Minding the Empathy Trap

It’s unlikely to find someone willing to argue that empathy is not a good thing. In fact, from a professional perspective, it’s often touted as one of the most important qualities for leadership.

Leaders who can understand and connect with the experiences of others are more able to build trust, strengthen relationships, and create environments where people feel seen and valued.

Yet empathy, just like many strengths, can become problematic when it’s overused or misapplied.

An empathy trap is what happens when empathy shifts from understanding another person’s experience to instead absorbing it and then taking actions that relieve one’s own discomfort rather than supporting the other person’s growth.

This can also be an emotional pathway into overfunctioning and is where many well-intentioned leaders find themselves getting into trouble.

Carrying Instead of Caring

Most leaders have experienced some version of the following scenario:

An employee is struggling. Perhaps they are overwhelmed by a project, frustrated by a conflict with a colleague, or anxious about a new responsibility. Wanting to help, the empathetic leader steps in. They offer to take on part of the work, solve the problem, smooth the path, or maybe even shield the employee from consequences.

The immediate aftermath of these kinds of actions often feels positive because pressure decreases, the employee feels relieved, and the leader feels they have been helpful.

Until the same or a similar issue resurfaces, again … and again.

What initially was meant to be compassionate support may have ended up unintentionally hampering the employee’s opportunity to develop new skills, confidence, and resilience.

In situations like these, it can be more useful to discern when feelings of empathy begin slipping into over-identification.

A leader who is empathetic says:

“I can understand what this is like for you.”

But a leader who is over-identified says:

“I feel what you feel, and now I need to make it stop.”

The first response creates connection.

The second response often leads to rescuing.

Highly empathetic leaders seem to be particularly vulnerable to this kind of over-functioning. Because they experience others’ distress so intensely, they may feel compelled to alleviate it quickly even when that means taking burdens on themselves.  And because this kind of over-functioning is reciprocal, the consequences of such choices are not confined to a single individual or circumstance.

When leaders consistently over-function for some people, they often under-support others. So high performers may end up shouldering additional responsibilities while chronic underperformance may be unintentionally introduced and reinforced because the system adapts around it rather than addressing it. Meanwhile, beneath the surface, anxiety and resentment build. And something that began with the intention of compassion to an individual can gradually end up undermining both fairness and accountability in the greater organizational system because rather than increasing capability a dependency was created.

Leadership Core Strength

Just as our body’s core muscles help us remain upright and balanced under strain, leadership requires a similar set of internal capacities that allow us to stay present in the face of discomfort without immediately attempting to eliminate it.
These core muscles include elements that are also key to resilient leadership:

• Emotional regulation: remaining steady when others are upset.
• Tolerance for discomfort: resisting the urge to immediately remove struggle.
• Clarity of role: supporting growth rather than rescuing.
• Curiosity under pressure: asking instead of fixing.
• Healthy boundaries: avoiding the temptation to take ownership of someone else’s work.

Just like physical strength training, repetition is key to cultivating these capacities. Ultimately, the goal being not to eliminate the desire to help, but to hone and strengthen a leader’s ability to notice when the emotional impulse to rescue arises and to create space in which they can intentionally choose actions that foster growth rather than rush to comfort.

Productive Discomfort

Most of us unconsciously equate discomfort with harm. When you think about it, though, growth almost always involves some degree of discomfort.

Common professional experiences like learning a new skill, receiving feedback, navigating conflict, and taking responsibility can all be uncomfortable. Yet, all are also necessary for growth – evidence that discomfort is not necessarily a problem to solve because it is often the very condition required for development.

The leader’s role is to cultivate an environment where people can navigate challenges, build and expand their capability, while also knowing they are not alone.

To do this, leaders need to be close enough to support and influence, while remaining differentiated enough to avoid falling into the empathy trap and carrying the experience for someone else.

Choosing with Intention

Empathy traps rarely announce themselves with signage, instead they tend to just show up in the moment – perhaps as an urge to jump in and fix, or maybe as a desire to make things easier, even as a temptation to solve a problem that someone else is likely capable of solving on their own.

It is in these moments that leadership core strength is really developed.

Every time we notice the impulse to rescue and choose instead to remain curious, we can strengthen our capacity to lead more effectively.

