Role-Play: Leading a Restructuring When You Don’t Have the Answers (Part 2) | Cynthia Conigliaro

Your company announces a restructuring. Your team wants answers. You don’t have any. What do you say? In Part 2, Cynthia Conigliaro, MSW, MBA, CHWC, founder of Work Well Webinars, steps into the hardest seat in the room. Chris and Lucie play anxious team members who push her with every question she can’t answer: “Should I update my resume?” “We’re planning a family. Will I still have a job?” Then the three of them debrief what worked, what each of them would do differently, and how leaders can take care of themselves after a meeting like this. In this episode: A live role-play: announcing a restructuring with no concrete answers Why “I don’t have all the answers” builds more trust than pretending How well-meant support (like time off) can sound like “you’re getting fired” The goal isn’t to make people happy. It’s to keep them grounded and supported. The “internal resume”: one concrete action for anxious employees When caring leaders feel crushed, and imposter syndrome after the meeting Why pushing productivity in chaos backfires, and what to do instead What everyone gets wrong about resilience CHAPTERS 00:00 Welcome to Part 2 00:14 Setting up the role-play 00:57 The role-play begins: announcing the restructuring 01:29 “Should I update my resume?” 02:11 “We’re planning a family. I need to know.” 03:58 When support sounds like bad news 05:35 Open door and bringing in the team 06:35 Debrief: “It’s such a challenge” 07:22 Cynthia’s approach: empathy and honesty 08:54 Confirmation bias: hearing “you’re getting fired” 11:13 Leaders need empathy too 12:37 The goal isn’t to make people happy 14:02 To answer the resume question or not? 16:01 The internal resume 17:41 When caring leaders feel crushed 19:29 Imposter syndrome after the hard meeting 20:43 The mistake of forcing productivity in chaos 22:40 Lessons from The Pitt: strip down to what matters 24:19 Rapid fire: what everyone gets wrong about resilience 25:12 Where to find Cynthia 25:58 What’s next from Chris and Lucie ABOUT CYNTHIA Cynthia Conigliaro, MSW, MBA, CHWC, is the founder of Work Well Webinars, delivering emotional, physical, and organizational wellness programs to companies nationwide. She holds an MSW and MBA (focus on Organizational and Group Psychology) from Boston College, is trained in Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR), and has been a health and wellness coach for over 20 years. CONNECT WITH CYNTHIA Website: https://www.workwellwebinars.com LinkedIn:   / cynthia-conigliaro-mba-msw-hwc   CONNECT WITH THE HOSTS Join our newsletters, plus the waitlist for Chris’s book on building a future-ready nonprofit: https://www.myleadershippotential.com... Chris Wong, Leadership Potential: https://myleadershippotential.com/ Lucie Tesarova, MindFittery, mental fitness for leaders: https://www.mindfittery.com/ LISTEN ON Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast... Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0KCWLzi... When you communicate better, you live better. #Leadership #RolePlay #Restructuring #Layoffs #ChangeManagement #Resilience #DifficultConversations