# data[].attributes.headline
The Power of Self-Talk: Transforming Mental Wellness

# data[].attributes.subject
The Power of Self-Talk: Transforming Mental Wellness

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
The Power of Self-Talk: Transforming Mental Wellness

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Discover how positive self-talk can enhance your mental wellness. Learn techniques to shift your inner dialogue for better health and confidence.

# data[].attributes.headline
3 Approaches for Leaders the Cultivate Positive Relationships 

# data[].attributes.subject
3 Approaches for Leaders the Cultivate Positive Relationships 

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
3 Approaches for Leaders to Cultivate Positive Relationships

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
A recent study brings awareness to one of the top energy drains of loneliness in leadership and how leaders can overcome it by fostering high-quality relationships.

# data[].attributes.headline
10 Ways Leaders Can Improve Engagement and Wellbeing

# data[].attributes.subject
10 Ways Leaders Can Improve Engagement and Wellbeing

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
10 Ways Leaders Can Improve Engagement and Wellbeing

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Story Highlights Employee engagement and wellbeing yield additive benefits Engaged and high-wellbeing workers have higher life ratings Best practices incorporate wellbeing into engagement action planning Employee engagement has long been recognized as an important driver of employee retention and performance.

# data[].attributes.headline
The Importance of Positive Relationships in the Workplace

# data[].attributes.subject
The Importance of Positive Relationships in the Workplace

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
The workplace retains a central role in many people's lives.

With lots of people spending more time at work than on any other daily activity, it is vital that individuals within any organization feel connected and supported by peers, subordinates, and leaders.

Psychosocial hazards related to the culture within an organization, such as poor interpersonal relations and a lack of policies and practices related to respect for workers, are significant contributors to workplace stress (Stoewen, 2016).

While prolonged exposure to these psychosocial hazards is related to increased psychiatric and physiological health problems, positive social relationships among employees are how work gets done.

Whether organizations and their employees flounder or flourish largely depends on the quality of the social relationships therein.

This article will take a look at the science behind positive relationships at work and the importance of positive social interactions, and discuss some of the ways positive employee interaction can be introduced and encouraged in the workplace.

Before you continue, we thought you might like to download our three Work & Career Coaching Exercises for free. These detailed, science-based exercises will help you or your clients identify opportunities for professional growth and create a more meaningful career.

The Science Behind Positive Relationships at Work

Psychologists have long identified the desire to feel connected to others as a basic human need, and interpersonal relationships have a significant impact on our mental health, health behavior, physical health, and mortality risk (Umberson & Montez, 2010). Our physiological systems are highly responsive to positive social interactions.

Gable and Gosnell (2011) surmised that humans are endowed with separate reflexive brain networks for social thinking. Close relationships are linked to health as they build certain biological systems that may protect against the adverse effects of stress. Their research found that in response to social contact, the brain releases oxytocin, a powerful hormone linked to trustworthiness and motivation to help others in the workplace.

Dunbar and Dunbar (1998) suggested that when individuals experience social pain in the workplace from feeling isolated, for instance, the region of the brain that is activated is the same as if physical pain had been experienced.

Conversely, when relationships in the workplace are characterized by cooperation, trust, and fairness, the reward center of the brain is activated, which encourages future interactions that promote employee trust, respect, and confidence, with employees believing the best in each other and inspiring each other in their performance (Geue, 2017).

Positive social interactions at work directly affect the body's physiological processes. According to Heaphy and Dutton (2008), positive social interactions serve to bolster physiological resourcefulness by fortifying the cardiovascular, immune, and neuroendocrine systems through immediate and enduring decreases in cardiovascular reactivity, strengthened immune responses, and healthier hormonal patterns.

Put simply, when employees experience positive relationships, the body's ability to build, maintain, and repair itself is improved both in and out of the workplace.

What Are the Benefits of Social Interaction at Work?

1. Social interactions play an essential role in wellbeing, which, in turn, has a positive impact on employee engagement. Organizations with higher levels of employee engagement indicated lower business costs, improved performance outcomes, lower staff turnover and absenteeism, and fewer safety incidents (Gallup, 2015).

2. Social interaction can lead to knowledge and productivity spillover from trained to untrained workers in collaborative team settings or between senior and junior workers, particularly in low-skilled tasks and occupations (Cornelissen, 2016). For instance, Mas and Moretti (2009) found that productivity was improved when employees were assigned to work alongside faster, more knowledgeable coworkers.