Try this:  When you find yourself in that moment, teetering on the edge of an empathy trap, instead of immediately offering solutions or comfort, try to lean into curiosity and offer empowering questions such as:

• “What do you think the next step might be?”
• “How have you handled something similar before?”
• “What feels most challenging about this?”
• “How can I support your thinking about this?”

Asking questions can also help shift responsibility back where it belongs while still communicating care and support.

A particularly useful phrase is:  “I’m here to think it through with you, not solve it for you.”

Wrap-Up

It is often far easier, in the moment, to just step in and solve. Doing so can create a sense of quick relief and can even make us feel effective, but rescuing weakens individuals and systems over time.

Leadership is not simply about solving problems. It is about developing the capacity of others to solve them.

So, the next time you find yourself in that moment of choice between offering comfort or challenge, remember:

• The goal is not to be the most helpful person in the room.
• The goal is to create a room where more people become capable.

EileenWiediger, Certified Resilient Leadership Coach

Eileen is an ICF-certified coach who empowers individuals at all levels to navigate the dynamic journey from self-awareness to self-transcendence. She has worked as a strategist, instructional designer, and facilitator solving complex problems and creating systems for learning and growth. You can reach her at: https://www.linkedin.com/in/a-eileen-wiediger/ or through her website: https://www.steeproad.com.

The Patterns That Persist

Imagine someone who never moved on from the worst day of their life. She still wears the dress from that day.
The table is still set.
The once white cake, now yellowed beneath layers of cobwebs, still sits where it was left.

Time moved forward. She didn’t.

Charles Dickens, in his book Great Expectations, gave her a name: Miss Havisham. It’s easy to believe that only extreme characters live so visibly in the grip of their past.
But most of us are shaped by old experiences, inherited habits, and unfinished stories in ways we are frequently unaware of. The difference is that we tend to carry the lingering remnants of our past within rather than wearing them for everyone to see.

Whenever you walk into the office (or anywhere), you’re not walking in alone.
Neither is anyone else.

Influence from the Past

The echoes of the past still sound beneath present-day interactions, shaping our reactions and responses.

For years, professional culture encouraged striving for a kind of emotional separation: leave your personal life at home and bring your professional self to work.  The problem with that line of thinking is human beings don’t actually function like that.

Wherever we go, so go our experiences. So the question becomes not whether our personal past influences us. The question is whether we recognize how it influences us.

Seeing the Patterns in Ourselves

The first task is to become aware of the legacies we carry and learn to identify the ways they show up in our thoughts, reactions, and relationships.  Keeping in mind that not all patterns are problems waiting to be solved.

Many of our tendencies developed for good reasons and may have served us well. Think about how the person who learned to anticipate needs as a coping strategy may become highly empathetic and attentive. The individual who grew up taking responsibility early may become dependable and capable under pressure. Or someone who learned to carefully read the emotional environment may become perceptive and relationally skilled.

The challenge is that strengths developed in one context can become limitations in another.

To recognize these patterns in ourselves, we need to tune in to how experiences impact our behaviors: how we respond under pressure, cope with conflict, seek approval, avoid vulnerability, or attempt to maintain control.  These habits of response are often subtle, typically show up indirectly in recurrent reactions rather than through dramatic disclosures.

Key indicators that an underlying historical dynamic – whether helpful or limiting – might be at work are repetitive thoughts or emotional responses.

Try this:

Be on the look-out for self-talk or ways of responding that feel overly familiar, that give you a sense of déjà vu. When they show up, pause and get curious:

• “Where have I experienced this before?”
• “At what other times has this story shown up?”
• “Where did this come from?”
• “Is this serving me or limiting me in this circumstance?”

Noticing Patterns in Others

Recognizing these patterns in ourselves first can help us respond differently to others. The goal is not to psychoanalyze colleagues or to rationalize their behavior, but to heighten our awareness in a way that creates space for curiosity rather than rushing to an assumption or snap judgment.
Sometimes what we experience as difficult behavior in others may actually be an overextension of one of their strengths.

• The highly dependable employee may struggle to delegate.
• The deeply empathetic leader may overfunction for others.
• The person who values harmony may avoid necessary conflict.
• The independent colleague may resist asking for help.

