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{"id":25529,"date":"2023-08-29T11:52:17","date_gmt":"2023-08-29T06:22:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thecorporatemagazine.com\/?p=25529"},"modified":"2023-10-14T09:45:25","modified_gmt":"2023-10-14T04:15:25","slug":"leading-with-empathy-accountability-resilience-laura-bolger","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thecorporatemagazine.com\/leading-with-empathy-accountability-resilience-laura-bolger\/","title":{"rendered":"Leading with Empathy, Accountability, Resilience | Laura Bolger"},"content":{"rendered":"\t\t

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Leading with Empathy, Accountability, Resilience | Laura Bolger<\/h1>\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
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Laura Bolger<\/h2>\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
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Managing Director of Investigations & Intelligence<\/h2>\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
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Harvard Business School Professor Amy Edmondson has found that a \u201cpsychologically safe work environment\u201d \u2013 an environment in which teams feel free \u201cto take risks, to express their ideas and concerns, [ask] questions, and to admit mistakes\u2026 without fear of negative consequences\u201d \u2013 promotes team engagement and motivation.<\/p>
Simply, a culture of constant improvement starts with empathy; employees must feel that their perspectives are heard and understood by their managers. Under this paradigm, mistakes are not met with admonishment, but encouragement \u2013 they are necessary steps toward improvement. Empathetic instruction emphasizes potential, and that potential motivates employees to greater heights.<\/p>
Laura Bolger, Managing Director of Investigations & Intelligence, Polaris Corporate Risk Management, lives by this approach. \u201cCulture is often seen as corollary to a workplace\u2019s activity,\u201d Laura notes, \u201cor as a by-product of your workflow, business goals, and performance standards. I disagree: in my experience, how you do the work is as important as the end product itself.\u201d<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t
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Laura has found that the best leaders \u201cmodel empathy, accountability, resilience,\u201d and that high standards of quality follow naturally.\u201d<\/p>
While her approach has improved outcomes for Polaris\u2019 clients, Laura\u2019s commitment to this ethos is personal, as well as professional. Her philosophy is the product of two \u2013 seemingly contradictory \u2013 early life experiences: her parents\u2019 experiences leading an off-Broadway theatre company, and her time playing competitive soccer. \u201cThese experiences exposed me to different models of leadership,\u201d explains Laura. \u201cI spent countless childhood weekends at my parents\u2019 rehearsals and performances. I had a front-row seat to their craft and talent \u2013 and to their discipline. I don\u2019t remember the sets or costumes as much as I remember their command over the many logistical challenges of staging a show.\u201d<\/p>
Even as a child, Laura respected how this careful alchemy of decisions could manifest something beyond the capacity of any individual contributor. The experience lent Laura a unique eye for leadership strategy \u2013 a skill that followed her to college, where she competed on several high-level soccer teams. \u201cI heard parents shout criticisms from the bleachers, and saw how they affected players\u2019 psychologies. I was lucky that my sideline support \u2013 my father, a former collegiate athlete \u2013 understood the pressure I was facing,\u201d she says. \u201cRather than criticizing my technique, my father related to me, telling me stories of his own time as a college athlete, and the mistakes he made. He didn\u2019t list my faults, but reminded me of my ambitions. There was no criticism \u2013 only encouragement.\u201d<\/p>
These lessons informed Laura\u2019s current leadership at Polaris. \u201cOn a personal level,\u201d she notes, \u201cleading with empathy feels intuitive and straightforward \u2013 even clich\u00e9. So many workplaces claim to do the same, though with varying degrees of success and sincerity. But my approach is based on research like Professor Edmondson\u2019s, as well as compassion.\u201d While Laura acknowledges that an employee\u2019s psychological safety does not guarantee their success, she contends that an empathetic approach helps them progress. \u201cEmpathy,\u201d says Laura, \u201censures reliable improvement. I want employees to imagine the quality of work they could be achieving in time, once they\u2019ve refined their abilities. That can\u2019t happen if they linger on past mistakes.\u201d<\/p>
