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Listen to this week’s podcast episode, Ep.254: Human Performance: Understanding and Leading from Body, Brain, Identity and Behaviour, with Vicky Midwood, click here to listen now.
If they are normally the person who arrives early and they're suddenly being late, notice that.
If they're disappearing at breaks and they're literally leaving the building, is that new or different behavior?
So look out for different new behavior. Don't make any judgments, just kind of mentally keep a note of it.
I think the next thing is ask rather than assume … that's a big one. I know a lot of people don't like to ask questions, it's not just like, “you okay?” Because you're just going to get a “Fine”.
But it could be along the lines of say, “I've noticed you don't quite seem yourself. Are you doing okay? Is there something happening?”
The whole Human at work & moving beyond tick-box workplace Wellness
In corporate life (big or small!), we often pretend our working selves exist independently of our physical bodies. We expect professionals to check personal challenges at the door and operate with continuous cognitive efficiency. When stress spikes, companies respond with surface-level perks (the infamous pizza party… or a meditation app, or free fruit in the kitchen) while hoping to tick the well-being box without putting too much time or effort into examining the systemic pressures driving exhaustion.
Talking on the podcast this week with Vicky Midwood, human performance strategist and creator of the Whole Human Method, we explored why this fragmented approach fails. Vicky brings a hard-won perspective to executive performance, getting her start in fitness in 1991 running a women-only gym, she discovered that training often had far less to do with exercise mechanics than with counseling, coaching and emotion. Behind the scenes, she spent years struggling with eating disorders and addiction to cigarettes and alcohol, projecting outward fitness while privately fighting to stay afloat.
Following rehab in 2005, Vicky pursued degrees in education and addiction psychology before building an international coaching practice. Today, she helps business owners, founders, and executives close the gap between knowing what to do and actually doing it. Our discussion this week pulls apart the myths surrounding self-discipline, explores the dangers of binary thinking and what it genuinely looks like to lead people as complete human beings.
The myth of Willpower and the Coping Brain
When leaders dial back unhealthy habits, the default strategy is usually sheer willpower. Most of us have probably relied on that ‘tool’ at least once in our lives or careers… “I’m going to have fewer meetings” “I won’t have as many snacks between meals” “No more sugary drinks” and so on. We promise to skip drinks at an evening event, only to find a glass in hand thirty minutes later, followed by self-criticism over lacking discipline, feeling shame at our ‘inadequate’ willpower.
As Vicky explains this week, though, and as we heard from Fred last week too: attempting to white-knuckle through entrenched habits misunderstands neuroscience. Your subconscious brain processes information in roughly two hundred milliseconds, firing far faster than conscious logic can intervene.
Trying to willpower your way out of that loop without understanding why you turned to the behavior in the first place, only guarantees frustration. If an a leader (or anyone else!) drinks wine every evening or compulsively checks their notifications throughout the night, that action serves a function: providing a boundary, numbing discomfort or escaping cognitive load. Vicky’s key point is this, sustainable change doesn't come from self-criticism; it comes from identifying the trigger and adopting an alternative that genuinely meets the underlying need.
Escaping the false-choice binary-view of Management
A major barrier to organisational health is our conditioning toward binary thinking; we’re taught from childhood to view circumstances through an either/or lens: good or bad, success or failure, productive or lazy.
In business, this black-and-white mindset causes immense damage because (for example) when an employee struggles with an assignment, managers often jump to sweeping character judgments, labeling the person incompetent or disengaged rather than examining the specific context. Similarly, leaders judge themselves harshly, interpreting a single operational setback as evidence that they aren't cut out for management.
Vicky notes that human beings are multifaceted, complex and nuanced; and this is something to be celebrated. True performance can’t be reduced to simple polar opposites. When we force setbacks or challenges through a binary filter, we miss the middle ground where creative solutions tend to exist. A leader who embraces nuance doesn't demand that their team pick between working around the clock or failing completely, what they do instead is foster an environment where people can acknowledge fatigue, talk about failures, adjust timelines intelligently and explore alternative paths to an outcome without fear of being written off or reprimanded.
