Erik Flegal
Alright, we are on. Thank you all for joining us for this edition of Thought and Action. We’re very pleased to have Mary Jo Romeo. She is an executive coach with MJR Coaching and Consulting joining us. We’re going to be talking about wellness, I think is a topic especially in 2020 is super pertinent. She’s got some great insight. She’s got 20 years of experience leading teams as an executive. She also is a business owner and entrepreneur, and she’s a very consultant from the standpoint of she’s very outcome-based. So this isn’t you know, let’s have long engagements and see how long we can make this last. She’s all about getting to the point.
And as a New Yorker, the other fellow New Yorkers will know exactly what I’m talking about, but it’s a great attribute for what she’s doing. So I want to dig into a question that she’s probably seen with all of her clients this year – wellness. It’s in every single question and engagement that you have. So let’s start broadly, as an executive coach, take me through the role that wellness has played when you’re talking to your clients in 2020.
Mary Jo Romeo-Pappas
First of all, thanks for having me, Erik. I’m really happy to be here I just love chatting with you. So we’re gonna have a good time today. The clients come to me for two reasons. Either they want to get better – a better leader, get promoted – or they’re in pain.
And they’re in pain because they work in a toxic environment. And they don’t know whether they’re going to stay or they’re going to leave. They’re in between jobs and they don’t know what direction to take. There are a zillion reasons to go to a coach.
Everything in life literally goes back to who we are and how we feel about ourselves. And I like to think about wellness, as your head impacts your body and your body impacts your head. How you think about the situation that you’re in. Let’s say you’re in a toxic environment. How you think about it is really important because that’s impacting your head. The story you’re telling yourself in your head, right? A toxic environment could also impact your body. How many times you’re physically feeling sick before going to work. Wellness is tied really into everything that we do. And as you said, with COVID, it’s really hard because everything is up in the air.
It’s such a hot topic. It’s written about constantly in the press right now wellness. Wall Street Journal had a really good article in today’s edition called, “The One Thing you can Control Right Now is Yourself.” Right, which is a great point because you can’t control COVID. You can’t control whether you’re going to even get COVID or your loved ones are going to get COVID. So there are a limit on things that you can control and one of those things is wellness.
What does wellness mean? How you eat. What you’re putting into your body. How about whether you’re moving or whether you’re sleeping well? All of those things you can control, you should be controlling. And then in terms of your head, so many articles say, “watch what news you’re taking in.” So, many of my clients have said to me, Mary Jo, I made a shift. I’m healthier today.” Why? Because they stopped watching the news, which is a terribly sad thing to say. But you have to be careful with all that toxicity going into your system. It’s going to impact you. When I think about wellness, I always think about airlines and that famous line – put the mask on yourself before you put it on your child. You have to take care of yourself before you take care of your employees or your team or your family. Wellness is everything. It really is your own health. And I also like to challenge clients by asking “What are you doing differently during COVID from a wellness perspective?”
Erik Flegal
Such a good point. Do you have any like hard and fast rules? Are there any kind of specific things that you that people should focus on from a wellness perspective? Moderating news input is a great example. Eating better – another one. Do you have a top-five list?
Mary Jo Romeo-Pappas
Well, I could probably give you 10. But I’ll go for the one really important thing that is proven is meditation or mindfulness. Meditation is hugely important. It’s going through this amazing spike right now in terms of growth and it’s so easy to access.
Erik Flegal
Is there an app for that?