Often, the very qualities that contribute to someone’s effectiveness can become constraining when they are applied automatically rather than intentionally.

Try this:

The next time a colleague’s behavior irritates or confuses you, see if you can slow your own response and replace judgment or frustration with curiosity:

• What need, concern, or strength might be operating beneath the surface?
• What assumptions am I making?
• What assumptions might my colleague be making?
• What else might explain what I’m observing?

Recognizing Organizational Legacies

Not all the patterns we fall into are personal. Some are cultural, organizational, or collective.
When I worked in the corporate world, we had a phrase for getting caught up in these kinds of group dynamics: going native.  Over time, people gradually absorbed the norms, assumptions, and relational habits of the systems around them. Without consciously realizing it, their own reactions and behaviors shifted to align with the culture around them.

We don’t just bring the heritage of our past experiences and family systems into work; work systems can shape us too.

A fundamental concept of Resilient Leadership is that every organization is comprised of both a rational and an emotional system.  Like an iceberg, the rational system (strategy, structure, goals) is what is easily observed above the water line. Beneath it lies the emotional system, where these inherited patterns lurk and operate, largely hidden from awareness.

The challenge is that although not clearly visible, these emotional legacies are remarkably persistent.  Leadership changes, restructures happen, people come and go; yet these underlying and unseen patterns often remain intact.

It is a rare organization that takes the time to explore the details of its emotional system inheritance. In fact, looking to the past in this way is often dismissed as being a waste of time at best and a problematic re-invigorating of old grievances at worst. Yet without this background, organizations can remain stuck in entrenched patterns they aren’t aware of and don’t fully understand.
Fortunately, even when these dynamics aren’t openly discussed, they can be observed because patterns leave clues.

Try this:

Organizational legacies often reveal themselves through repeated stories, assumptions, or familiar phrases. Learn to listen for clues such as:

• “That’s just how things work around here.”
• “We tried that before.”
• “We’ve never … “
• “People around here always …”

Then ask yourself:

• What belief or history might sit beneath this?
• What strengths has this created?
• What limitations might it also create?
• How might this be explored and illuminated?

What We Carry Forward

Resilient Leadership isn’t about becoming perfectly self-aware or emotionally detached, nor is it about erasing organizational or personal pasts and experiences.  It’s about developing the ability to notice and get curious about the invisible influences that impact us and the systems we operate in.

Miss Havisham lived in and wore her past for everyone to see.  Most of us do not.  Yet our histories still show up in ourselves, in our relationships, and in the organizations we build.

Awareness creates choice and the possibility of carrying forward those inheritances that serve us well while releasing what does not.

EileenWiediger, Certified Resilient Leadership Coach

Eileen is an ICF-certified coach who empowers individuals at all levels to navigate the dynamic journey from self-awareness to self-transcendence. She has worked as a strategist, instructional designer, and facilitator solving complex problems and creating systems for learning and growth. You can reach her at: https://www.linkedin.com/in/a-eileen-wiediger/ or through her website: https://www.steeproad.com.

Transforming Triangles

After spending over two hours with a technical expert to troubleshoot issues with my cell phone, I ended up driving home with no resolution and a factory-reset phone that I would have to manually restore.

On my silent, disconnected drive home without navigation or tunes – the reset having rendered the phone unable to connect with CarPlay – I could feel annoyance and frustration rising.

Still fuming, I opened the door to my house … to be met by my toy fox terrier, Tugboat.

He didn’t ask what happened. He didn’t try to fix it. He didn’t take a side. Instead, he just bounded toward me, acting like my return home was the most important event of his day.  Within a few moments, I noticed the tight coil of stress begin to loosen. My shoulders relaxed and I even found myself smiling as he insisted on a greeting that required me to step out of my rumination and into the moment.

Nothing about the situation with my phone had changed. But something in me had.

In that moment, Tugboat became the third point in a triangle I didn’t even realize I had entered – a triangle between me and a frustrating experience with a technician that had begun to consume my attention and elevate my stress. Without intention or technique, he did what healthy triangles do best: he absorbed none of my tension, amplified none of my frustration, and yet somehow, he helped dissipate both.

