The Depressive Leader.

I don’t know precisely how I generate the energy to work on the days I am depressed, never mind fulfil entirely my role as a senior leader, whilst meeting the needs of my employer, my team and my customer, but somehow, I do.

An old friend and former colleague who is a HR professional and has a sound understanding of business psychology, suggested I write an entry which explores what it is like to be a depressive at work. A brilliant idea, I thought, but I’ve found myself really struggling to articulate what it is actually like and I’ve reached the conclusion that this is because my depression has played a key role in the career success I have enjoyed.

I am not ashamed to admit that the majority of career opportunities awarded to me have been as a result of both dumb luck and being in the right place, at the right time. Depression has also contributed enormously to the person (in a professional capacity) I am today. The stigma associated with ill-mental health often drives employers and bosses to associate depressives with long bouts of absence, acrimonious relations with colleagues and generally being too difficult to manage.

It is of course the case that during a serious depressive episode, one can find it near impossible to source the impetus required to do a full day’s work, although in my experience this is extremely rare. And yes, during a depression or spells of mania, one can find oneself engaging in fractious confrontation from time to time, again though, I can count the number of occasions this has happened to me on one hand.

The taboo that has anchored itself to depression has made it all too difficult to recognise just how productive, creative and effective depressives in the workplace can actually be.  It is not an exaggeration to state that some of the most notable leadership figures in history have themselves been depressives:

Sir Winston Churchill – a man most Brits view as being the greatest Prime Minister of all time, suffered from bipolar disorder

Marie Curie – a lady who pioneered the study of radioactivity, suffered from crippling anxiety and depression

Martin Luther King JR – a revolutionary leader of the civil rights movement, attempted suicide twice before his assassination

Florence Nightingale – discovered modern nursing, whilst suffering from bipolar and PTSD

Abraham Lincoln – 16^th U.S President and widely regarded as history’s greatest leader of the free world, he was a depressive and a severe alcoholic

‘What makes you bad, makes you better’ is a phrase quite pertinent where depression is concerned, particularly in relation to its impact on one’s ability to perform well in the workplace. If I were to sum up why depressives can make brilliant leaders in just three words, I’d say: creativity; empathy; resilience.

You don’t need to read too far back into the history books to see some pretty stark examples of this.

Resilience

Take the late 1930s for example, the highly competent and ‘sane’ British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain, found himself unable to handle the events of and develop the approach to respond to World War II and, consequently, relinquished his leadership to the bipolar and often suicidal Winston Churchill.

Churchill’s resilience and ‘never say die’ attitude towards World War II was likely born out of his own personal struggles with his mental health. Depressives often find themselves in personal crisis and, through resilience, develop the ability to manage this internal turmoil reasonably well, at the very least, they continue to function. This equips them with the tools to manage such critical events in a leadership capacity because, there is no bigger challenge than to continue to live life whilst feeling utterly dead inside. Do you see the link? A workplace system failure or high-level customer escalation seems relatively trivial when, in recent times you’ve wanted to die, and so as a depressive you are well-equipped to rationalise issues, put them into perspective, and tackle them with a cool head.

Empathy

Empathy is the bond that binds one person to another, and our personal experiences allow us to extend our feelings to others, who may be experiencing either the same or a similar event(s). As a leader, empathy allows you to create an environment of open communication and feedback, which in turn allows for a happier and more productive team. It is, in my experience, often the case that depressive leaders have empathy by the bucket load, because a person who has gone through long periods of suffering has an immense ability to put themselves in the position of others who are too, and can therefore understand the impact work and the work environment can have on this and vice versa.

