4 Support: Why even the best performers need support, not just pressure

Lead with EASE delves deep into the strategies and mindset shifts you need to realign your goals and reclaim your path, with EASE. This week, we explore the third principle of the EASE Framework: Support enables true performance which depends not just on pressure or skill, but on the right environmental conditions.

In high-performing teams, it is easy to assume that the best people simply “handle it.” They are competent, driven, and resilient, or so it appears. Their capacity can appear almost limitless at times. However, this is exactly the time to be aware of the breaking strain of people and the potential for burnout.

Competence without support creates increased risk. Tipping points are hard to see until you pass them. Pressure without psychological safety creates burnout. Resilience without rest becomes brittle.

If leaders want teams to thrive—not merely survive—then support is a responsibility, not a soft option.

Support is not rescuing. It is designing environments where people can stay resilient, learn quickly, and remain engaged, even under significant demands.

🎯 Why Support Matters

The best teams I have seen are not those where no one struggles, but where struggle is seen and supported, openly and without shame.

Professor Amy Edmondson calls this psychological safety: the belief that one can speak up, admit mistakes, ask for help, or offer a dissenting view without fear of humiliation or punishment. Easy to say, but truly quite difficult to create and nurture.

Support also means clarity of challenge. When people know what is expected and believe they can succeed with the right effort and resources, they become energised rather than overwhelmed. Self efficacy is empowering for individuals and teams but may also enable over-confidence

At the core of the Job Demands–Resources (JD-R) Model, developed by Arnold Bakker and Evangelia Demerouti we can see the fine balance between success and failure. The model shows that performance and wellbeing are not opposing forces. When challenges are paired with adequate resources, motivation and engagement increase. When demands rise and resources fall, exhaustion quickly follows. So how can we address this in our teams? Perhaps it all starts with that essential of leadership, communication and good relationships.

🧭 Practical Support: Ask, Adjust, Acknowledge

Support does not mean lowering standards. It means ensuring conditions are right for people to meet those standards in changing contexts. "It was tougher in my day..." might seem like a pithy comment, but how objective is all of that. We may not know all the factors that are affecting an individual or a team.

Here is a simple way to apply this mindset:

1. Ask

• What are the current pressures this person or team is under?
• Do they feel safe asking for help or expressing doubt?
• When did I last ask what they need?

2. Adjust

• Can we reduce unnecessary demands or constraints?
• Are we expecting outcomes without giving the tools?
• Have we created space for recovery, feedback, and autonomy?

3. Acknowledge

• Do we celebrate effort, learning, and honesty, not just outputs?
• How are we managing performance and is fairness and equity a priority or an afterthought?
• Have we named the pressure people are under, or are we pretending everything is fine?

Support begins by paying attention and taking care of each other.

💡 Try This:

In your next one-to-one or team check-in, try asking each other:

“What is one thing that would make this work more manageable or sustainable for you right now?”

This small shift in attention can unlock honesty and connection, two vital forms of support.

And remember support is for everyone and not just something that comes down from on high.

How can you support the people who are managing you?

Do they trust you to deliver and do you know how to speak up the chain too?

Referenced Thinkers:

• Amy Edmondson – Psychological Safety and Learning Behaviour in Work Teams
• Bakker & Demerouti – The Job Demands–Resources Model
• Karl Weick – Sensemaking in Organisations, where support is often about reducing noise and helping people interpret what is happening

Coming Next Week:

Empower – Why real leadership means letting go, not holding tighter. We will look at how to develop autonomy, trust, and ownership at every level, without losing accountability or standards.

Let us lead with EASE.

If this helped shift your perspective, please repost or share it. Leadership is not just about lifting others, it is about building environments where they can stand strong.

#Leadership #PsychologicalSafety #JobDemandsResources #OrganisationalPsychology #LeadWithEASE #ProactiveWorkplaces

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