Page 111 - Appreciative Leadership

84 Appreciative Leadership

Professor of Positive Psychology Barbara Fredrickson deter-

mined, through her research, that humans flourish when they are in
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an environment of positive emotions. She found that people who
are surrounded by positive emotions such as hope, joy, optimism,
love, confidence, trust, and happiness have a greater openness and

broader capacity to learn and grow from new experiences. She calls
this her “broaden-and-build theory of positive emotions.” It makes
sense. When we feel safe, we are open to new possibilities. On the
other hand, she also found that when people are surrounded by nega-
tive emotions such as anger, fear, scarcity, criticism, and blame, their

“fi ght-or-flight” tendencies go into gear and they become defensive
and unable to listen, learn, or see new options for action.

More specifically Fredrickson’s research shows that much of
what leaders try to create in organizations today such as collabora-
tion, achievement, and innovation requires positive emotions such as
compassion, love, perseverance, and play at work. Our research folds
directly into hers. The people we spoke with want leadership that cares

about them, creates a safe environment for learning, and uses power
to make a positive difference in the world. They want to live and work

in a positive emotional environment.

The best way to ensure a positive emotional environment is to man-
age the ratio of positive to negative conversations in your organization.
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Members of successful teams, organizations, and even couples talk
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three to five times more positively, hopefully, and appreciatively about

their group and its members as they do negatively. The ratio of fi ve pos-
itive conversations for every one negative conversation seems to be the
determining factor for a positive emotional environment. Leaders who
are critical, or who foster critique and problem solving as “the way of
doing things,” unintentionally tilt the emotional environment of their
organization toward the negative. In doing do, they are stifl ing creativ-
ity and high performance. In contrast, leaders who put forth vocabu-
laries of strengths, capabilities, hopes, and dreams, those who are gen-

erous with affirmation and illuminate the best in people and situations
(even when they are not always at their best), create positive emotional
environments that nurture innovation and high performance.