The 60-Second Reset — How to Shift Your State Before It Shifts Your Team

The 60-Second Reset — How to Shift Your State Before It Shifts Your Team

From The Leader's Kitbag by Ben Morton

June 3, 2026 · 6 min

About this episode

This episode discusses how a leader's emotional state can impact their team and offers techniques to reset before meetings.

In this episode of The Leaders Kitbag, I explore something that most leaders experience but rarely address: walking into a meeting still carrying the weight of the one before it. Research on emotional contagion tells us that your team picks up on your state within seconds of you walking into a room. If you’re stressed, distracted, or mentally still in the last conversation, that transmits, and it affects everyone’s performance, not just yours. The good news is that while you can’t always control what happens to you, you can control what you do in the moments before you show up for your people. I share two simple breathing techniques, and more importantly, a practical way to actually remember to use them. Because knowing about a technique and building it into your day are two very different things. In this episode, you will learn: Why your emotional state spreads to your team faster than you realise What’s happening in your nervous system when you’re under pressure, and how to reverse it quickly One simple breathing technique you can use in under sixty seconds Why most people know about these techniques but don’t use them, and how to close that gap A straightforward habit to build…

People in this episode

Host: Ben Morton

Topics covered

  • emotional contagion
  • leadership
  • breathing techniques
  • team performance
  • stress management

Keywords

  • emotional state
  • breathing techniques
  • team dynamics
  • leadership skills
  • performance improvement

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