3. Employees who are satisfied with the overall quality of their workplace relationships are likely to be more attached to the organization. Leaders who encourage informal interactions, such as after-hours social gatherings, can foster the development of more positive relationships and significantly influence and improve employee satisfaction (Sias, 2005).

4. A lack of social interaction in the workplace can have potentially negative consequences in relation to social support. Several studies have indicated that the sense of isolation that comes from this lack of social support is associated with a host of negative health consequences, including a higher risk of cardiovascular disease, compromised immunity, increased risk of depression, and shortened lifespan (Holt-Lunstad, Smith, Baker, Harris, & Stephenson, 2015; Cacioppo, Hawkley, Norman, & Berntson, 2011; Mushtaq, Shoib, Shah, & Mushtaq, 2014).

5. Strong within-group ties with coworkers (characterized by frequent social interactions) provide opportunities to facilitate innovative thinking. According to Wang, Fang, Qureshi, and Janssen (2015), the strong ties developed by social interactions assist innovators in the search for inspiration, sponsorship, and support within the workplace.

6. Social interactions in the workplace help to ensure everyone in a group is on the same page. According to Sias, Krone, and Jablin (2002), peer relationships (also referred to as equivalent-status relationships) represent the most common type of employee interaction.

These peer relationships exist between coworkers with no formal authority over one another and act as an important source of informational and emotional support for employees. Coworkers who possess knowledge about and an understanding of their specific workplace experience are given opportunities to feel connected and included through the sharing of information through regular social interactions.

7. Social interactions in the workplace have been found to increase self-reported positive feelings at the end of the workday (Nolan & Küpers, 2009).

8. Repeated positive social interactions cultivate greater shared experiences and the gradual development of more trusting relationships (Oh, Chung, & Labianca, 2004). When trust exists between team members, they are more likely to engage in positive, cooperative behavior, which in turn increases employee access to valuable resources.

Employees who engage in positive social interactions also tend to exhibit more altruistic behaviors by providing coworkers with help, guidance, advice, and feedback on various work-related matters (Hamilton, 2007).

9. The information collated through social interaction can help a team collectively improve its performance and the precision of its estimates (Jayles et al., 2017).

10. Social interaction and positive relationships are important for various attitudinal, wellbeing, and performance-related outcomes. Basford and Offermann (2012) found that employees in both low- and high-status positions reported higher levels of motivation when interpersonal relationships with coworkers were good.

Why Are Positive Interactions in the Workplace So Important?

As with any interpersonal relationship, those formed in the workplace reflect a varying and dynamic spectrum of quality.

At their very best, interactions can be a source of enrichment and vitality that helps and encourages individuals, groups, and organizations as a whole to thrive and flourish.

Conversely, negative workplace interactions have the potential to be a source of psychological distress, depletion, and dysfunction.

Positive social interactions are often referred to as appetitive. They are characterized by the pursuit of rewarding and desirable outcomes, while negative ones are aversive and commonly characterized by unwelcome and punishing results (Reis & Gable, 2003).

Positive interactions in the workplace have been shown to improve job satisfaction and positively influence staff turnover, as employees who experience support from colleagues are more likely to remain in an organization long term (Hodson, 2004; Moynihan & Pandey, 2008).

Furthermore, positive interactions between supportive coworkers who provide help and clarify tasks can improve an individual's understanding of their role, thus reducing job role ambiguity and workload, which, according to Chiaburu and Harrison (2008), may ultimately increase job satisfaction and organizational commitment.

Positive interactions in the workplace are marked by trust, mutual regard, and active engagement. According to Rosales (2016), interactions characterized in this way can improve employee awareness of others, foster positive emotions such as empathy and compassion, and increase the likelihood of trusting, respectful engagement between individuals.

In contrast, negative ties between two individuals at work are characterized by animosity, exclusion, or avoidance, which can cause stress and job dissatisfaction (Rosales, 2016).

This can, unsurprisingly, have a detrimental effect upon an employee's emotional wellbeing; social relations at work that are disrespectful, distrustful, and lack reciprocity are independent predictors of medically diagnosed depression (Oksanen, Kouvonen, Vahtera, Virtanen, & Kivimäki, 2010).

Employees tend to be involved in many dyadic relationships within the workplace, with individuals generally possessing both negative and positive ties. However, when individuals have more negative associations with coworkers than positive, they might experience negative moods, emotions, and other adverse outcomes such as social ostracism (Venkataramani & Dalal, 2007).

Mastroianni and Storberg-Walker (2014) indicated that wellbeing is enhanced through work interactions when those interactions are trusting, collaborative, and positive, and when employees feel valued and respected. Interactions lacking these characteristics were found to detract from wellbeing and negatively impacted sleeping and eating patterns, socializing, exercise, personal relations, careers, and energy.

