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Do you tend toward tears? Join the hankie club: 41 percent of women (and 9 percent of men) have shed tears at work in the previous year, says Anne Kreamer, author of It’s Always Personal: Emotion in the New Workplace (she co-conducted a national poll). “People at every level of management cry,” Anne told us. “Crying does not prevent a person from being successful.”
In fact, she says, “Crying is the most effective biological reset button we have. When we cry, we produce dopamine, a neuro-transmitter that helps elevate our moods. And we reduce the amount of prolactin in our body—we actually give ourselves the ability to reboot emotionally.”
All well and good, but don’t we need a little damage control? “You don’t have to apologize,” Anne says. “If you cry in a meeting, you can just say, ‘Look, I need a second. I’m going to walk around the block. Give yourself space to compose yourself, as opposed to trying to sit there and suck it up. If you’re one-on-one, you can say, “We’ve obviously touched a nerve here. Can I take a moment to pull myself together?”
Now that we know our waterworks haven’t wrecked our reputations, we’re so happy we could….well, pass the tissue.
—For more on It’s Always Personal: Emotion in the New Workplace, go to annekreamer.com