Health and Wellness at work aren’t a tick-box
One of the most persistent issues in business is the separation of physical health from professional execution, like the way we talk about mental well-being as if it floats in midair, completely detached from biology. In truth, everything you eat, the quality of your sleep, the movement you incorporate into your day and the state of your nervous system directly dictate your cognitive bandwidth.
Vicky says too many corporate wellness programs fail because they confuse access to data with actual understanding. We have more wearable trackers and wellness metrics than ever, yet chronic illness and burnout continue to climb. Access to information doesn’t generate health; taking relevant, individualised action does.
Management also undermines wellness policies through contradictory behavior. Early in my career, a former manager treated sick leave like a personal offense. If you called in sick, he phoned at nine to verify your symptoms, followed by emails throughout the day to extract work while you were in bed or suffering a migraine (by the way, for those who’ve never experienced one, about the worst thing you can do is look at a screen or read!). Forcing sick employees to work prolongs illness, destroys productivity and risks infecting the entire team when it’s infectious.
Also, it’s not a great look for the company culture either… ‘productivity is more important than any of your health’ …I don’t think so, buddy.
True wellness isn't about an annual seminar, a token effort or nice words without follow-through. It’s about building an everyday culture where physical health is respected, rest is treated as a strategic necessity and people are given space to recover when they need it.
The Accidental Manager and the power of observation
Much dysfunction stems from the "accidental manager" problem, where high performers are promoted based purely on technical expertise, experience or length of service. A brilliant engineer or accountant is placed in charge of a department with zero training in navigating interpersonal dynamics or supporting human beings, actual leadership.
Lacking development, not knowing how to develop or employ the totally new and different skills for their new role, these new managers retreat into self-preservation. Pressured to appear in control and terrified that asking for help will expose them as frauds, they often mask insecurity through micromanagement and rigid enforcement.
For leaders who want to break the cycle we’ve talked about so far, whether the wellness challenge, preventing burnout, building better culture, or just generally looking after & supporting their people, Vicky offered three practical rules of thumb:
Notice Behavioral Shifts: Pay attention to subtle departures from normal routines. If a colleague who is usually punctual begins arriving late, or if a team member suddenly leaves the building alone during every break, take note without rushing to judgment.
Ask Rather Than Assume: Avoid shallow check-ins like "Are you okay?", which almost always trigger an automated "I'm fine." Instead, approach with specific observation: "I've noticed you don't seem quite yourself lately. How are things going, and is there anything I can do to support you?" Then, stay quiet and actually listen to the response. For bonus points, do something about it, if you can.
Examine Your Role Modeling: Look honestly at the behavior you project; if you instruct your team to log off and rest while sending emails yourself at eleven o'clock at night, your actions will always drown out your words.
Drop the aggrandising nonsense, focus on the individuals instead…
Creating a high-performing team doesn’t require grand corporate initiatives or complex management philosophies, it’s really just about recognising that the individuals executing your strategy are whole human beings whose professional output is inseparable from their physical vitality, mental clarity and emotional security.
When leaders step away from rigid binaries and take the time to observe, listen and understand the people in their care, management becomes a collaborative partnership where performance and well-being reinforce one another.
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Listen to the full episode at: https://smartlink.ausha.co/leading-with-integrity/ep-254-human-performance-understanding-and-leading-from-body-brain-identity-and-behaviour-with-vicky-midwood
Or watch in 4K video on YouTube: https://youtu.be/mlM0o7tojUk
Thanks for being here in October, I hope you’ll be back again next week and next month, for my next conversation with James Miller II as we hear about his love of mountain climbing and how that (along with his career) inspired him to write a book called ‘The Silent Summit’ about the loneliness of leadership.
THANK YOU for reading, listening, supporting Leading with Integrity. There’s no show or newsletter, no future of leadership without each and every one of you.
Be a Leader Not a Boss,
- David
In case you don’t know me that well, I’m David Hatch and I’m here to help you lead like a Starfleet Captain.
If you’re a new manager or first-time leader in a tech, expertise or specialist driven workplace and you’re feeling lonely, stuck, overwhelmed, or simply ready for your next chapter in leadership, the Integrity Leaders Community offers conversations, courses, resources and support to help you grow one step at a time. If you have a healthy love of sci-fi and want to learn more about leadership, then this is the community for you! Solopreneurs also welcome. 😉