Mary Jo Romeo-Pappas
Of course, there’s a zillion apps! I use Insight Timer. I meditate every morning for at least 10 minutes. Calm is another app. Another one is HeadSpace. Mindfulness and meditation are not the same things, meditation gives you mindfulness. Mindfulness is a sense of being present in the moment. If you meditate, you will become more mindful. So #1 is Mindfulness. #2 has also been documented, write a gratitude journal, it doesn’t have to War and Peace, a sentence a day. Oprah, many years ago, had a gratitude journal, gratitude journal and she kept it for years. Then she stopped doing it for whatever reason. Fast-forward two or three years. she’s got more money, she’s got more fame, she’s got more of everything, and she’s miserable. She realizes she has stopped really thinking about what she was grateful for. So a gratitude journal is really useful. Faith is really useful if that’s your thing, it’s my thing. My faith is critically important to keeping me grounded and knowing that there’s something greater than myself. Another thing, obviously, is exercise. Everyday. Another one is sleep. I have a bi-weekly newsletter, and last week it was on sleep. Go to bed the same time every night, try to wake up the same time every morning. Sleep is huge.
You know, consistency with all these things, creating tiny habits. There’s a lot that’s being written right now about the importance of habits and that just gets you that consistency. Exercise is great, but if you only do it once a week, it’s not so good.
Erik Flegal
So would you think that like in this COVID world, the shift of being in an office as opposed to being remote breaks up that consistency. Is that the biggest hit on wellness? Where do you see COVID really impacting wellness the most right now?
Mary Jo Romeo-Pappas
It’s so different for different people. If you’re dealing with a person who used to go to the office and is social, their main struggle is not having that connection with people. From a professional standpoint, it’s brutally hard. And Zoom, like we’re doing now; although it’s an amazing technology, it’s not the same. There are nuances that are missed. The human touch, not being able to shake hands, not being able to hug people that you care about. I think it’s a big lack. Those are the professional things.
But then you get into all of the mountains of problems with personal things. For example, maybe you have a senior living in a nursing home. To me what’s happening there is just brutal. Or you have your child who’s seven years old and going to school being homeschooled right now. Not homeschool, but living off of a video camera. I mean a video teaching, it’s very hard, and explaining to your kiddo that you can’t go see your grandmother. I think the constrictions on humanity are really, really hard right now. But then on the other side, when you talk about COVID and business, it’s what about all those people that lost their jobs or can’t work or have left work or who are furloughed. That’s a whole other thing. And so I’m grateful that I have my coaching practice because I’m able to partner with clients from around the country. I’m using Zoom, I’ve always used Zoom technology. So this is nothing new for me because I’ve always had clients all over the place. But I’m grateful to have that because there are so many people really suffering right now.
Erik Flegal
Let’s start with the harder nut to crack – the ones that are out of a job. Controlling what you can control. Things that are free and simple, things like sleeping, meditating, things like that. What other kind of tactics are available for people that are really trying to find hope and wellness? What kind of strategies can they employ, you know, job or not, to have a better go on a day-to-day basis?
Mary Jo Romeo-Pappas
Well, one of the other things we’ve talked about this in the past, is being a lifelong learner. Having a growth mindset versus a fixed mindset. There’s so much information out there. Take a class if you’re not feeling good. Coursera has a great course on happiness. Just to take the class, it’s free. You do it on video on your own time. Use this time to improve yourself and improve the lives of others. If you are unemployed right now – learn. See what you can do for yourself and your community. What are some things that you can do? That kind of stuff is huge because that’s automatically going to release that feeling of giving back satisfaction. It’s a bit like the gratitude journal, it gives the same reaction inside your body. When we get stuck, we’re living in fear. So wellness is – how do I get out of fear?
Erik Flegal
Right.
Mary Jo Romeo-Pappas
And we get out of fear by getting out of the story in our head. “I’m a loser. I don’t have a job. COVID is ramping. I can’t go out.” All that negativity is really dangerous, really bad for you.
Erik Flegal
So interesting. I was listening to a podcast three months ago and they were talking about how this is the time to try something new. People will forgive you in the midst of all of this going on if it doesn’t work out. If you try something totally off the wall, because it’s this time of transition, this is the time to do it. Have you seen people out of a job or any transition say, “I’m going to try something out of left field just because I can!” Do you have any stories like that?
