develop this kind of armor for myself and this strength and independence, and it was great. It helped me be a top producer in the recruiting industry. I spent 25 years in the top 5% of that industry in the United States. And not until I started my own business did I see that all of those strengths were actually barriers to me getting to the next level. It wasn’t until I hired a business advisor, and he sat in my office, and he said, “Which one of your parents was the alcoholic?” And I was super offended. And then I said, “What would make you say that?” And then before I even got that out of my mouth, I said, “It was my father, but how did you know?” And he said, “You’re running your business like a codependent.”
I was 36 years old. That was the beginning of my journey to self-exploration, self-management and self-regulation. In the last 20 years, I have taken over 40 courses on ontology, psychology, spirituality, transformation, neuroscience, neurobiology. And it stopped being to fix my impediments about five years in, and then it was an innate curiosity to liberate people from their past. To liberate them from the chains that keep them stuck.
S: You created something called the ResponseAgility™ framework. What is that?
MG: I created a process for myself called SCULPT. And the SCULPT process allows me for myself and to teach others how to move from friction—which is agitation, frustration, anxiety, fear, despair, hopelessness—to shift that into courage.… Stopping whatever’s going on, taking a breath, calming down my nervous system by slowing my breathing and connecting to what it is that I believe is my highest power… and then taking a moment to understand what’s going on with my biology, my thoughts, my feelings, my emotions, my energy.… Once you understand it, then you ask yourself a question: “What do I need now?.… Why am I unhappy? Upset? Triggered? Below the power and freedom line? Why am I in that space and what do I need? Maybe I need a walk… maybe I need to pet my dog. Maybe I need to drink a smoothie.… Listen for the answer… your intuition knows before your brain knows… and then process it… quickly with discernment, processing everything you just experienced and then choosing the next right action, taking action…. And when you do that and you practice every day, three times a day, five times a day, it becomes a habit. And when it becomes a habit, it becomes an automatic way to deal with stress. And when you master it, you can do it in 90 seconds.
S: What kind of place does a company need to be in for you to show up?
MG: My work is for people serious about making individual or organizational change.… When you’ve tried everything and the stuff, the employee engagement isn’t working, the incentives aren’t working, you have to face the fact that innovation is happening 10,000 times faster than it happened in the Industrial Revolution, but the human biology has not changed in 50,000 years. Human beings are not equipped or trained on how to self-regulate.… [What I offer] is the solution because the facts are clear: when you are in homeostasis, when you are calm, you can think clearly.
All culture begins with the leader. And if the leader isn’t self-regulated, isn’t doing his or her work, then that energy that they’re bringing to the situation—of anxiety, of impatience, of frustration—that’s like a tsunami wave of energy dampening the hearts and the minds of the people who work [for them].
S: How does a reactive leader affect the culture around them?
MG: A reactive leader is operating in survival mode…. Energy is contagious and people feel it.… That leader who’s stressed out? Their nervous system is compromised. Something someone says is going to annoy them…. The sound of a person’s voice is going to sound like nails on a chalkboard. Someone’s going to give an idea that maybe is a mediocre idea, but they’re going to cut them off in the middle of it and not even hear them out, because what’s running the show is, “I want this problem to go away.” And everybody becomes an obstacle.
S: What does a leader with strong ResponseAgility™ do differently in tense moments?
MG: They’re more aware of the environment. They’re much more aware of others, because when you’re in a stressful situation and you allow that to take over you, all you can see is yourself. So their aperture opens. Their system judgment is in full gear. Their balanced decision-making turns on. They’re more empathetic. And they’re more solution-oriented because they have access to both hemispheres. When you’re under the gun… your focus narrows. Because think about if you are an animal and something’s coming after you—you’re a deer and there’s a lion—you’re just focused on you, “How do I survive this situation?” But if you’re in a state of courage, your aperture opens and the hormones running through your body are dopamine, endorphins, oxytocin and serotonin… You can feel what’s happening with other people. You can see, you can listen to other perspectives. You don’t have to defend. When you are under stress, the human animal takes over. And when you are regulated, the human spirit takes over.
Featured image provided courtesy of Margaret Graziano