Why was Martin Luther King JR such an effective leader of the civil rights movement? Because he had suffered in the same way as those he served to inspire and lead, so his ability to connect, understand and truly empathise was far greater than others and people value this in a leader. It is, in my humble opinion, one of the key reasons for Joe Biden’s recent victory in the U.S Presidential election. He has suffered loss on a scale many of us could not imagine, and so his ability to empathise with the members of the American electorate who had lost loved ones due to COVID19 for example, is far greater than that of his predecessor Donald Trump. Consequently, the decisions President Biden will make as part of his pandemic response plan are likely to be made from a position of empathy, care and sincerity, opposed to self-promotion or political advantage, and people value this in their leaders.

Creativity

Mental illness does not have to be present for creativity to exist, but many studies have identified a link between mental illness and creativity. It is not often I have moments of genius (some might argue that I never have them), but on reflection my most creative moments have been born either during or in the run up to a manic-depressive episode. This is generally because during a state of mania, my energy levels are off the scale and so my ability to come up with new concepts and inspire others to implement them is exceptional.

Of course, the crash which follows is often inevitable, but that doesn’t take away from my ability to positively identify new ideas. It is important to note though, that one of my major weaknesses is the inability to implement new concepts. I’m great at coming up with them, but I need ‘completer finishers’ in my team who will do what I see as ‘the boring stuff’ - seeing these ideas through to implementation. I believe this inability to stay focused after the identification of the concept, is often due to the fact that my manic spells are almost always followed by a sizeable decline.

As part of this post, I took the opportunity to speak with some professional acquaintances past and present, as well as football players I coach, to understand in three words how they would describe me as a leader, a colleague, a coach, and a subordinate. It wasn’t my intention to embark on this exercise as some sort of ego-inflation (although, that’s what it turned out to be), but to identify whether their summary of me links to the observations I have illustrated earlier on in this blog post about the synergies between mental-illness and leadership capabilities. Here’s what they said (for the record, I did not insist the comments be positive):

Bosses	Boss 1	Boss 2	Boss 3
	Enthusiastic Ambitious Worrier	Sensitive Thoughtful Transparent	Progressive Supportive Involved
Subordinates	Subordinate 1	Subordinate 2	Subordinate 3
	Honest Humble Resilient	Inspiring Empowering Resourceful	Passionate Confident Engaged
Peers	Peer 1	Peer 2	Peer 3
	Inspiring Driven Supportive	Passionate Driven Inclusive	Direct Humorous Honest
Football Players/Parents	Player/Parent 1	Player/Parent 2	Player/Parent 3
	Fun Passionate Ambitious	Funny Smart Motivating	Kind Organised Constructive

Below, I have, where possible, aligned these to the three traits I observed as being recurrent in a depressive leader: resilience; empathy; creativity; and all non-related words under a category titled ‘other’.

Resilience	Ambitious, Enthusiastic, Progressive, Involved, Resilient, Resourceful, Confident, Driven, Direct
Empathy	Worrier, Sensitive, Thoughtful, Transparent, Honest, Humble, Supportive, Kind, Constructive, Inclusive, Humorous, Honest
Creativity	Inspiring, Passionate, Fun, Motivating
Other	Empowering, Engaged, Smart, Organised

As I’ve said, I did not initiate this exercise in an attempt to feed my already sizable ego, but I would be lying if I were to pretend that wasn’t a pleasant side-effect.

I am not attempting to draw even the vaguest of similarities between myself and the leadership capabilities of historical legends such as Sir Winston Churchill (even I recognise that would be ridiculous), but the feedback I have received would suggest that the traits which have been consistent amongst depressive leaders appear to be commonplace with the experience others have had working with me, albeit on a scale much smaller and less impressive than the likes of Martin Luther King JR and Marie Curie.

So, what can we conclude from this? Well, primarily that depression isn’t merely negative in its impact on one’s ability to be an effective professional, in fact, the opposite is true. Depressives can be outstanding leaders because of the skills that their illness forces them to develop and history has taught us this time and time again. Be inclusive, always.

Comments, arguments and feedback always welcome.

Disclaimer: Views expressed in this blog are done so in a professional capacity and are based on personal experiences and views, they have not been validated or reviewed by psychological or medical professionals prior to being published.