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Grace Under Pressure
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Grace Under Pressure

Leading Through Change and Crisis

John Baldoni
Savio Republic, 2023
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8

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  • Overview
  • Engaging
  • Inspiring

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How do some leaders manage pressure while others struggle? Executive coach John Baldoni, host of LinkedIn Live’s Grace Under Pressure interview series, explains how to maintain your composure in stressful situations. Your first priority when pressure hits is to make sure your people are okay. Then, make sure you’re okay – take the deep breath you need. Look as wisely as possible into the future and consider how to prevent today’s stress from compounding. Make sure that whatever happens next will benefit your people, rather than harming them. Baldoni stresses the importance of inculcating courage, compassion, empathy, hope, resilience, and selflessness into your life and the lives of your team members.

Summary

“Grace under pressure” calls for maintaining your cool under all circumstances.

Visualize a multi alarm fire: two or three fire trucks, giant fire hoses gushing pressurized water, busy firefighters, unbearable heat, tremendous noise, and horrified onlookers watching in shocked befuddlement. Such imaginative mental imagery is incomplete without a fire chief – the dependable, composed executive directing the firefight. The chief is a leadership role model who exhibits steady grace under pressure.

The well-worn phrase “grace under pressure” has vintage roots. In 1929, in an interview Dorothy Parker conducted with Ernest Hemingway for the New Yorker magazine, he spoke tellingly of grace under pressure. The phrase evokes the ability to operate coolly in terrifying, complex, and challenging circumstances.

Grace serves you, your firm, and your stakeholders. 

Grace is a mysterious, spiritual, even magical, force that appears out of nowhere, unannounced. Gary Burnison, the CEO of Korn Ferry, believes that grace is a locomotive force that propels people to their higher...

About the Author

John Baldoni is a leadership educator, executive coach and the author of 16 leadership books now translated into 10 languages. He hosts LinkedIn Live’s GRACE Under Pressure interview series. 

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    R. A. 5 months ago
    Well written
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    A. N. 7 months ago
    Grace under pressure challenges the commonly understood show your authority to get the job done concept.<br>Dealing with people who believe showing grace under pressure is wrong is what makes it a constant struggle to motivate yourself.