An interactive Amity Global Alumni Forum On the theme “Psychological Safety and Emotional Intelligence: The role of Business Leaders and teams in the time of flux” was organized by Amity University. COVID-19 has been the biggest shock to the lives and livelihoods in nearly a century. Global Alumni were invited to share their knowledge, best practices, real time challenges and solutions and success stories to motivate the young budding professionals, entrepreneurs, researchers, faculty members and other participants on the theme.
Dr. Balvinder Shukla, VC, Amity University shared that due to COVID people across the globe are living through extreme uncertainties of various kinds. At such times, when employees are living through a period of extraordinary uncertainty—organizations have to take care about their physical safety, economic security, and the daily conditions in which they will be operating for the next 6, 12, 18 months or longer. One consequence is emotional disturbance characterized by rising levels of anxiety, fear, and stress among employees and teams. At the same time business leaders are confronting these challenges on an individual level, they also are responsible for supporting a wide cross-section of people and teams, all of whom have their own range of experiences, emotions, and resources for responding—and many who are paying a psychological toll that is still poorly understood by many organizations. She stressed on the need for strengthening psychological and emotional health of the teams.
Mr. Madhav Dhasmana, Director, Business Transformation - Philips, Amsterdam, Netherlands talked about psychological safety being the basic needs in the time of the pandemic. Talking about his own work, he stated that he is spending much more time at work than home and how for managers and leaders psychological safety is often not measured for them and their team. He stressed on the need for keeping the psychological safety barometer. He added that the more senior one gets in their career, their work gets less task oriented and becomes imperative to develop emotional intelligence to gauge and understand the unsaid. Mr. Dhasmana averred that it’s an interesting time to be a manager and can be used as an opportunity to get up-close & personal with their teams over just business objectives and foster deeper connections with them. He also stressed on the need to pause and reflect & analyse if things are being done in the right way and leaders can assist in fostering this mindset in their teams. He further added that professional objectives will change due to the pandemic and leaders should be open to discuss the same with their team members. With his organization being in the medical equipment business and a number of employees being on the frontline gives lot of motivation. He added that performance reviews are being done a more frequent basis along with physiological and psychological coaches being provided to ensure employee well-being.
Ms. Priya Sahni, Vice President, Barclays, London, United Kingdom stated that psychological safety is important to everyone. She averred that in reality EQ plays a major role in defining how one does their job or lives their life and not just IQ. Psychological safety is felt at home where one can be themselves, accept their faults and work better. Leaders need to create such an environment for their workers to allow them to work better and grow. It’s very important to response and then react and is an important quality to be learnt. EQ is the key in defining how one succeeds and is important to work on these skills, especially in these times.
Mr. Tanmeet Singh Gulati, Global Segment Leader-Residential and Commercial, DuPont Water solutions, DuPont, Singapore shared that in today’s time of pandemic where everyone is talking of safety, as this period is getting prolonged, it has created a psychological impact. The need for psychological safety has come up putting the onus on the leader to assume this safety, be upbeat first to put an example in front of their team. He also stressed on the need for increasing engagement with the team to sharpen their skills and look at improving their health.
Mr. Lalit Sharma, Global Innovation Manager- Foods and Nutraceuticals, Omya International, Greater Zurich, Switzerland stated that psychological safety can be achieved when there is emotional intelligence and to ensure business people safety will be achieved by psychological safety.