He didn’t pull me further into the problem. He helped me step out of it just enough to regain perspective.

We often talk about triangles as something to avoid.  But what if the real skill isn’t avoiding them, but figuring out how we can make them beneficial and productive when find ourselves in one?

The reality is, a triangle is not inherently toxic; it is, in fact, a structure that regulates stress by offering a pathway to offload and defuse difficult situations.  When tension between two people rises to a level that is beyond what they can navigate, there is often a natural inclination to recruit a third person, which can create stability.  In essence, triangulation is a signal that the system is attempting to regulate itself when under pressure.

The problem isn’t that leaders get pulled into triangles, the problem is that most leaders don’t know how to lead from within one.

Toxic vs Transformative Triangles

In unhealthy triangles, stress becomes fuel for dysfunction.  Instead of creating stability, they further anxiety and stress due to reactive thinking and behavior, which is often driven by old feelings and automatic actions/reactions.  Anxiety travels around the triangle, due to reactivity, moving from one person, to the other, to the next; frequently creating even more triangles in response.  These dysfunctional triangles foster anxious and more reactive systems.

Healthy triangles can be transformative as stress becomes fuel for growth.  They foster calmer and less reactive systems and are characterized by clear thinking and thoughtful, intentional behaviors among those involved.

Three Steps to Shift from a Toxic to Transformative Triangle

1.Take in (not take sides)

• Receive the stress without absorbing the narrative as truth.
  • “I hear this is frustrating, help me understand what matters most here.”

2.Transform (not transmit)

• Shift the energy from reactivity to reflection.
  • Slow it down
  • Notice and name patterns
  • Distinguish facts from interpretation

3.Transfer back (with intention)

• The triangle is not the end point; think of it as a staging ground.
  • “What would it look like to share this directly with this person in a way that moves things forward?”

• Toxic triangles trap energy
• Healthy triangles process and return it

Wrapping it Up

Triangles don’t disappear as systems mature, but they can become more conscious and act as positive catalysts for redistributing systemic anxiety.  The goal for leaders is not to avoid or step out of triangles, but to practice stepping into them and participating differently – using their presence to shift from toxic to transformative.

EileenWiediger, Certified Resilient Leadership Coach

Eileen is an ICF-certified coach who empowers individuals at all levels to navigate the dynamic journey from self-awareness to self-transcendence. She has worked as a strategist, instructional designer, and facilitator solving complex problems and creating systems for learning and growth. You can reach her at: https://www.linkedin.com/in/a-eileen-wiediger/ or through her website: https://www.steeproad.com.

Balancing the Seesaw: Overfunctioning, Underfunctioning, and the Work In Between

Overfunctioning and underfunctioning, forms of anxiety-driven reactivity, are a frequent topic in Resilient Leadership coaching. They exist in a reciprocal dynamic, like a seesaw: when one appears, it is almost always enabling the other somewhere else in the system.

Yet what many struggle with most is a subtler form of overfunctioning. It often goes undetected because it doesn’t show up in the usual, observable ways. Although their calendars may look manageable, their task lists entirely reasonable they still experience a kind of lingering mental exhaustion, that rest doesn’t resolve. Some of my clients have described it as something feeling just slightly too heavy, a weight they can’t shift.

This type of overfunctioning isn’t rooted in what they’re doing, but in what they’re feeling responsible for.

Different Kinds of Overfunctioning
When most people hear the word “overfunctioning,” they think of things that are observable and quantifiable like too many tasks, too many hours, or a workload that has exceeded capacity. But below that visible and more observable layer, lies emotional overfunctioning that comes from feeling responsible for outcomes, feelings, and situations that belong to someone else. Things like worrying about another colleague’s performance on a new project or a team member’s low morale you feel personally accountable for lifting.

These are not the types of things that show up on a calendar or a to-do list, but they carry weight nonetheless. Oddly enough, the solution to this kind of emotional overfunctioning isn’t to do less. It’s to feel less responsible for what was never yours to own.

The Camouflage Problem
One reason this kind of overfunctioning can be hard to discern is that it rarely announces itself as overwork or stress. Instead, it can show up dressed as conscientiousness or as caring. The very qualities many of us may have been rewarded for, which makes them genuinely difficult to examine with any sense of critical distance.

