How can we end the epidemic of loneliness in leadership?
With more than 50% of senior business leaders reporting feelings of loneliness and isolation, is it time to look more closely at the causes — and possible solutions?
When Sir Keir Starmer won the UK election in July, he announced that he wouldn’t be working after 6pm on Fridays. As a married father of two young children, the new prime minister insisted family time was sacred. The news was met with derision by the opposition press, who insisted that the top job came with a responsibility to be available 24 hours a day.
But others might say that rather than shirking his responsibilities, by sticking to his principles and prioritizing his family at weekends the PM is more likely to perform at his best.
Negative impact
In January, Forbes reported that half of CEOs and senior leaders have experienced loneliness and isolation, with 61 percent of those believing it had a negative impact on performance.
But a survey by the UK tech leadership coaching and mentor group CTO Craft found that the rates of loneliness among senior tech leaders were much higher — results that the company called “alarming” and “in some cases, upsetting”.
“Of the 100 people questioned, almost 97% had felt lonely as a leader at one point or another, with 63.5% feeling lonely in their current role ‘sometimes’ and almost 19% feeling that way all of the time,” the company reports.
The survey also found loneliness had a significant negative impact on performance: 86.5 percent of respondents reported issues with motivation and engagement, 44.6 percent said confidence when dealing with stakeholders was impacted, 34.4 percent said they struggled to lead teams, and 32.3 percent reported a dip in productivity and delivery.
Serious health risks
In 2022, the American Medical Association (AMA) categorized loneliness as a public health issue that affects people of all ages. Writing for the AMA, Dr Tiffani Bell Washington explains: “People assume if someone is doing well, making money and has a family that they can’t be lonely, but that is not true. We all benefit from having a deeper connection with others, no matter what stage of life we’re in.
“Loneliness is something to be taken seriously,” Dr. Bell Washington continues. “It can have serious mental and physical complications that worsen if ignored.”
And according to the US Center for Disease Control and Prevention, those risks include heart disease and stroke, Type 2 diabetes, depression, anxiety, suicidal thoughts and self-harm, dementia — and early death.
Identify the cause
Marc Correa is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of People Management and Organization at Esade. In a conversation with the Spanish newspaper Expansión earlier this year, Correa said awareness is key in combatting this alarming trend.
“The first thing to do is to be aware that loneliness is associated with the leadership position and, therefore, it must be managed in the same way that a person takes care of their physical health,” he explains.
“We also need to understand the causes: is it because the social circles within the organization change — getting smaller and smaller as one moves up the organizational pyramid — or because of the high volume of work and the demands of the agenda, causing the time available to cultivate relationships to decrease dramatically?”
Do the work
Proactively prioritizing wellbeing and relationships is essential for recovery, says Correa. “Leaders must get down to work and take care of their emotional well-being, strengthen relationships within the organization, seek external help and strengthen relationships not linked to work."
However, he warns that it can be hard to do with the small circle of people at the top who understand the pressures at play.
“It is increasingly difficult to find peers, inside or outside the organization, who can truly understand the difficulty of the decisions to be made, the complications associated with the situation you are experiencing or the complexity of a certain operation,” he explains.
“This significantly affects the number of people to turn to in old circles in times of need and that responsibility takes its emotional toll. Scientific evidence shows us that, when this type of pressure is experienced, the neurological and endocrinological mechanisms cause the manager to become more and more closed in on himself. The sympathetic nervous system is activated, and with it, greater closure, and that creates a vicious circle that does not help.”
Don’t be a hero
To combat this shrinking circle, Correa advises turning to family and friends and, like Sir Starmer, making a conscious effort to nurture those relationships.
“Family and friends help the parasympathetic nervous system to be activated and, therefore, the feeling of closure decreases,” he explains. “Dedicating time to them and establishing dynamics where everyone listens to and supports each other is a key element of successful leadership."
Dr. Bell Washington agrees: “It is not a sign of weakness,” she says. “You do not have to be a superhero. You don’t have to be strong all of the time and there’s nothing wrong with desiring or seeking connections.”