Mary Jo Romeo-Pappas
I’ve had clients where their companies have pivoted, which I think is very cool. Very exciting and in terms of clients that have pivoted. I have clients that have pivoted, but not during COVID. My clients right now are all really focused on just getting better at whatever they’re doing. I coach a lot of senior leaders who just want to be better leaders and want to figure out how to navigate their teams. There’s a lot around messaging and things like that.
Erik Flegal
Are they trying new things? Give me an example of that someone who was always the hard-nosed boss or the nice guy or whatever. Give me a story of someone who’s pivoted with regards to COVID and turned it into a real positive doing something they may have been uncomfortable with.
Mary Jo Romeo-Pappas
It’s simple. It’s as simple as communication because they’re being forced outside of their comfort zone in the first place because they’re on Zoom. So what can we do that’s fun? One of my clients had people bring their dogs on zoom. Now we could all share each other. He’s a very straight-down-the-middle boss that would normally never do that. But it pushed him to say let’s have some fun here. Every meeting now has an element of humor. Humor is great. It relaxes you, it lets down your filters. It opens up your mind to learning just by doing silly things like that, I loved that. And the other thing we haven’t talked about specifically is being flexible. That concept of not being so hard. And you just said it when you talked about people changing careers or doing something completely different. Flexibility in this environment, being adaptable, being a little resilient is really, really important. Because it pulls you out of yourself.
Erik Flegal
That’s a good point because I’m hearing the flexibility, work environment, things like that. But let’s just say you’re working in an environment that is not healthy. It’s very toxic, stress is there and revenues are down. You’re worried you’re on the chopping block every day. In those situations, what can someone do?
Mary Jo Romeo-Pappas
I have a couple of clients in that space right now. One client is in a really, really toxic situation her boss is terrible. But she doesn’t want to leave because she’s making good money, and then we came up with tactics for her to get her power back.
Erik Flegal
Okay, what do you mean by power? Like what does that phrase mean?
Mary Jo Romeo-Pappas
She was allowing him, because we all make choices, to make her miserable. She was allowing him to get her physically sick. She was allowing him to make her feel bad about herself. So once she decided that she wanted to stay, the tactics were very specific. As you mentioned earlier, I’m a New Yorker at heart, very direct and the tactics were specific. They were outcome-based. But one thing was she did was put how much money she made on a sticky note right next to her computer. She knew, “I got to live for that because that’s what I need to do for my family right now.” She came up with some pet phrases that every time he would call, she would use them so she could just like “La la la, la la” and not even listen to them. She just came up with very specific tactics. She stayed, and in terms of getting her power back, she realized I have the power here. I’m staying by choice. Nobody’s making me stay here. Well, she started to figure out how to navigate him. Work on her business, keep her head down, and she will leave, she has an action plan to leave. But she’s doing it on her terms. I have another client in New York who had a target on her back. And anybody who’s ever had a target on their back knows it’s a miserable, miserable feeling. It’s really hard to function.
Erik Flegal
A target in terms of what’s creating it, people wanting her out? COVID? Management being cut?
Mary Jo Romeo-Pappas
Yes, yes, and yes. Due to Covid, business was down, they wanted to do a haircut on the staff. She was pretty senior. She wasn’t their kind of person. You know, a lot of times it’s “you’re gonna go or I’m gonna go.” She was that level. And when through coaching, she realized she had options again – control, power, choice. And she ended up having a conversation with HR and asked what happens if we part as friends and she ended up getting six months, which having been at the company for two and a half years, it’s not a bad gig. She got six months, she has interviews with other companies already lined up. Or she might just like to pivot and do something with her family business. Choices, choices. So whenever you’re in a toxic situation – and COVID is bringing out the worst in some managers – I think it’s bringing out the best in some people as well. And whenever that happens, just think, you have a choice. You can make some changes in yourself, or you can make some changes in your situation.
