It’s Office ! There is no place for Emotions

It’s a Myth. No elaborations needed. It’s a plain and simple myth. We all have someone in office who burst in tears, pound their fist, bang on tea cup or some other ways to emote themselves. Frustration, worry, sadness, anger, jubilation, excitement, ecstasy every human emotion will be carried everywhere along with human beings and to the work place as well. There is no point skirting the issue under the carpet as at the max it will lead to bigger issues. Holding the emotions can stall productivity and limit the creativity if nothing else.
The best way to treat it as another way of communication as that’s what they are, nonverbal cues of emotional state of the person or team even as some are expressive others might feel the same but are holding back. Handling them then and there keeps the team mental health in a great state. It’s factual data coming to you in a raw form. As a leader we need to get beyond the theatricals and use our Emotional Intelligence (EQ) to analyze the subtle message.
Second myth along the line is we don’t have time for petty things. Then surely some of your team members will have a backroom discussion and that will hamper more time and energy rather than saving some. It will be coupled with more good or bad advices and locker room talks before it resurfaces in a bigger way somewhere else. Unheard emotions will only amplify go bigger and become destructive if not today then tomorrow.
Another myth is emotions cloud decisions: sure they do just you don’t admit. Only choice is to make them explicit and involve the whole team or just keep them as your own emotional bias. Does your feelings about a subject matter don’t reflect in your decision, it does. So it can be the team emotional feeling as well as at least it will bring everyone on the same page and it’s all encompassing course of action. Once the person feels heard his respect in leader and process increases and it impacts the well being of the whole team.
Spot instead of stop: spot the discomfort, in body language, talks or facial expressions. Ask the person to come in clear. A withdrawal is noticeable to keen eyes. Encourage to speak up before an outburst.
Listen and acknowledge: Listen as valuable feedback and acknowledge the inputs as data reducing the noise. Being calm and keeping your own emotions under check, probe to gather the real uncomforting issue behind emotions. “I sense that there is something behind these frequent pauses in your sentences, lets discuss it.”
Resolve it: Talk it out surfacing various aspects of the issue and together bring out an addressal to the issue in hand.
Specially, when you are dealing with a highly skilled and complex team emotions are best to be discussed, debated and resolved rather than being allowed to slow brew, become messy, complex and uncomfortable.