363: How to Lead with Optimism and Resilience in the Workplace with Michelle Gielan

Allyship in Action

In this episode, positive psychology researcher Michelle Gielan explains the distinction between fleeting optimism and 'resilient optimism,'

Key takeaways

Resilient optimism is defined as a realistic assessment of the present coupled with the belief that one's behavior matters.
High levels of work optimism are associated with being three times more likely to be engaged and five times less likely to burn out.
A study at Frost Bank found that highly optimistic individuals experience seven times higher levels of financial wellbeing.
The 'closet optimist' phenomenon reveals that 31% of people hold an optimistic mindset but do not express it, which can weaken workplace culture.
Research involving Arianna Huffington showed that pairing negative news with potential solutions improves creative problem-solving by 20%.

Main topics

Resilient Optimism vs. Traditional Optimism
Workplace Performance and ROI
Managing Closet Optimists

Notable quotes

Resilient optimism is built upon a set of behaviors that help keep your brain positive, hopeful, and optimistic when the first plan fails.

Conclusion

The episode provides listeners with concrete, behavior-based tools to

Transcript preview

Speaker 2 (0:00) We have with us Michelle Geelan, who is a positive psychology researcher, bestselling author of Broadcasting Happiness. She has a new book out, Resilient Optimism. And she was an executive producer of PBS's The Happiness Advantage. She was on CBS Morning News as an anchor. Her research on optimism and resilience has been featured on The Today Show, Washington Post, Harvard Business Review, New York Times, a tons more. And a little side note, if Michelle's work sounds familiar to you, she's actually married to a fellow happiness researcher, Sean Acor. So that was a fun thing I found out when reading the book. Sean's work's been... really impactful for me over the years. And so I'm so excited, Michelle, to have you on the show. Thanks. I'm so thrilled to be here. Thanks for having me. Of course. Of course. Well, tell us about resilient optimism. Does it go together? Is it, what's the relationship between these two, like resilience, optimism? How does it work? Speaker 1 (1:02) Yeah. So traditional optimism is basically an expectation of good things to happen. And resilient optimism is optimism that stays strong when it's tested. So the difference is that it's not this fleeting feeling of, I think I can do this or everything's going to be okay. But instead... Resilient optimism is built upon a set of behaviors that help keep your brain positive, hopeful, and optimistic when the first plan fails or things don't work out or change keeps coming or you're exhausted. The reason I love this is that sometimes we don't feel optimistic in the midst of big challenges that we're experiencing. Meanwhile, behaviors are always accessible to us and sometimes you can behave optimistically and then hopefully the feeling will follow as well. Uh, it tricked my Speaker 2 (1:49) students and, uh, I teach leadership and undergraduate at Indiana university. And, uh, Speaker 1 (1:55) we Speaker 2 (1:55) just did this exercise with our students. Like you can absolutely behave. Even if your attitude is different, you can trick your brain by behaving in a way we have them like stand up and say, yay, it's kind of a silly exercise and sit down and like, everyone's smiling. Like everybody, the mood is totally different in the room. just because of the behavior. So to your point, Michelle, like even if you're not feeling it, you can still lean into it. And that's the resilience piece. Yeah. Speaker 1 (2:20) Yeah. Speaker 2 (2:21) Very cool. You know, as I was reading your book, I was thinking about my Speaker 1 (2:27) childhood. My Speaker 2 (2:29) mom got like, she's an amazing single mom and, you know, just talk about resilience, like had a lot of tests that a lot of single parents wrestle with. And one of the things that she would say is, I'm not a pessimist. I am a realist. And I was just so curious, Michelle, on your take on that. Speaker 1 (2:51) Yeah. So I've heard all kinds of definitions about optimism. And then I've heard this comment. I'm not an optimist or pessimist. I'm a realist. I know what's going on. So first let's level set optimism. Cause I think that's a really important thing. So you mentioned my husband, Sean, Sean Acor. He's very, very funny. If you've seen his Ted talk 12 minutes, you laugh the entire time, right? The unicorn. Speaker 2 (3:12) I mean, how could you forget about the unicorn? I know. Listeners, you got to watch it. Speaker 1 (3:15) I know. Speaker 1 (3:18) And so I always love his stories when he comes home from talks. You know, he has like fun stories. And so he comes home one time, he says, you won't believe what happened. I said, what is it? He said, so I give this talk on the power of optimism at this company. And the CEO loved the research, wanted to talk to him about it. So he asked him, you know, I can give you a ride to the airport and we can. talk about it in the car and how we'll use it in my organization. So Sean says, sure, that sounds great. He gets in the guy's car, clicks on a seatbelt and the CEO gets in and doesn't put on a seatbelt. So after a while, the seatbelt bell's going off. And again, Sean, very funny, thinks he's making a joke, turns to CEO and says, oh, so you don't wear seatbelts? The guy's like, nah, man, I saw your talk. I'm an optimist. It's like, no, you're not. Speaker 1 (4:00) cars from hitting us or reality from negatively affecting us. So what we talk here about in the research that I've been doing now for 15 years is rational optimism. It's taking a realistic assessment of the present moment while maintaining the belief that our behavior matters, especially in the face of challenges. And so optimists, the idea here is that they clearly see reality. They just believe that the setback is just the start of the story. Meanwhile, pessimists, either consciously or sometimes unconsciously, they don't necessarily expect good things to happen. They don't necessarily believe their behavior matters. And so they're less likely to engage in those positive behaviors that help them create a positive outcome. So technically from the definitions, when people are saying, oh, I'm a realist, what they're trying to say is I see reality clearly. And that's wonderful. That's being rational about reality. The question is, what are we doing from here? So that's where I think the optimism becomes really interesting and especially resilient optimism because you can engage in those behaviors, move your brain forward, help it see hope, possibility, progress that you've already made, and most important, that next meaningful action step that you can take. Okay. Okay. So now that we have a good level set of resilience, Speaker 2 (5:23) optimism, and what it is and what it isn't, it's not about being reckless. Speaker 1 (5:32) Resilient optimists, they put on their seatbelt and then they ask, what can we do next? Exactly. Speaker 2 (5:37) Exactly. They don't expect for a car wreck, but they're also prepared for the reality of that possibility. What I think about this is interesting for the workplace. I do a lot of teaching on the importance of attitudes and job satisfaction and employee engagement. And what I love about your research is with resilient optimism. So people that scored high in work optimism are three times more likely to be highly engaged and five times more likely, less likely rather to burn out. Speaker 1 (6:08) So Speaker 2 (6:09) there's some real like. financial outcomes and job performance indicators that come out of this feeling of optimism. Tell me more about that