Know Your Chimes: The Leadership Advantage of Self-Regulation
Leadership is hard enough without feeling like your emotions are running the show. Ever found yourself reacting in a meeting before your brain catches up? Or later wondering, Why did I say that? We’ve all been there. As leaders, though, how we manage ourselves - our triggers, our reactions - can make or break trust, decisions, and relationships.
Self-regulation is the quiet superpower of leadership
It starts with self-awareness. I like to think of it as knowing your chimes - those signals that let you know something (or someone) is setting you off. When you can hear them clearly, you’ve got a chance to respond rather than react. But if you’re not tuned in, those chimes can clang away, and before you know it, you’ve reacted impulsively, made a poor decision, or damaged a relationship without meaning to.
If you’re not aware of what triggers you, someone else will find a way to use it. It might not even be intentional, but when you’re not in charge of your emotional responses, it’s easy to be influenced, manipulated, or thrown off course. And in leadership, that costs - credibility, respect, clarity.
Satya Nadella, CEO of Microsoft, is a great example of a leader who’s worked on this. Early in his leadership, he recognised that his automatic responses weren’t always helpful. He told a story about being asked a question at a leadership event. It was a question he felt he should have known but didn’t. His old pattern would have been to react defensively or avoid the discomfort. Instead, he leaned into curiosity and calm.
Nadella talks about shifting from a “know-it-all” mindset to a “learn-it-all” one. That shift helped him regulate his reactions and stay present in tough moments. It’s no coincidence that under his leadership, Microsoft’s culture transformed into one of empathy and learning. His ability to regulate himself created space for a different kind of leadership.
So how do you get better at this? Start by noticing. What situations make you tense? Who gets under your skin? What’s your pattern when you’re stressed or blindsided? Those are your chimes. They’re not bad - they’re just signals. When you notice them early, you can pause. Breathe. Buy yourself time to make a conscious choice about how to respond.
A few tips that help:
- Name your emotions. "I’m feeling defensive right now." It’s amazing how calling it out (even just to yourself) gives you distance.
- Slow the moment down. Take a drink of water, ask a question, or take a breath. You don’t have to react instantly.
- Get curious. What’s really going on here? What’s the other person’s intention? Curiosity shifts you from reaction to response.
- Reflect afterward. What worked? What didn’t? Self-regulation is a skill you get better at with practice.
Knowing your chimes won’t make you a perfect leader, but it will make you a more grounded one. And that’s the leader people trust, follow, and want to work with.
Where are your chimes ringing?
#RealLeadership #SelfRegulation #Triggers
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