With the amount of time we spend at work, it is imperative that employees feel connected and supported through positive social relationships. Seligman (2011) noted that happiness could not be achieved without social relationships, and while social relationships do not guarantee happiness, happiness does not often occur without them (Diener & Seligman, 2002).

Such connections and interactions give energy to individuals and to the organization in which they work, whereas negative relationships may deplete energy and lead to individual and corporate floundering (Ragins & Dutton, 2007).

How to Foster Employee Interaction in the Workplace

Given the organizational and personal benefits of positive workplace relationships, creating opportunities for and fostering positive social interactions should be a paramount objective for team leaders and managers.

According to the Society for Human Resource Management's 2016 Employee Job Satisfaction and Employee Report, relationships with colleagues were the number one contributor to employee engagement, with 77% of respondents listing workplace connections as a priority.

It is therefore crucial that leaders and managers determine ways to promote positive workplace relationships. In doing so, organizations are better able to adopt a more relationship-centric outlook wherein the fostering of positive employee interactions becomes a goal in and of itself. According to Geue (2017), 'elevating interactions' is a critical requirement in creating a positive work environment.

In general, maximizing engagement levels can be boiled down to two key concepts: removing barriers that limit social interaction in the workplace and creating opportunities for employees to engage with each other. These outcomes can be achieved in several ways, and while not all approaches are suitable for all organizational types, the concepts hold true.

Promote face-to-face interaction

With the advent of digital communication, we're now only ever a few clicks away from contact with virtually anyone anywhere in the world. While the internet has facilitated communication on a scale hereto unrivaled, there's a lot to be said for traditional face-to-face interaction. An email might be easier, but we lose the nuances of nonverbal cues and tone.

For traditional workplaces, consider the layout of shared working environments. Is the layout of the office conducive to employee interaction? Considering the stereotypical 'bull-pen' office environment, literally removing the barriers between employees can open doors for social interaction opportunities.

Include remote workers

What about employees who work remotely? The upward trend in telecommuting is expected to continue over the coming years, with more employees working from home (or otherwise remotely), posing fresh challenges for the relationship-centric organization.

While organizations have been keen to reap the benefits of access to a broader talent pool and reduced office overheads, remote workers pose a challenge to the relationship-centric workplace.

Where in-person interaction isn't feasible, face-to-face interaction can still be facilitated using social technology. Using video-conferencing software regularly can help to foster positive social relationships for remote workers.

Plan collaborative events

Dedicating time to specifically promoting positive social interactions in the workplace can be a powerful route to ensuring the relationship-centric approach doesn't fall by the wayside amidst organizational pressure to achieve.

Set aside time for employees to interact; focus on interests and experiences out of work to direct attention to shared interests to allow for employees to discover commonalities and relatedness.

Effectively mediate conflict

Both employees and employers require meaningful relationships with others in the workplace, and yet these needs may be impeded by counterproductive and destructive workplace practices (Bolden & Gosling, 2006).

Organizational leaders should attempt to minimize negative interactions between employees by proactively mediating and resolving differences and building a culture of open communication that fosters trust and relationship building.

Lead by example

Creating a physical environment that nurtures positive social interactions between employees is a significant first step, but to promote relationships, a good team leader, supervisor, or manager should practice what they preach.

By establishing consistent patterns of behavior that exemplify the desired culture, you can promote an emotional environment of inclusivity and positivity.

Positive psychology founding father Martin Seligman's (2011) PERMA model highlights five critical elements for mental wellbeing, which business leaders can adopt to promote a positive culture that encourages belonging.

The five elements of the PERMA model are:

1. Positive emotion

2. Engagement

3. Positive relationships

4. Meaning

5. Achievement/accomplishment

Learn how to put the PERMA model into practice here.

A Take-Home Message

The workplace is one of the few environments where people are 'forced' into relationships. By their very nature, workplace environments are made up of a blend of diverse groups of people, many of whom would have very little interest in freely meeting or socializing outside of the workplace. While a company's greatest asset is its employees, those employees do not work together harmoniously all the time.

There are, however, actions that any individual or organization can take to encourage employee interaction and develop an inclusive workplace culture. Through the promotion of positive social interactions, workplace relationships can be a source of individual and collective growth, learning, and flourishing.

