Conversation recorded August 2024
Most workplaces only talk about mental health once something has gone wrong. The teams that sustain high performance train for it before the crisis, the way athletes do.
In conversation with Chinazom Sunny Nwabueze and Ijeoma (Ije) Jemie-Nwabueze of Dream Catchers Performance. Chinazom is a mental fitness coach and author who has worked with athletes and spent years in investment banking. Ije is a business strategy and transformation expert who now leads executive and team coaching. They are business partners, and married. Chinazom admits his first reaction when Ije decided to become a coach too was panic, because she had always been the safety net. Building the business together has forced them both to communicate at a level they never expected.
Mental fitness is the prerequisite for performance
Chinazom developed the idea of mental fitness while working with athletes. Mental health talk often carries the stigma of something broken. Mental fitness is about protecting it: noticing your inner dialogue, scoring your emotional energy, recovering after a big performance and reconnecting with why you do the work. As he points out, no athlete empties the tank and goes straight into the next event, yet that's what most of us do after a big presentation or a week of travel.
"Mental fitness is the prerequisite for performance." Chinazom Sunny Nwabueze
Individuals go back into systems that break them
Chinazom noticed a pattern. He'd coach someone, they'd thrive, and six or nine months later they'd be back, broken again. They had returned to a team that wasn't set up for sustainable performance. Ije describes the difference between a group of experts doing their job descriptions, a real team with a shared purpose, and the rare high performing team where each person cares as much about the others' growth as their own.
Trust comes before the check-in
Check-in questions and wellbeing rituals are powerful, but only on a foundation of trust. Without it, people give the safe answer or stay silent. Ije is also clear that psychological safety is shared work. Leaders carry more responsibility because of their rank, but each person knows best what they need to feel safe, and can ask for it.
"If there isn't a sense of trust, people will respond falsely." Ijeoma Jemie-Nwabueze
In a crisis, tell the truth and trust your people
When the 2008 crash hit, Chinazom's team at Bank of America went from around 80 people to 14. Instead of ruling by fear, he told them straight: this is hard, I need you to perform like never before, and I need you to tell me your limits. The team built its own way of working and covered for each other. The lesson for leaders today is that fear in hard times erodes trust fast, while honesty builds it.
Petra's take
This is the conversation I wish every leadership team would have. Wellbeing and performance aren't opposites. When I started my business, I opened team meetings with "how's your mental health today?" and I always went first, because leaders give permission by going first. Over time the structure became culture, and now the check-ins happen without me. Chinazom's point about technology lands too. We have tools that should give us more time to connect, and instead we've layered on more back-to-back meetings. That isn't efficiency. It's hiding.
Three things to try this week
Score your emotional energy out of 10 before your biggest meeting this week, and plan something to recover after it.
Rotate a check-in question at the start of your team meeting, from "what's one thing bringing you joy?" to "what's one challenge you're facing?", and go first.
Turn one coffee chat into a real one. Spend 20 minutes getting to know a colleague as a human, so you already trust each other when the pressure hits.
Bring this to your team: explore our Leadership training
Watch the full conversation on YouTube
Related insights: High Performance Culture · Why Men Don't Talk About Mental Health at Work
About the author. Petra Velzeboer is a psychotherapist, keynote speaker and author of Begin With You and Digital Wellbeing. She works with leaders and People teams to build healthy cultures where people perform at their best.