Working Healthy: Speakers Excellence Interviews Dr. Walter Kromm
The subtitle of your latest book reads: Why the consequences of poor leadership cannot be healed by a doctor. What is the core idea behind this statement? The core idea is that health in a company has very little to do with medicine and a lot with the quality of human interaction! How can a doctor say something like that? Well, my biography has always allowed me to be active in the world of medicine and in the world of companies. Health has many facets and depends on many factors. I have experienced and know from my own studies that an atmosphere where one feels good and where one is eager to contribute with their talents is particularly healthy! Healthy for the company and healthy for the people who work there. How important is organizational culture? When people feel connected to something, they want to maintain it. This means that they want to contribute to common goals because they see meaning in it. How can connectedness be established? I have been pondering this question for a long time. Today, my answer is: People feel connected when they have a good feeling. What creates a good feeling? It feels good to be appreciated for what one achieves. It feels good to be addressed on an equal footing. It feels good to know that one receives support and can trust. It feels good to be able to shape things in connection with others and to be asked for one's opinion on important decisions. Is this good feeling healthy? Oh yes! Perhaps even the healthiest of all. These good feelings provide strength and resilience. They are, so to speak, resistance resources against high stress. Your SHAPE study deals with the question: How can people stay healthy despite diverse demands? What are the key findings of this study? High stress in the workplace is not inherently pathogenic. Together with the necessary resilience resources, it can even contribute to health. What is crucial for companies today? Work is social interaction! More than ever, the ability to grow together and stay healthy together counts! What role should leaders play in this? If there were such a thing as a secret to good leadership, it would be the ability to create a social interaction field where engagement, creativity, and productivity can thrive. If successful, demanding tasks can be tackled, and everyone stays healthy together. So, the key to a "healthy company" lies with the leaders? Not only. The key to how healthy and productive a company is lies with all the people working together in the company! Why are successful interactions becoming increasingly important for companies? Companies face the challenge that a significant part of their business activities are based on the resource of knowledge and resulting creative processes. These creative processes do not arise from knowledge out there in the network but from people who can apply this knowledge in exchange with others. Creative processes usually occur when something comes together that was not together before. The exchange or mixing of individually acquired insights and experiences is thus the basic innovation for future successes. What should a forward-thinking "Corporate Health Management" look like? First and foremost, one should let go of the notion that a company can become healthier by doing something "healthy". If the atmosphere in the company is poor, even activities resembling a "health resort" are of little help! A company should be healthy in terms of its strength in the market! This is best achieved with healthy employees who have a strong emotional attachment to the company and a high quality of presence. What does the quality of presence mean? Well, employees should not only not be sick, but those who are present should also be productive. When is presence productive? In my experience, it is productive when people working together engage in exchange processes. Exchange of knowledge and exchange of empowering resources, such as the aforementioned good feelings. This sparks the desire to contribute. How important is the team? Very important! Even the best doctor in the world could not contribute nearly as much to the team's health as the team itself could. It is crucial that relationship building succeeds. Only then will these empowering and creative exchange processes be set in motion. What are the health challenges for leaders? If leaders have the competence to organize the atmosphere in their team as described above, it will also be beneficial for their own health. However, having the competence to lead others is not enough! It also requires competence in one's own affairs. Regarding time, leisure, love, and mindfulness, many people no longer realize - in my experience - that these are essential prerequisites for being able to deal responsibly and meaningfully with oneself and with other people. Most people who have something like burnout see themselves as victims of circumstances. However, upon closer inspection, it becomes apparent that they unconsciously burn themselves out through their thoughts, feelings, and behaviors. What is unconscious, we cannot know at first. My task as a doctor is to help people recognize these patterns. What is the essence of your experiences in supporting companies? We know that the health, engagement, and productivity of employees are relevant resources for companies. Where it is successful to reliably influence this valuable asset, the companies are also "healthy"! There are still many potentials within companies, as everyone can do more than they think! How can one "reliably influence this valuable asset"? That is the most important question! Essentially, everyone knows what I have said above. But why is it so easy to ignore the benefits of successful interactions daily and why is it so difficult to achieve them? Through thought experiments in various companies, I have found that people in the company can be sensitized to this. If it is possible to recognize the barriers that prevent successful interactions, employees become aware of what is really important and what matters. I am currently writing a book about this. When will it be ready? I plan to present it at the Wissensforum in Stuttgart on October 14, 2016. Working successfully together and staying healthy!
