How to Effectively Handle Anxiety Part 3

In my two previous blogs in this series, I introduced Barbara, who struggles with anxiety in managing projects. She used Adaptive Inquiry (AI) to help her handle her emotions and become more effective.  Barbara considered her beliefs, practices, priorities and place and began building a strategy to use her anxiety to mitigate risks and fortify her resilience.  In this blog, I will describe how she used priorities and place to arrive at a successful adaptive strategy.

After asking herself potent questions about her beliefs and practices, Barbara considered her priorities. She asked, “Would I benefit from changing my priorities with regard to mitigating this risk?”

Barbara considered what it might cost her to reduce the probability of completing the project late. She decided that communicating with her team members more frequently could lower that risk - and it could have some side benefits if she approached her team with intentions to coach and remove obstacles, rather than nagging them or micro-managing.  Therefore, there were no costs. Barbara decided that the time, attention and resources she would be willing to invest in increasing her communications with her team and her boss were worth it in order to mitigate any risks.

Finally, Barbara looked at her options around place. She asked herself, “Would I benefit from changing my place (relationship with my team, the management role, this particular project, my company, etc.) to improve my ability to mitigate these risks?”

Barbara realized that, although she felt anxious with all the responsibilities of managing projects, if she took a less responsible position, she wouldn’t meet her other needs for learning and career growth. Barbara knew that communicating more would help to raise her credibility with her boss as well. She would grow from changing her practices and would also increase her feeling of self-effectiveness in this current position.

Using the Adaptive Inquiry technique to take her through each instance of anxiety, Barbara found ways to work with her anxieties to mitigate the potential of loss or injury.  

-Andrea Zintz, Career Coach