We hope you enjoyed reading this article. Don't forget to download our three Work & Career Coaching Exercises for free.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
The Importance of Positive Relationships in the Workplace

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
The workplace retains a central role in many people's lives. With lots of people spending more time at work than on any other daily activity, it is vital that individuals within any organization feel connected and supported by peers, subordinates, and leaders.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Being around people who are different from us makes us more creative, diligent, and hard-working.

# data[].attributes.headline
Three Ways Mindfulness Can Make You Less Biased

# data[].attributes.subject
Three Ways Mindfulness Can Make You Less Biased

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Today, prejudice against people who don't share our race, ethnicity, gender, religion, or political persuasion is creating an atmosphere of distrust and hostility that is dividing the United States. Citizens and researchers alike are desperate to understand where these divisions come from and how to heal them.

Some answers might be found in the scientific literature on mindfulness.

For those who don't know, mindfulness is a state of being-often practiced through meditation-that involves an increased awareness of our emotions, thoughts, and surroundings, accompanied by a sense of acceptance and non-judgment. Several studies have suggested that practicing mindfulness can reduce prejudice and bias.

For example, one study found that a brief loving-kindness meditation reduced prejudice toward homeless people, while another found that a brief mindfulness training decreased unconscious bias against black people and elderly people. In a third study, by Adam Lueke and Bryan Gibson, white participants who received a brief mindfulness training demonstrated less biased behavior (not just attitudes) toward black participants in a trust game.

"We see a general trend to treat people without preconceived notions-in a more fair and balanced way-after practicing mindfulness," Lueke says.

But how does mindfulness have this impact? This is a crucial question, if we want to design activities and programs to help people bridge their differences, and to understand our own personal obstacles.

A flurry of recent studies are starting to explore this, and they support the idea that mindfulness may target prejudice indirectly, by lessening our cognitive biases-automatic, systematic errors in our thinking-in ways that impact our judgments of other people. By reducing our susceptibility to cognitive biases, mindfulness could play a role in improving social relationships in our society.

1. Mindfulness helps us see the full context for people's actions

Humans have a natural tendency to see people's actions as reflective of stable character traits rather than external factors. So if a student doesn't pass his math test, you may decide he's not good at math or lazy, rather than thinking that he didn't get a good night's sleep.

This tendency to ignore circumstances is called the correspondence bias, and it impacts how we judge people, including people of different social groups.

It's easy to see how this plays out in real life. When Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans, many white Americans assumed the residents who stayed were stubborn, rather than simply too poor to evacuate. Research also suggests that this bias plays a role in the courtroom, where juries often dismiss mitigating circumstances when assigning punishment, especially for people of color.

But mindfulness can help us fight this tendency in ourselves.

In a recent study by Tim Hopthrow and colleagues, participants were divided into three groups and given either a brief mindful eating exercise, a task that required them to pay attention to detail, or neither (serving as a control). Afterwards, the participants read an essay that was either pro- or anti-nuclear power, with the understanding that the writer hadn't chosen their position-it was assigned. They then rated how strongly they believed the writer was for or against nuclear power.

Results showed that participants in the mindfulness group were significantly less willing to equate the position taken in the writer's essay with their true beliefs than those in the other two groups. In other words, they were less likely to fall prey to the correspondence bias.

These results suggest that mindfulness could play a role in decreasing a bias that we use to pigeonhole people, which could benefit all social relationships, but particularly cross-group interactions.

When we understand that someone may be acting in a certain way because of pressures they face or situations they find themselves in-rather than personal attributes-we may be more empathic and better able to bridge misunderstandings that arise between us.

2. Mindfulness helps us decrease our negativity bias

Most of us naturally pay more attention to and react more strongly to negative events than positive events in our lives-a phenomenon called the negativity bias. This is due to our early evolutionary history, where being vigilant counted heavily for our survival.

Having a strong negativity bias can make us extra cautious about entering situations where we anticipate that something bad might happen. And research shows that interactions with people from different social groups can be stressful, in part because we worry about being rejected-a strongly negative experience for most people. For those with high negativity bias, fear of rejection is even more of a barrier.

But mindfulness can help reduce our negativity bias and consequently help us to be less wary of negative social encounters. Support for this claim comes from experiments looking at how mindfulness impacts our emotional reactivity to negative stimuli.

In one study, researchers studied how mindfulness affected participant brain activity. Participants reported on their general mindfulness levels, then briefly viewed photos that induced strong positive emotion (like photos of babies), strong negative emotion (like photos of people in pain), or neither while having their brains scanned.

More mindful participants were less reactive to negative photos and showed higher indications of positive feeling when seeing the positive photos. This was assessed via brain patterns associated with reactions to distress. According to the authors, this supports the contention that mindfulness decreases the negativity bias-something other studies support, too.