This feeling of responsibility, particularly for leaders, can be so seamlessly integrated into a sense of professional identity that questioning it can feel like questioning who you are. And so the overfunctioning goes unchecked, keeping up a sort of low-grade vigilance that runs in the background even during the hours when you’re supposed to be off.

This is anxiety doing what anxiety does best; generating the illusion that our worry and our readiness to step in is what’s keeping things from going wrong.

Seeing the Seesaw
Like a seesaw, every system – whether a team, a family, an organization – seeks a kind of equilibrium. When one person consistently carries more than their share of emotional or functional weight, the system adjusts. Someone, somewhere, carries less in response. It happens, usually unconsciously, through the ordinary gravitational pull of repeated patterns.  The more reliably you step in, the less necessary it becomes for others to step up. Not because they’re lazy or unaware, but because the system has found its balance although it’s perhaps not a particularly healthy one.

And this is where systems thinking becomes so valuable, because the reciprocal dynamic doesn’t always show up in the most obvious place. It may not be the person you’re overfunctioning for who begins to underfunction. The imbalance can ripple elsewhere; into your own capacity to lead in other areas, into relationships where you’re no longer as present, even into the parts of yourself that have gone unattended while you were busy managing everyone else’s portion of the world.

All of this means the act of balancing the seesaw is never just personal. When you take your hands off something that wasn’t yours to hold, you are doing something for the system, not just for yourself. You are creating the conditions for someone else to discover that they too are competent and capable, which may be something that your steady presence in the gap has been unintentionally hindering.

A Practice of Feeling Less Responsible
If the problem lives in the emotional world, the practices need to meet it there and that means starting with awareness before moving to action.

Notice what responsibility actually feels like in your body. Emotional overfunctioning can have physical signatures such as low-grade tension, a particular kind of alertness that doesn’t switch off, or a heaviness that settles in around certain people or situations. Getting familiar with that felt sense is the first step toward recognizing it earlier.

Get curious about the story underneath the feeling. When you notice yourself feeling responsible for someone else’s outcome, it’s worth asking: what do I believe will happen if I don’t step in? The fear is usually specific, even if it’s rarely examined. And when it is examined, it often turns out to be less inevitable (and less yours to prevent) than underlying anxiety has been insisting.

Practice distinguishing concern from ownership. Concern for someone is relational and healthy; it keeps us connected and present. Ownership of their outcomes is something different because it assumes their results are primarily ours to produce or prevent. The difference can be subtle, but learning to feel it is one of the more useful things a leader can develop.
Experiment with staying in the room without picking up the rope. The behavioral experiment that corresponds to this inner work is simply this: the next time you feel the urge to step in, pause. Don’t suppress the impulse; just notice it, name what you’re feeling responsible for, and wait. See what happens. More often than not, the system responds and someone else steps forward. The crisis doesn’t materialize. Or if it does, it turns out to be workable and informative for everyone involved, not just you.

Trust the reciprocal nature of the system. This may be the hardest practice of all, because it requires tolerating the uncertainty of not knowing exactly how things will unfold when you stop managing them. But the seesaw truly does rebalance. Adjusting your functioning, most especially your emotional functioning, is where you have choice and influence. You don’t have to orchestrate the outcome on the other end.

Closing Thoughts
There is a meaningful difference between being deeply committed to the people and work around you and feeling personally accountable for others’ performance and outcomes. The first is leadership. The second is exhaustion, albeit often cloaked in a very convincing costume.

The invitation here is to get curious about your own overfunctioning not by not just looking at what’s on the calendar or the to-do list, but by reflecting on what shows up in your inner experience. Consider where you might be carrying an emotional sense of responsibility for others that was never meant for you to carry.  And what might become possible, not only for you but for others on your team or in your organization, if you were to choose to put it down.