But what do you do when an employee does grow overwhelmed? At Polaris \u2013 where employees are constantly managing high-pressure projects \u2013 it\u2019s easy to get discouraged. Laura understands this feeling \u2013 both professionally and personally. \u201cAs a mother,\u201d says Laura, \u201cit\u2019s easy to feel like you\u2019re always a step behind.\u201d Just as Laura\u2019s parents informed her initial leadership, Laura\u2019s current approach is informed by her status as a working mom \u2013 though Laura emphasizes that \u201call moms, full-time job or not, are working moms.\u201d All moms, says Laura, \u201care experts at balancing and addressing many needs at once. The key is to celebrate progress whenever you can.\u201d By emphasizing progression \u2013 and not binary, point-in-time assessments of success \u2013 Laura flips the script on traditional narratives of corporate achievement. \u201cInstead of asking \u2018What did I get done?\u2019\u201d says Laura, \u201cyou can ask yourself, \u2018What did I move forward? What did I progress?\u2019 The reality is that there will always be more to do \u2013 but that also means that there\u2019s always somewhere to start.\u201d<\/p>
At Polaris, the team\u2019s immediate success starts with Laura, and how she holds herself accountable. \u201cAs a manager, I owe my team proactive and effective communication,\u201d says Laura. Clarity is central to her role, as she defines each project\u2019s precise, unique scope of work. This scope dictates Polaris\u2019 searches, schedule, and form. \u201cAny ambiguity trickles down,\u201d Laura explains. \u201cIf I don\u2019t fulfill my responsibilities, my team won\u2019t have the understanding or flexibility they need to address a client\u2019s request.\u201d Early transparency helps Laura articulate a client\u2019s needs to her team \u2013 likely during their weekly team meetings, which offer Laura space to personally address her team\u2019s current stresses, looming deadlines, and project concerns, as well as beneficial investigative strategies. \u201cIt is my responsibility to make sure that my team is supported as they balance their workload,\u201d Laura says, \u201cI need be accountable; to do everything I can to set them up for success.\u201d<\/p>
\u201cAccountability also demands reliability,\u201d says Laura. \u201cTeam members should be able to rely on each other \u2013 and me \u2013 for consistent, dependable support. Every report is a product of collaboration, and successful partnerships require transparency, communication, and diligence.\u201d This is most evident in Polaris\u2019 robust quality control process, in which employees review a colleague\u2019s work in detail prior to delivery. The reviewer corrects clarity issues and cross-checks supporting documents to resolve questions, make suggestions, and streamline reports. While this process helps deliver consistently high-quality reporting, Laura\u2019s primary motivation for instituting this process was to ensure that each team member is accountable for the others \u2013 herself included.<\/p>
The process of drafting, progressing, fact-checking, and delivering Polaris reports can feel exhaustive and exhausting. To prevent burnout and frustration, Laura promotes resilience \u2013 at the individual level, and across whole teams. Teams must be equipped to sustain questions, criticisms, and strategy changes. If, for example, an employee fear they\u2019ll miss a deadline, it\u2019s up to Laura to plot a more efficient, resilient solution. \u201cAs a team leader, I see the concerns of our employees as an opportunity to demonstrate our flexibility and adaptability,\u201d says Laura. \u201cWe have a team of diverse perspectives that \u2013 with the right workflow \u2013 can meet any challenge. I encourage candid dialogue because I trust my team to rearrange itself for any challenge,\u201d she adds.<\/p>
\u201cAt Polaris,\u201d says Laura, \u201cthe quality of each employees\u2019 work product is equal to the support that they receive.\u201d By centering empathy, transparency, and resilience, Laura and her team can always find a path forward \u2013 however complex a project might be.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t Next<\/span>Delivering Change that Sustains | Sarah-Mae Amde<\/span><\/span>