In another study, some participants in an fMRI machine were given a short mindfulness instruction-to "consciously be aware of yourself, of what happens to you at this moment," without judgment-before being told to expect photos depicting negative events, and then seeing the photos. Those who'd received mindfulness instruction showed increased activation in the prefrontal cortex of the brain and decreased activity in the amygdala-a pattern associated with less emotional reactivity-before seeing the photos and while seeing them. This suggests that even a short mindfulness teaching may help people handle anxiety-inducing experiences in a healthier way.

And that includes negative social situations. In one study, participants reported on their fear of being ostracized in social encounters, self-esteem, and mindfulness levels. The researchers found that although participants with low self-esteem had a greater fear of being rejected, being more mindful decreased those effects.

Taken together, these studies suggest that mindfulness can decrease our emotional reactivity to negative events, potentially leading to less social friction in more uncertain, anxiety-producing situations.

3. Mindfulness may help us see others as equals

Another common psychological bias is the self-positivity bias: the need to hold onto positive views of ourselves in comparison to others. This can sometimes lead us to want to put others down to make ourselves look good. The self-positivity bias is at work when we assume that our boss's critique of our workgroup's project has nothing to do with us, for example.

But in at least one study, mindfulness has been shown to decrease the self-positivity bias, suggesting another way it could be useful to our social relationships.

Here, participants received either a 15-minute talk on the benefits of mindfulness, 15 minutes of mindfulness meditation, or 15 minutes of loving-kindness meditation. Then, participants viewed photos of themselves or of strangers and had to pair the photos with either positive or negative words, depending on the instructions they were given. Self-positivity bias was measured by how easily they associated themselves with positive words and strangers with negative words.

Results showed that the people who practiced either mindfulness meditation or loving-kindness meditation showed less self-positivity bias than the group who simply learned about the benefits of mindfulness.

Though this research is still relatively preliminary, others have made the case that mindfulness helps us to keep a strong sense of self while also increasing our empathy with and care for those who are different-something you'd expect of people with low self-positivity bias. In fact, these and other benefits of mindfulness training have led some to suggest that attorneys and doctors consider mindfulness practices as part of the solution for reducing implicit biases they may have toward clients and patients.

While it's clear that mindfulness impacts our personal well-being, it's becoming clearer how it may also influence our social well-being. By reducing the correspondence bias, negativity bias, and self-positivity bias, mindfulness can help us have better relationships with others-including those who look and behave differently.

Given how defensive people can be about receiving training to reduce racism, Lueke believes teaching mindfulness in general may be particularly useful. If mindfulness training has these benefits without actually targeting bias directly, it might be more palatable than specific bias reduction programs, he says.

"If you tell people that they're prejudiced and racist, and that you're going to try to fix that, people become defensive," he says. "The fact that mindfulness is not specifically targeted toward reducing discrimination-and that it carries all these personal benefits, like less stress, greater life satisfaction, etc.-is very positive, because people won't have their guards up."

Perhaps if we want to get along better, we could do worse than starting with mindfulness. After all, what have we got to lose?

Greater Good wants to know: Do you think this article will influence your opinions or behavior?

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Three Ways Mindfulness Can Make You Less Biased

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Today, prejudice against people who don't share our race, ethnicity, gender, religion, or political persuasion is creating an atmosphere of distrust and hostility that is dividing the United States. Citizens and researchers alike are desperate to understand where these divisions come from and how to heal them.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
This article is the third in a series exploring the effects that unconscious racial biases have on the criminal justice system in the United States.
© Benjamin Brink/The Oregonian

When I was promoted to tenured full professor, the dean of my law school kindly had flowers sent to me at my home in Pacific Heights, an overpriced San Francisco neighborhood almost devoid of black residents. I opened the door to find a tall, young, African-American deliveryman who announced, "Delivery for Professor Magee." I, a petite black woman, dressed for a simple Saturday spent in my own home, reached for the flowers saying, "I am Professor Magee."

The deliveryman looked down at the order and back up at me. Apparently shaken from the hidden ground of his preconceptions, he looked at me again. Incredulous, he asked, "Are you sure?"

Let me be clear. I'll never know what exactly it was that caused the deliveryman to conclude, on seeing me, that I must not actually be the person to whom the flowers were to be delivered. I am not privy to what was going on inside his head. But it seems inescapable that his confusion had something to do with features of my social identity that had, for him, been coded instantly, if not unconsciously, as inconsistent with the identity of "professor" and "resident" of a home in an upscale neighborhood.

