May is Mental Health Awareness Month in the US, and if you're a manager, that might mean seeing company-wide emails with an EAP link, or a meditation app discount, and maybe a Lunch & Learn invite.

All of that is good - resources matter. Knowing how to connect your team to formal support - from HR to licensed therapists - is genuinely important. But what else can you do as a manager?

You don't have to become their therapist, and it's important to have things like EAP links to share with your teams. But there's also a middle ground in the day-to-day, the part you can control: the tone of a Slack message, the meeting that starts late and runs long, the email that goes unanswered, the colleague who can't seem to stop one-upping you. Those things shape how people feel at work. And how people feel at work doesn't stay at work.

In this video, I talk about realizing how much a single person's words from years ago can stick with you - for better or for worse. Most of us have one of those memories. The kicker is: we're also someone else's memory. We just don't usually pause long enough to notice. 

In this blog, I want to share the exercise I walk through in the video - the one I wish someone had handed me years ago.

The exercise: a two-part pause

This exercise involves the Pause-Consider-Act framework applied specifically to your impact on the people around you. It takes about five minutes - but its effects will last long after.

Part 1: How have others impacted YOUR mental health at work?

Think back across your career. Not just the big things - new jobs, promotions, layoffs, toxic bosses. Think about the small things, too. The manager who never quite got your name right. The colleague whose tone in meetings made your body clench. But also, the leader who took the time to give you helpful career advice when they could have said nothing. The teammate who covered for you when you had a rough week.

Some questions to sit with:

- What's a conversation from early in your career that you still think about?

- Who treated you in a way that made you feel like you belonged? Who didn't?

- Have you ever started a new job after being established somewhere and felt like you had to prove yourself all over again? Who made that easier? Who made it harder?

- What's a comment that stuck with you long after the workday ended?

The point isn't to build a grudge list. It's to notice the pattern: other people's words and actions shape us, sometimes in ways they never realized.

Part 2: How do YOU impact the people around you?

This is the harder one. Flip the lens - think about the way you impact others.

- Are your expectations clear, or are you assuming people can read your mind?

- When something goes wrong, do you ask questions first, or do you come in hot?

- Do you spell people's names correctly? (Yes, this matters more than you think.)

- Are you contributing to an "us vs. them" dynamic between departments - or pushing against it?

- How do you communicate when you're rushed? Is your "fast mode" something your team would describe as efficient, or as scary?

These aren't to make you feel guilty. They're the small, repeated behaviors that add up to how it feels to work for you. And here's the part that trips up new and experienced managers alike: you can be a kind person and still have things you miss. The pause is how you find them.

The action step: reach out to one person

Think of one person who positively shaped you - a former boss, a peer, a mentor, anyone - and tell them. Even if it's been years. Especially if it's been years.

Yes, it will feel awkward - to you. But keep your focus on them.

For the person on the receiving end, hearing that something they did mattered can be water in the desert. You don't know what kind of week they're having. You don't know if they've been doubting themselves. You don't know if this is the message that reminds them their work meant something. And it costs you about 60 seconds and one slightly cringey moment of vulnerability (and it can help by giving context to say "I was watching a video and it said to think of someone I really appreciated at work - and I immediately thought of you.")

And then... do it for someone on your team this week.

This is the same idea, but a different audience. A specific, genuine acknowledgment of something a team member did and the impact it had. Something like: "The way you handled the client call on Tuesday - how you didn't get defensive when they pushed back - that showed ownership and changed the whole dynamic of the conversation. That's not just client management - that's leadership."

This whole exercise can just take a few minutes. But it can change you - and others - for long after.

You're not a therapist - and you don't need to be. But you are a person whose words land with weight, whether you want them to or not. Mental Health Awareness Month is a good reminder to use that weight on purpose.

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