How’s your day going?
Have you just come out of a tough meeting? Maybe that campaign you have been working on has not generated much coverage.
Perhaps something has gone wrong, and you are in crisis media management mode, inundated with calls from journalists.
If you are a spokesperson, you may have just finished a tough interview.
Working in comms and with the media is fast-paced. Comms teams are increasingly asked to do more with less. You may be dealing with sensitive and emotionally draining subjects.
And in the age of social media and 24/7 news coverage, it can be hard to ever switch off.
So, building resilience and being resilient have never been more vital
That’s why we explored the topic in our latest exclusive masterclass for members of The Media Team Academy.
The session was led by Kirsty Waite and Dani Boniface – expert tutors from our sister company The BCF Group.
And one of those aspects they explored was how to build personal resilience.
Before we take a look at their advice, let’s ensure we understand what resilience means. It is a word we all hear a lot. We used to talk about resilient systems. But we increasingly speak about resilient people.
And it is more than the latest buzzword.
A definition The BCF Group uses during its leadership training and business coaching is that resilience is “the capacity to recover quickly from difficulties or challenges.”
So, how can you build your resilience and become resilient?
Personal wellbeing
To be resilient, you need to think about your wellbeing.
“If we are physically and mentally not well, we will not be able to cope well with changes and challenges,” Kirsty said.
“We deal with things so much easier when we are looking after ourselves.
“Comms roles are demanding. But you must be kind to yourself. Are you eating and sleeping well? Are you looking after yourself – or are you sitting at your desk from 7am to 7pm without having a break?
“If it is the latter, that is not good for mind or body.
“When you are feeling strong and are looking after yourself, you feel like you are ready to take on the world. If you are sleep deprived and are focusing on the negatives, it will be hard to make a decision in that mindset.
“The other key thing is that when things change fast in the workplace, it is not personal. If we don’t have a strong mindset and are not looking after ourselves, it can be easy to think that it is your fault when, in reality, the organisation needs to do something different to meet its priorities.”
The role of reflection
Another crucial area for building personal resilience is self-reflection.
This isn’t about dwelling on the past and letting our inner critic take over. It is about processing what has happened and thinking about what you can learn from it.
Could you have done anything different in that last media interview? Did you manage that crisis communication incident well?
“Self-reflection can feel a bit alien and wishy-washy,” Kirst said.
“But it feeds into emotional intelligence and self-awareness.
“If we take a minute to stop and reflect on situations, rather than rushing off to the next thing at 100mph and not giving a second thought, what we can take from that will help us learn, develop and improve.
“When we are aware of how we react and behave, it comes from reflection. And it feeds into self-awareness because we can do something about it.
“So, you need to shift your mindset from ‘why me?’, ‘this always happens to me’ to ‘what can I learn from this situation?’, ‘what could I do differently?’.
“If things have not gone that well, you might want to move on and never think about it again. But it is an opportunity to grow and build our resilience. Reflect on how your actions and behaviours could have led to a different outcome.”
But don’t forget to reflect on what went well. Maybe you successfully landed your personal stories and examples just like we showed you during your media training. Perhaps that crisis communication plan you worked so hard on stood up under the most intense scrutiny.
Kirsty added: “You also need to recognise what went well. Then the next time you are in a challenging situation, you can think back to what went well last time you dealt with something similar.”
How much time should you spend on self-reflection?
Dan said: “I often hear people say, ‘I haven’t got time to reflect’. But how can you not have time to do that? You can’t move forward, you can’t grow, and you can’t develop if you are not reflecting.
“It is not about setting yourself an hour every day to go and reflect. You could do that. But you could also reflect in the car on the way home or on the train. Or you could keep a journal and spend two minutes at the end of the day jotting down how things went.
“I do it at the end of each webinar, course or coaching session. You do it because you pick things up that can change and things you didn’t plan to do, but that worked well.”
Timing is a critical consideration in reflection.
“If something has gone badly wrong and you did not feel you reacted well, and you react on that five minutes later, you are reflecting from the wound,” Kirsty said. “It will still be raw.
“But if you wait a while, you will come from it from a different perspective, you’ll think differently, and there may be more to learn from it. Reflect from the scar, not the wound.”
Self-awareness
The other vital area of personal resilience that Dan and Kirsty focused on was self-awareness.
It is about understanding your strengths, what you need to perform at your best and what your trigger points and coping mechanisms are.
“Reflection encourages self-awareness,” Kirsty said.
“And to be resilient, you need to be aware of what you need to perform well in certain situations.
“If you know that when someone senior comes to you and asks you to do something, you say ‘yes’ to everything because you don’t want to challenge them, and that leads you not to perform well, you need to understand what you need to succeed in that situation.
“It may be that you need to speak to your manager. Or that you have to have a conversation about priorities upfront
“Also, think about how your behaviours and reactions impact situations. When you are self-aware, you can be intentional about how you react and become conscious about it.
“You’ll know what the outcome will be on the individual, team or business when you behave in a certain way.
“So, you become intentional about that, rather than being triggered and reacting without being calm.
“The self-awareness comes from the reflection, which comes from looking after yourself - all these things add up to creating a more resilient workplace for you.”
Dan added: “One of the big things for me with resilience is self-awareness and emotional intelligence. Understand how you feel in the moment, and then think about what you are doing to regulate that.
“If someone has sent you an email that has made you feel angry, recognise that you are feeling angry and frustrated, and rather than reacting, go for a walk or make a cup of coffee and let it out of your system a bit.”
This exclusive masterclass for members of The Media Team Academy also explored how you can help your team to become more resilient, including how to build a culture that supports resilience. And it looked at how you can take these resilience tips and techniques into your role.
If you want to be part of masterclasses like this with expert personal development and leadership coaches and the sessions with our brilliant current working journalist tutors, you need to be a member of The Media Team Academy.
The next cohort of the learning and development programme does not start until October. But if you sign up now, we will activate your membership early – giving you extra time to enjoy the masterclasses, on-demand courses and exclusive resource hub.
Media First are media and communications training specialists with over 35 years of experience. We have a team of trainers, each with decades of experience working as journalists, presenters, communications coaches and media trainers.
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