We are each reminded almost daily of the way that race intersects with judgment in our daily lives, leading to bad decisions and over-reactions-which in the context of criminal justice can have deadly consequences. As the story of my encounter with the black deliveryman indicates, none of us is immune: Black people may be as conditioned as anyone else by stereotypes and unconscious expectations.

Is there a solution? Research shows that mindfulness practices help us focus, give us greater control over our emotions, and increase our capacity to think clearly and act with purpose. Might mindfulness assist police and other public servants in minimizing the mistaken judgments that lead to such harms? Might they help the rest of us-professors and deliverymen alike-minimize our biases as well?

In a word, yes. The good news is that mindfulness and related practices do assist in increasing focus and raising awareness, and have been shown to assist in minimizing bias. While the research is ongoing, studies are beginning to show that mindfulness meditation and compassion practices serve as potent aids in the work of decreasing bias.

When we consider these new findings along with some of the already proven benefits of mindfulness, and combine them with teachings about contemporary forms of racism, the outlines of an effective set of new mindfulness-based interventions-for police, doctors, educators, and the full range of others-have already begun to emerge. I call these Mindfulness-Based ColorInsight Practices.

Colorblindness vs. mindfulness

It might sound counterintuitive to some, but both insight and analysis suggests that implicit bias may actually be heightened by the societal emphasis on colorblindness, a notion that dates at least to the Plessy v. Ferguson case in the late 19th century (Justice Harlan, dissenting), and played an important role in the civil rights movement of the mid-20th.

When embraced by conservatives in the late 20th century, however, it became a basis for largely shutting down effective understanding of race and its impact in our lives.

As most of us know from simple, everyday experience, none of us is actually blind to race or color. In fact, research confirms common disconnects between explicit and implicit cognition around race and color. Even if we try to act adopt a colorblind view in the world, it doesn't work because our brains don't actually work that way.

Indeed, cognitive, emotional, and behavioral dissonance results from implicit and explicit efforts to comply with social norms against recognizing race and color. Despite professing to be more or less colorblind, social psychologists have found that when confronted with a racial Other, anxieties cause us to, for example, arrange seats farther apart than we might otherwise, to over-anticipate disagreement and conflict, to avoid potentially charged topics that actually lead to enhanced understanding. Professing to be colorblind amidst all such evidence to the contrary has been deemed by some to be a new form of racism-colorblind racism.

Obviously, we need a new way of dealing with these dynamics in our lives. What, if anything, might we do to help minimize with these pervasive reactions?

How to minimize bias

Enter mindfulness. A decade of research indicates that mindfulness and compassion practices assist in raising awareness of our emotions and sensations in a given moment, regulating emotional responses and specifically reducing anxiety, increasing empathy and perspective-taking, and increasing overall gratitude and well-being. This all suggests that mindfulness and compassion practices may be important to creating the general conditions that support minimizing bias.

For example, a recent study found that compassion practice, specifically a traditional meditation known as "lovingkindness practice," increased the sense of wellbeing among students and thus led to more effective learning in a classroom environment. Further, one study suggested that even a 10-minute mindfulness practice reduced race and age bias on the Implicit Attitude Test, possibly by reducing participants' tendencies to automatically activate associations.

And where such bias may exist, studies have shown that performance may suffer. Here again, mindfulness may assist-in this case, by supporting those vulnerable to having their performance negatively impacted by the threat of confirming a stereotype during a given exercise, providing protection against this so called "stereotype threat." In another study, a mere five-minute practice session appeared to reverse the impact of stereotype threat and prevent lower performance when compared to what would have otherwise occurred to students facing such threats in a classroom environment.

Introducing "ColorInsight"

In my own work, I identify, develop and examine the efficacy of a set of practices that intentionally link inner and outer work to raise awareness about race and racial experience in our lives, with a focus on personal, interpersonal, and systemic or structural levels.

The resulting "ColorInsight Practices " combine mindfulness-based practices with teaching and learning about race and color to increase awareness of how race and color impact us all, and give rise to insight and greater understanding. They pave the way to new experiences that help us loosen our attachments to narratives and other forms of suffering that give rise to biases along the way.

By identifying and creating personal, interpersonal and systemic teachings and practices which increase and deepen experiences of interconnection across lines of real and perceived difference, Mindfulness-Based ColorInsight Practice increases our actual capacities not only for acting in less biased ways, but also for making more authentic, positive and effective cross-race relationships in these re-segregated times.

