The Real Truth About Managing Staff When Everything's Going Sideways

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You know what really grinds my gears? Management gurus who've never actually managed anyone telling you to "stay calm and carry on" when your team's falling apart faster than a cheap umbrella in a Brisbane storm.

After seventeen years of managing everyone from fresh-faced graduates to battle-scarred veterans across Sydney, Melbourne, and Perth, I can tell you that managing staff through genuinely stressful situations isn't about motivational posters or team-building exercises. It's about real leadership when the chips are down.

The Mythology of the Unflappable Manager

Here's my first controversial opinion: showing emotion as a manager isn't weakness—it's honesty. And honesty builds trust faster than any corporate training programme ever will.

I remember during the 2020 lockdowns when half my team was homeschooling kids while trying to meet quarterly targets. The textbook advice was to "maintain professional composure." What a load of rubbish. Instead, I told them straight up: "This is mental, we're all struggling, and anyone who says they're not is lying."

That admission didn't undermine my authority. It cemented it.

The problem with most management advice is it assumes your staff are robots who just need the right programming. Real people have real problems. Sarah's mum has dementia. James is going through a divorce. Michelle's landlord just jacked up her rent by 40%. These aren't "performance issues"—they're life hitting hard.

But here's where I'll probably annoy the HR brigade: not every stressful situation deserves the same response. Some stress is good stress. The kind that comes from stretching, growing, achieving something meaningful. Other stress? That's the toxic kind that slowly poisons everything it touches.

The Four Types of Workplace Stress (And Why Three of Them Are Actually Fine)

Challenge Stress: This is your team pushing themselves to deliver a massive project, working late but feeling energised. Like when Apple launches a new iPhone—everyone's working their backsides off, but they're also part of something exciting.

Constraint Stress: When external factors create pressure but your team has some control. Budget cuts, regulatory changes, supply chain hiccups. Manageable with the right approach.

Personal Stress: Life stuff spilling into work. This is where you need to be human first, manager second.

Toxic Stress: The kind created by poor leadership, impossible demands, or office politics. This is the killer. And if you're creating this kind of stress, you're not a manager—you're a problem.

During my early days managing a team in Adelaide (God, was I green), I thought being "supportive" meant solving everyone's problems for them. Wrong move. Completely wrong.

I had this brilliant account manager, let's call her Karen (and yes, she was actually lovely despite the name), who was drowning under client demands. Instead of helping her prioritise and set boundaries, I just took half her workload. Know what happened? She never learned to manage the pressure, and I created a dependency that helped nobody.

Better approach? Teach them to fish, as they say. But also recognise when someone's genuinely underwater and needs immediate help.

The Communication Reality Check

Here's controversial opinion number two: sometimes you need to tell your team things are going to get worse before they get better. And they'll respect you for it.

Most managers cushion bad news until it's meaningless. "We're facing some challenges" instead of "We're probably going to lose the Henderson account, which means redundancies are possible."

Your team isn't stupid. They can sense when things are off. Treating them like children who can't handle reality is insulting and counterproductive.

I learned this lesson the hard way during a company restructure in 2019. For weeks, I fed my team corporate speak about "optimising our human resources" and "rightsizing for efficiency." Meanwhile, they were all updating their LinkedIn profiles and having nervous conversations by the coffee machine.

When I finally sat them down and said, "Look, three positions are being cut, I don't know which ones yet, but I'll tell you the moment I do," the relief was palpable. Not happiness—relief. Because uncertainty is worse than bad news.

One thing about stress management that really works is giving people some control, even if it's limited. During that restructure, I couldn't control who got made redundant, but I could control how much notice they got to prepare. I could control making sure they had time to use their leave. I could control ensuring good references and introductions to my network.

Small things? Maybe. But they matter enormously when people feel powerless.

The Practical Stuff That Actually Works

Daily check-ins that aren't performance reviews. "How are you really going?" not "Where are we on the Morrison project?"

Flexible deadlines when possible. Not everything is genuinely urgent, despite what some people would have you believe.

Proper breaks. And I mean proper breaks, not "grab a sandwich at your desk" breaks.

Clear priorities. When everything's urgent, nothing's urgent. Pick three things max.

Here's something that might sound soft but absolutely works: acknowledging when your requests are unreasonable. "I know this deadline is mental, but the client's breathing down our necks. How can we make this work without you having a breakdown?"

That kind of honesty creates partnership, not resentment.

When It's Time to Get Tough

But—and this is important—sometimes stress reveals who shouldn't be on your team. Not everyone rises to challenges. Some people crumble, blame others, or just check out entirely.

I had this one guy (let's call him Dave) who turned every minor hiccup into a drama production. Equipment malfunction? Dave's having a meltdown. Tight deadline? Dave's calling in sick. Client complaint? Dave's writing resignation letters.

You can't manage that kind of person through stress. You manage them out.

The Bunnings approach works here: team members who support each other under pressure stay. Those who make everything about themselves? There's the door.

The Mental Health Minefield

Now, mental health in the workplace—this is where things get really tricky. And where a lot of managers stuff up spectacularly.

You're not a therapist. You're not qualified to diagnose or treat anything. But you are responsible for creating an environment where people feel safe asking for help.

The key is boundaries. You can offer support for employee supervision and workplace adjustments. You can't fix someone's anxiety disorder.

What you can do is recognise the signs: sudden performance drops, increased sick leave, withdrawal from team activities, irritability, missed deadlines that used to be routine.

What you shouldn't do is try to be Dr Phil.

The Recovery Phase Everyone Forgets

Here's what nobody talks about: what happens after the crisis passes. Your team's been through the wringer, survived a massive deadline or restructure or whatever fresh hell landed on your desk.

Most managers just go back to business as usual. Big mistake.

People need time to decompress. They need acknowledgment of what they've been through. They need to process the experience before moving on to the next challenge.

I usually plan something low-key after big stressful periods. Sometimes it's just knocking off early on Friday. Sometimes it's a proper team lunch where work talk is banned. Nothing fancy, nothing forced, just recognition that we've all been through something together.

The Inconvenient Truth About Resilience

Everyone bangs on about building resilient teams. Here's the thing though—resilience isn't about grinding through everything that gets thrown at you. That's not resilience, that's learned helplessness.

Real resilience is knowing when to push through and when to push back. It's having the confidence to say "this deadline's unrealistic" or "we need more resources" or "something's got to give."

Resilient teams don't just survive stress—they learn from it. They get better at spotting problems early, communicating needs clearly, and supporting each other when things get tough.

The best teams I've managed weren't the ones that never complained. They were the ones that complained constructively and worked together to solve problems.

What Really Matters

At the end of the day, managing people through stress isn't about having all the answers. It's about being present, being honest, and being genuinely concerned about your team's wellbeing.

Your staff will forgive mistakes. They'll forgive being asked to work harder than usual. They won't forgive being treated like disposable resources or being lied to about what's really happening.

The managers who get this right understand that their job isn't to eliminate stress—it's to help their teams navigate it successfully. Because stress is inevitable. How you handle it as a leader? That's entirely up to you.

And that's probably the most important lesson of all.