Why Strategic Play is a Vital Leadership Metric
Take a look at this photo. It is messy, colourful, and involves a few ridiculous hats. This is a snapshot of what I call Strategic Play.
My accident happened when I was just nine years old. While I wasn’t thinking about “high-performance goals” at that age, the years of recovery that followed shaped my entire perspective on resilience.
Later in my life, as I navigated the complexities of long-term healing and professional ambition, I realized I had spent years with my nervous system stuck in survival mode. I was hyper-aware of every pain and every potential setback. But you cannot sustain a high-level life, or high-level healing, if you never allow yourself to drop the serious mask.
In leadership, we often treat fun as a reward for after the work is done. I’ve come to believe that play is the fuel that gets the work done.
By allowing ourselves to engage in play, whether it’s a competitive family gathering or a simple joke with a colleague, we are doing three essential things:
- Resetting the System: Play signals to our brains that it is safe to relax, which is our best defense against long-term burnout.
- Building Authentic Connection: We trust people more when we have laughed with them.
- Encouraging Vulnerability: It takes real courage to be the one in the “ridiculous hat.” That vulnerability creates a culture where others feel safe to be themselves.
This January, don’t just audit your project timelines. Audit your joy. If your team has forgotten how to laugh, they have forgotten how to thrive.
Cheers,
Heather