While still under construction, the approach so far combines teaching and learning about race (including whiteness), bias, privilege and historical conditions that have contributed to their ongoing operation in our lives with regular experiential practices for opening awareness and increasing capacity for new ways of being with and minimizing racism and color-related suffering. Such practices include sitting with awareness, compassion, self-compassion and lovingkindness practices, mindful communication practice, narrative practices, circle practice, vows practices, and more, some of which are described in the sidebars that accompany this piece.

Practices such as these should become a part of basic mindfulness practice for each of us, to help each of us work more effectively with others in increasingly diverse and conflict-laden environments. They create pathways-neural, emotional, and relational-to engagements that promote not merely personal, but relational and systemic changes that support real social justice.

While more research is needed, studies show that our conscious, explicit beliefs about race and color are only part of the story about how these social facts impact our everyday lives and life chances.

Fortunately, mindfulness practices actually do help in the fight against implicit bias and its capacity to cause explicit suffering in our lives. While they won't end racism, mindfulness and other contemplative practices do support ways of being in the world that reflect less of the biases that each of us holds, whether we are deliverymen, students, teachers-or men and women with badges, authorized to shoot to kill.

And that is truly good news.

Greater Good wants to know: Do you think this article will influence your opinions or behavior?

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
There might be a solution to implicit racial bias, argues Rhonda Magee: cultivating moment-to-moment awareness of thoughts, feelings, and surroundings.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
The Inner Work of Racial Justice: Healing Ourselves and Transforming Our Communities Through Mindfulness

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
The Inner Work of Racial Justice: Healing Ourselves and Transforming Our Communities Through Mindfulness [Magee, Rhonda V.] on Amazon.com. *FREE* shipping on qualifying offers. The Inner Work of Racial Justice: Healing Ourselves and Transforming Our Communities Through Mindfulness

# data[].attributes.headline
5 Ways to Lead with Emotional Intelligence – and Boost Productivity

# data[].attributes.subject
5 Ways to Lead with Emotional Intelligence – and Boost Productivity

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Employees today are much more aware of whether or not they are a good fit in their workplace culture and they want their leaders to be more mindful of their needs. In general, employees have become more sensitive about how to best co-exist in a workplace environment that allows them to be who they naturally are. Employees are tired of playing games and just want to be themselves. As such, they are managing their careers and looking to advance by searching for jobs that truly fuel their passion, fulfill their desires, and ignite their real talent. For most, today's economic landscape has made the career management journey extra challenging. And beyond career advancement opportunities, people want their supervisors and leaders to be more in touch with who they are as people (not just as their colleagues) to assure that their career track is in proper alignment with and supports their personal and professional goals.

Leaders are so focused on remaining relevant for their own personal gain that they have forgotten to be more sensitive about how to best serve their employees (the people who help give them relevancy). In the end, leaders become more valuable when they can prove to increase productivity, employee engagement and results by creating a teamwork environment that gets the best performance from everyone. This requires leaders to be strong mentors as well as sponsors who can help their colleagues better navigate workplace opportunities and catapult their careers.

Beyond the traditional leadership roles and responsibilities, today's workplace uncertainty requires leaders to be much more sensitive about what matters most to their employees. Too many leaders assume that their colleagues have the same drive to succeed and willingness to sacrifice in order to advance as they do. Everyone is different and leaders must be more mindful to embrace those differences and strategically leverage them to create and sustain unique opportunities within their departments and for the business.

The bottom line is that leaders must be more emotionally intelligent to be more effective and efficient at maximizing outcomes and desired results. Here are 5 ways to get started.
1. Care About People
Caring is a simple thing to do, but not always expressed or genuine in its delivery or tone. Leaders need to balance the head and the heart. This means that leaders can't always be so intense about what is required from their employees. Intensity requires proper timing and focus to build and keep momentum. As leaders, we need to show maturity along with our passion, and be more compassionate in order to balance what the job requires with the human spirit. Employees don't want to feel like a herd of cattle - but as people who are being appreciated for their hard work and effort. For the most part, employees don't need a boss that holds their hand; they just need to be reminded of what is expected of them. If this is done with proper tact and good heartedness, people will perform.
The recognized man appeals to the head where things are easily forgotten. The respected man captivates the heart and the heart doesn't forget. 2. Embrace Differences to Make a Big Difference Don't view differences as a melting pot, but rather as a mosaic of opportunities.
Make the extra effort to say thank you and be consistent about it. Take the time to mentor and / or sponsor employees who have earned the opportunity. Show that you care about people. This gesture is more powerful than you might think in enabling you to achieve your leadership goals and objectives.
3. Help Employees Experience Significance
We live in a world were differences in people are more apparent than ever before. People want to be authentic and appreciate those who embrace their differences. Today's leaders must be more sensitive about how to manage and leverage differences in people to assemble great teams and assign unique talents and abilities to certain situations. Be smart and look for common ground within the differences between people.
Significance is the force that changes people lives and perspectives on what matters most. 4. Be Accountable Like Everyone Else
Our differences fuel our unique perspectives and cultivate innovation and opportunity. Some might call this " diversity " - but that word has become associated with advocacy. I am not suggesting that you must advocate for one's differences - but rather, learn how to embrace and leverage those differences when people bring their unique ideas and ideals to the table. The more inclusive you are, the wider the breadth and depth of opportunities around you.
Accountability defines one's real intentions. The more accountable you are, the more you can be trusted. 5. Be Mindful of Their Needs
Leaders should not get caught up in converting their employees to be more like them - but rather in motivating employees with how the job can benefit their life, not just the bottom line. Allow your employees to appreciate and experience the human side of what success can bring to their families and life outside of work.