📞 Curious about how cultivating conviction can strengthen your leadership? Call, click, or email us today to start the conversation.
EileenWiediger, Certified Resilient Leadership Coach

EileenWiediger, Certified Resilient Leadership Coach

Eileen is an ICF-certified coach who empowers individuals at all levels to navigate the dynamic journey from self-awareness to self-transcendence. She has worked as a strategist, instructional designer, and facilitator solving complex problems and creating systems for learning and growth. You can reach her at: https://www.linkedin.com/in/a-eileen-wiediger/ or through her website: https://www.steeproad.com.

Cultivating & Calibrating Connection

Watching Alysa Liu perform her Olympic free skate, which earned her a gold medal, I noticed something beyond her technical brilliance. The arena was electric, the audience’s response was overwhelming – just watching from my couch, far from Milan, I felt caught up in the excitement and enthusiasm.

Alysa was visibly in a relationship with the cheering crowd, but at no point did she appear to be swept away by the high energy surging all around her. She was connected to her audience, but not enmeshed or engulfed. She was focused on her performance, but not remote or isolated.

And it struck me that this is what a healthy connection looks like in leadership: responsive, energized, and still self-possessed. At its worst, conviction can harden. When it’s overplayed, it can shift into rigidity, forcefulness, or stubborn attachment to plans and ideas that no longer serve. When conviction becomes immovable, it can shut down dialogue and foster a culture of compliance rather than engagement.

Challenges of Connection

In an era where there are oh-so-many ways to stay connected, it might be hard to see how connection could be a problem – unless, of course, the Wi-Fi network goes down and civilization collapses before lunch. And yet, despite these myriad communication options, I find that connection is one of the most frequent sources of strain in both my coaching practice and my personal experience.

“I wish everyone would just leave me alone so I can focus on getting things done!”

“I feel like I’m out of the loop, no one is talking to me, and I’m in the dark about what is going on!”

Both frustrations point to either end of the same tension. Staying connected, one of the core principles of Resilient Leadership, seems straightforward. Surely, this is the easy one! Yet as statements like these illustrate, the connection between human beings is not simplistic because in every relationship we are navigating a paradox: the need for closeness and belonging contrasted with an equal and opposing need for autonomy and individuality. Thus, connection is never just about access; it’s really about balance.

Calibrating Connection

Most of us have a default leaning toward one side or the other, which is not a limitation on capacity, but a preference based on comfort. The more we are aware of that tendency, the more flexibly we can adjust when circumstances or the needs of others require something different from us – adjustment being the operative word here. Connection is not something you can just set and forget, it’s a living calibration. Needs shift, contexts change, pressures rise and fall; and leaders, especially, must keep re-tuning their position on this continuum of connection so they are able to be close enough to influence, yet distant enough to lead.

Complicating matters further, research indicates that when anxiety is thrown into the equation it can push us toward the extremes of connection. Under stress, those who prefer closeness may over-attach or over-involve themselves, while those who prefer greater independence may withdraw or go silent. In times of uncertainty, the risk is not disconnection, it’s imbalance. Conscious and intentional connection is not just helpful, but essential.

Because this balance is dynamic, not static, it can be helpful to approach connection as an ongoing practice rather than a personality trait. The goal isn’t to become more distant or more available by default, it’s to become more responsive to the ever-shifting dynamics around us.

Attending to Connection

As with so many things in life, cultivating healthy connections begins with awareness. Responsiveness is only effective when there is clear seeing of the situation, the other person, and your own internal state. When that clarity is missing, what looks like a connection can slide into entanglement or withdrawal.

A practical place to start is noticing indicators that signal imbalance. These may show up in your own behavior, in others, or in the broader organizational climate. Think of them as early-warning lights on the dashboard; they aren’t judgments, rather, they are opportunities to recalibrate.

Indicators of Over-Closeness (Enmeshment)

Too much closeness can often blur boundaries and impede leadership perspective. It can look like:

• Taking sides rather than staying curious
• Over-identifying with another’s discomfort or problems to the point that your own effectiveness drops
• Difficulty distinguishing your responsibilities from those that belong to others
• Feeling compelled to fix, rescue, or absorb problems
• Discomfort when not included, consulted, or in close contact
• Loss of decision neutrality
• Difficulty identifying and maintaining boundaries

Indicators of Over-Distance (Disconnection)

Too much distance reduces trust, the flow of information, and the ability to influence. It can look like:

• Physical or relational unavailability (closed doors, delayed responses, hard to reach)
• Withholding information or limiting transparency
• Visible disengagement or “checking out” in meetings or conversations
• Deflecting responsibility or defaulting to blame
• Minimal curiosity about others’ perspectives
• Reduced collaboration or increased siloing

There is no fixed “correct” setting for connection, so the goal is not to land permanently at some imaginary static midpoint between closeness and distance. Connection in leadership is, by necessity, dynamic and shaped by context and the needs of the moment. The real work lies in maintaining awareness so that any drifts are noticed and being flexible enough to adjust. When you can stay genuinely connected without losing your own center, you are creating conditions for resilience in yourself and in the system around you.

📞 Curious about how cultivating conviction can strengthen your leadership? Call, click, or email us today to start the conversation.
EileenWiediger, Certified Resilient Leadership Coach

EileenWiediger, Certified Resilient Leadership Coach

Eileen is an ICF-certified coach who empowers individuals at all levels to navigate the dynamic journey from self-awareness to self-transcendence. She has worked as a strategist, instructional designer, and facilitator solving complex problems and creating systems for learning and growth. You can reach her at: https://www.linkedin.com/in/a-eileen-wiediger/ or through her website: https://www.steeproad.com.

Standing Steady: How to Lead with Conviction

Lead with conviction. It’s a simple phrase, but it requires deep practice.

At its best, leadership conviction shows up as clarity, courage, and a willingness to take action even when outcomes are uncertain and criticism is possible.  It invites leaders to take a stand and to move forward without waiting for perfect conditions.

At its worst, conviction can harden.  When it’s overplayed, it can shift into rigidity, forcefulness, or stubborn attachment to plans and ideas that no longer serve.  When conviction becomes immovable, it can shut down dialogue and create a culture of compliance instead of engagement.

Resilient leadership asks for something subtler: conviction that is steady without being brittle.

Conviction Is Not Certainty

There is a common myth that conviction requires certainty.  In reality, leaders are often asked to carry forward initiatives, changes, or decisions without having access to all the information themselves.  They are also expected to inspire confidence and invite commitment while navigating ambiguity in real time.

So what does conviction look like when you don’t have all the answers?

In these moments, conviction sounds less like “I know this will work” and more like “I am willing to stand behind this, learn from it, and adjust with integrity.”  Conviction is not about being right. It’s about being responsible.

It means holding your values steady while remaining open to challenge and new information.  From this perspective, conviction becomes:

• A commitment to values rather than guaranteed outcomes
• A willingness to act without certainty
• The courage to stay engaged when resistance arises and the future feels unclear

Conviction is not reactive perseverance.  It’s the capacity to continue forward without abandoning reflection, humility, or discernment.

Internal Alignment, Not External Agreement

Conviction does not require agreement.

Leaders may also find themselves responsible for implementing decisions they did not shape or perhaps even fully endorse.  Agreement refers to alignment with a specific policy or strategy.  Conviction, by contrast, is about alignment in how you choose to lead people through what must be done.

This kind of conviction signals to others:

• What you stand for (fairness, transparency, care, respect)
• How you will show up for your team, even within constraints you didn’t choose

Rather than “standing your ground,” conviction in this light becomes a practice of:

• Creating coherence amid complexity
• Offering steadiness when others feel unsettled

When conviction shifts from “this is what I agree with” to “this is what you can count on from me,” it becomes an ethical stance; a marker of leadership maturity.

Conviction Check

To keep conviction grounded in your daily leadership practice, consider checking in with yourself by reflecting regularly on these questions:

• What am I being asked to carry right now?
• Which of my values are non-negotiable in how I carry it?
• Where might I be confusing agreement with integrity—or rigidity with strength?

Closing Reflection

Leading with conviction is less about digging in your heels and more about standing steady.   It is the quiet strength that allows leaders to move forward without false certainty, to lead without full agreement, and to remain anchored in what matters most even as circumstances and conditions may change.

Conviction in leadership is something others can feel.  And in times of uncertainty, offering that sense of steadiness may be one of the most resilient leadership practices of all.

📞 Curious how leading with conviction could strengthen your leadership? Call, click, or email us today to start the conversation.