Erik Flegal
So what I’m hearing you talk a lot about is so much of it sounds like mindset, like that mindfulness. And I heard you tell the story about Oprah. And these lists of items we can do, it’s very simple. It’s very straightforward, but it feels like a lot of people can get into the habit of it, and then almost fall out of that habit. It’s something you really have to stay plugged into. Do you see a lot of people that come into coaching with you doing these tactics or do you see this something as, “Hey, ya know we can all do this, we all should do this like this is kind of our baseline we should start at and work up from.”
Mary Jo Romeo-Pappas
Two things. I do it every day. I do yoga for 30 minutes, gratitude journal, pray and meditate every day takes me an hour and a half. It’s my time. It is to the point where if I don’t do it, which I’ve not missed a day since COVID started March 19. But if I don’t I can feel it during the day, I need that time.
Erik Flegal
How long does it take to build that habit? I hear a lot of people say that. I’m at that point too, but there was definitely a point like before I started exercising where I would be the opposite, I would be like, “I do not want to exercise.” For people who don’t necessarily have these habits in place, and it feels like more of a chore doing it. Like it feels good when you’re done, but I want to get to the point where these actions pull me in. How long does that shift take for those people?
Mary Jo Romeo-Pappas
I don’t know. I really don’t know. I think of it as a gift I give myself. I would guess just practically, you probably have an opinion about this if you work out every day or a certain amount of times every week. It’s probably like two or three weeks. Again, we all make choices. These are habits. This is something you get up and you decide, “I’m going to keep a gratitude journal. I’m going to force myself to do it every day for two weeks and see if it sticks.” But you can see the difference. I was talking to a coach colleague, and I said, “I love your energy. You’re such a good listener and you’re so open.” And she said, “That’s because I meditate.” But there’s there’s definitely a correlation. But to your point, none of these are brain surgery. This is written about all over the place. People are going to choose to do it or they’re not. I have many clients who choose not to. And I have many clients I simply ask, “How much do you want to get better? How much do you want to be that lifelong learner? How open are you? How open are you to change? How flexible are you?” You know, we make choices. There are a lot of people Erik, who are quite happy in their own stuff. Truly miserable. They’re not ideal clients for me, you know I’m outcome-based. If you are miserable and you want to stop being miserable? Great, let’s work together. And miserable is really a good example, I’m much more business-focused. I’m not a life coach.
Erik Flegal
I know what you mean. I think when you when you talk about lifelong learning, you know, meditating, sleep, faith, exercise, a gratitude journal…some of those I do, some of those I don’t do. And the idea of like plugging a couple of things in and just creating a baseline. For example, say a career transition is something I got to do and I can’t figure it out, the ability to have those things in place to say like, “Okay, that’s my self-care and I’m taking care of myself.” But I still kind of need that extra push, that’s where then I can engage you or someone to help with tactics or strategies. Starting with that baseline in place in COVID, I think is really valuable regardless of where you at – job, no job, transition, no transition, holding on for dear life, thriving. Doing those things can only help.
Mary Jo Romeo-Pappas
It’s just practice, and you will get better and better at it over time. I have a few clients that I worked with, and they talked like they wanted to get better, and then they stopped working with me because they really don’t. They really don’t want to change jobs. People complain about their jobs, but they really don’t want to do the work. Being a lifelong learner requires energy. Developing healthy wellness habits requires energy. It requires commitment.
Erik Flegal
So take it easy on yourself as you grow. What if you’re a company leader and personally do these things, but really want to influence their employees. How can they steer the culture boat away from the negativity and more towards positivity? What kind of tactics can they use to get on board to do that?
Mary Jo Romeo-Pappas
I’m a big believer of assessments. So the first thing I would do is do a team assessment. And get a sense of where they are on the team where the team is together. One of the assessments I like is a whole-brain assessment. And some people fall in one bucket and other people fall in another and you want a team that’s a whole brain. So you find out if there was this very interesting research done, where the CEO is hiring people just like himself, or herself. And there’s no diversity on the team. That’s not a whole brain. That’s a gap. Or the other, that’s the NBI, another assessment I like to do with groups is Strengths Finder or Clifton strengths. Because you see and appreciate what my strengths are and what your strengths are and we learn the language, we understand each other a little bit better. You see what our themes are, there’s ways that you can do that. I’m doing a lot of it, you know, I do a lot of work in communication. And a lot of it is around communication, people having that inability to communicate. And this Zoom, although it’s fabulous, is an inhibitor to communication.