Today people want to feel as if they are creating an impact, that they can make a mark for themselves and those around them. Lead your employees in ways that allow them to be both successful and significant at work.

Just because you are in-charge doesn't mean that you can't be an equal. This means that as a leader you must hold yourself equally accountable and enforce the same rules of engagement that you expect from your employees. The best leaders always do - but in today's workplace this behavior must be more deliberate. Employees appreciate leaders who share their perks and privileges.. They want their leaders to be a more integrated part of the team; more available and less mysterious.

Admit when you are wrong and be transparent in how you lead others. Employees want to know that you can be trusted; revealing the areas where you can improve makes you more real and genuine. Leaders have historically played the game of authority and allowed their titles to influence the conversation and their attitudes. Be accountable, be an equal, and be trustworthy. Employees follow and support leaders who are approachable and relatable; those who will roll-up their sleeves and fight the battles with them.

If your employees are not working at or close to their capacity, then you are not doing your job as a leader. Your sensitivity radar must always be on. This means that you are equally mindful of your employees reaching their full potential as you are about yourself. Everyone has the ability to improve and increase their performance and productivity. However, improvements are a consequence of continuous feedback, recommendations and suggestions.

Be a better leader and get the most production from your employees by being more mindful of their needs. Just because the department's performance has exceeded the plan doesn't mean that each employee can't continue to grow and mature in their work.

A team is more powerful than the sum of its parts - but each part must be continually refurbished and renewed in order for the team to sustain its power.

Be more sensitive about your employees and their needs - open your eyes wider and begin to see opportunities previously unseen.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
5 Ways to Lead with Emotional Intelligence -- and Boost Productivity

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Employees today are much more aware of whether or not they are a good fit in their workplace culture and they want their leaders to be more mindful of their needs. In general, employees have become more sensitive about how to best co-exist in a workplace environment that allows them to be who they naturally are.

# data[].attributes.headline
Research Connections, Early Care and Education Teacher Well-being

# data[].attributes.subject
Research Connections, Early Care and Education Teacher Well-being

# data[].attributes.headline
In Response to Some of our Questions from Webinar #2...

# data[].attributes.subject
In Response to Some of our Questions from Webinar #2...

# data[].attributes.body
Remote Work (gallup.com)

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
6 Workplace Trends Leaders Should Watch in 2024

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
From hybrid work to restructuring, relationships between employees and employers have changed. Here are six of the most important trends leaders should watch in 2024.

# data[].attributes.headline
Stress management for leaders responding to a crisis

# data[].attributes.subject
Stress management for leaders responding to a crisis

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Stress management for leaders responding to a crisis

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
When leaders practice healthy stress management and self-care, they signal that it’s all right for others to do the same. Stress takes a toll on leaders’ decision making, sense of control, sleep, and mood.

# data[].attributes.headline
Downloading Calm: Supporting Co-Regulation in Early Childhood Leaders

# data[].attributes.subject
Downloading Calm: Supporting Co-Regulation in Early Childhood Leaders

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Downloading Calm: Supporting Co-Regulation in Early Childhood Leaders

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
A guide for early childhood administrators on using co-regulation practices to model calm, support staff emotional regulation, and strengthen team wellbeing in high-stress settings.

# data[].attributes.headline
3 proven health benefits of having a hobby

# data[].attributes.subject
3 proven health benefits of having a hobby

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
3 proven health benefits of having a hobby

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Hobbies can have significant health benefits, especially as you age. Engaging in a hobby improves your mental, cognitive and physical health.