EileenWiediger, Certified Resilient Leadership Coach

Eileen is an ICF-certified coach who empowers individuals at all levels to navigate the dynamic journey from self-awareness to self-transcendence. She has worked as a strategist, instructional designer, and facilitator solving complex problems and creating systems for learning and growth. You can reach her at: https://www.linkedin.com/in/a-eileen-wiediger/ or through her website: https://www.steeproad.com.

Lowering the Voltage: What Dogs, Vets, and Leaders Know About Anxiety

One of the most memorable concepts in Resilient Leadership is that of being a step-down transformer: cultivating the capacity to remain less anxious than those around you so that emotional intensity can diminish rather than escalate.

Clients often tell me this is the idea they reach for first in moments of strain – at work, at home, and everywhere in between.

My introduction to this concept didn’t come from Resilient Leadership, however. I first learned about it many years ago … from my veterinarian.

Anxiety is Contagious for Humans and Non-Humans

Our household was already home to three lively terrier mixes when a friend sent us a photo of a small dog found wandering the streets of Baltimore with a broken leg. It only took one look and we knew our pack was expanding. Within days, we welcomed Rudy to his new home with us.
We were prepared for the usual disruption that comes with adding a new dog. What we weren’t prepared for was the extent of Rudy’s anxiety. We didn’t know how long he’d been on the streets, what he’d endured, or even how his leg had been injured. What was clear was that his nervous system was perpetually on high alert.

Rudy whined. He paced. He startled easily.
And over time, I did too.

I threw myself into problem-solving mode. I researched. I worried. I monitored every sound and movement. My own frustration and concern intensified, and something else became clear: the other three dogs were growing more anxious as well. Tension, it turns out, is remarkably contagious.

Our longtime veterinarian offered thoughtful recommendations and although each helped a little, none solved the problem.

Identifying My Role in the Problem

On a phone call with the vet, I said in exasperation, “I’m at the end of my rope. What else can we do?”

There was a pause on the other end of the line.
Then he said, “You need to have a glass of wine.”
I laughed, assuming he had to be joking.
He wasn’t.

He explained that my anxiety about Rudy was amplifying his anxiety, which in turn was rippling through the rest of the pack. Dogs, like people, are exquisitely attuned to the emotional field around them. Until I could find a way to lower my own level of agitation, the system would remain unsettled.

In other words: I wasn’t just in the system.
I was setting the tone for it.

This is the essence of being a step-down transformer. It’s not about suppressing emotion, or fixing others, or pretending everything is fine. It’s about regulating yourself well enough that you don’t unknowingly escalate the stress that is already present. When one person can hold steadiness, especially when that is someone with relational or positional influence, it creates space for others to find a calmer space too.

Cultivating Step-Down Transformer Presence

Cultivating a step-down transformer presence is deceptively simple, but quietly powerful:

1. The first step is to really tune into the dynamics and energy around you – whether in the office, at home, or elsewhere. Notice also the body language, tone of voice, and other indicators that might signal stress and anxiety are heightened.
2. Next, pay close attention to where you might be matching (or exceeding) the anxiety of the people around you.
3. Finally, experiment with practices to find what helps you to become just a little calmer than the current level. It might be taking a moment to pause and just breathe. Or, when feasible, perhaps it’s taking a walk. It could be something as simple as taking a moment to savor the fragrance of a cup of tea or enjoying the view of blue sky through a window. And as you’re experimenting, become aware of which tactics are most helpful in downshifting your own feelings of stress.

You may discover, as I did, that your calmness does far more work than your cleverness ever could. And if that calm happens to begin with a metaphorical (or literal) glass of wine… well, leadership shows up in many forms.

📞 Curious how understanding triangles could strengthen your leadership? Call, click, or email us today to start the conversation.

EileenWiediger, Certified Resilient Leadership Coach

Eileen is an ICF-certified coach who empowers individuals at all levels to navigate the dynamic journey from self-awareness to self-transcendence. She has worked as a strategist, instructional designer, and facilitator solving complex problems and creating systems for learning and growth. You can reach her at: https://www.linkedin.com/in/a-eileen-wiediger/ or through her website: https://www.steeproad.com.