I read something yesterday about if you want to have a more emotional, heartfelt conversation, go on zoom. But if you want to talk to somebody and you don’t really feel authentic about it, use the phone. I think it’s interesting. The example they gave in the article was if someone in your company gets promoted, and you don’t really feel great about it, but you want to be polite and appropriate, call them up on the phone. And that the lowest level of communication is email. So this what we’re doing now the sight, sound, emotion of Zoom, or any video conferencing. Technology is great. It’s a great way to communicate but it doesn’t feed our humans.
Erik Flegal
I’m struggling with it myself because everything I used to do is lunches, events, and seeing people face to face. Now I can’t take someone from one side of the room and introduce them to someone on the other side of the room. People just aren’t excited to jump on a Zoom call to meet people because it doesn’t have that same authentic bend to it. So, we’re relegated to this for now. But, like you said, it’s still better than a phone call and we can do things like this and memorialize our thoughts and have it look like a dialogue which is fun. But still, I can’t wait to have lunch with you and you know three other people again and introduce, and kind of get back to pre-COVID norms. Give me some last thoughts as we wrap up. Things to consider, anything we haven’t touched on that you think people really need to know about?
Mary Jo Romeo-Pappas
What sticks out to me is this concept of choice. Wellness is a choice. Yes, your physical and mental health is a choice. And if you’re in a tough situation, work with somebody. If you’re in a real mental health issue, work with a therapist or psychologist to get the help you need. Work with a doctor. If you are struggling with a toxic environment or things like that, and a coach will work with you – great! Take care of yourself physically and mentally. It’s your decision.
Erik Flegal
Do you think most people don’t because they’ve never experienced it? What do you think the main resistance points do? I think you made a really good point, a lot of times the clients I work with, it can be something as simple as refinancing your house, you just don’t know you can refinance it. And so you start thinking, there’s a solution to almost every problem. And these are adult problems. My ten-year-old son has no idea when it comes to refinancing a house, he doesn’t even know what a mortgage is. That’s a kid problem. As an adult, we do have these problems where we have a job, we’ve climbed the corporate ladder, we’ve done well. And now we’re in this role where I might be a little out of my league, or this ship has come and I don’t know how to deal with it. Why do people resist help and change?
Mary Jo Romeo-Pappas
I have no idea. But I think that there are some people that are very comfortable in their zone. And that’s the story. What I love about coaching is it’s outcome-based for me. It’s working with people who are here and want to go there. They want to get hired, they want to improve whether it is their leadership style or their communication style, or their career, or they want to get to a better place from a career transition standpoint. Whatever it is, they want to improve business growth. They’re driven to do that and they’re willing to invest in themselves. They’re giving themselves the gift of a coaching partner to get better. There are resources out there for anything. You know, Google can tell you anything you want to know. But it’s acting on it, it’s doing the work that makes a difference. And coaching is great because you end up with this accountability partner, whether you want it or not.
Erik Flegal
I love that it’s a choice. The fact that it is a choice. And you’re going to be there and help people make the right choice, I’m going to push you in that direction. Kind, of course, correcting you a little bit because these are your movers, You just want to make sure you’re moving in the right direction.
Mary Jo Romeo-Pappas
I give clients homework after every session. Nothing like giving a 40-year-old guy homework! He’s like, “What!” It’s great. And that’s how you get better – by doing the work. It’s about doing the work.
Erik Flegal
Lifelong learners and choice. I love it. Well, we’re up on time. But I do very much appreciate your time, I mean I wrote down a bunch of notes. I love lists in general. I’m a sucker for like, top 10, top three, top five. So I love this list. Thank you for that.