The momentum of change continues to build. If you or the company you work with isn’t ready for continuing change then you risk the chance of becoming overwhelmed and left for dead by the Superhighway of existence! This dramatic metaphor is reported by the predictors of economic and business trends. With technologies and Globalization of commerce driving these trends, we have to learn how to adapt, gracefully, to this shift or be playing the very tough role of catch-up.
Let’s start
To illustrate my point, have you detect some changes to your work or family life in the past 30 years? Perhaps you only need to go back ten years. Think back to the late 1980’s, home computers were just catching on in a big way (productivity in the home, not just games.) Fax machines were starting to be utilized on a regular basis in small and large offices. You could still buy phonograph records. Pagers were yanking. Cellular phones weren’t an industry, yet. E-mail was rare outside corporate media systems and high tech companies. Cable TV offered 20 choices of programming.
The internet wasn’t widely known or used outside of military and academic organizations. I will bet you that even in case you haven’t updated into this high tech world, at a personal level, you end up driving down the street with another driver being distracted by the mobile phone conversation which he’s engaged in, rather than full attention to driving. Some of us are really, techno-phobic about the intimidating speed of change to a technology driven world. This impacts business, education, and even social activities.
Let’s understand it
Your children may learn more about the internet or computer technology than you do, and if they don’t, they’re either too young or in danger of missing the”ship” Techno-phobia is an anxiety related disorder that may make people uncomfortable, maybe unable to operate, in the business world. The rivalry for dominance in business has pushed all of the peoples of the planet into a race for excellence in high-technology.
The speed of the change is increasing exponentially. The upcoming obvious reality is that we aren’t physically evolving at a rate that can keep up with this efficiently driven evolutionary tendency. We still have a crude shift reaction mechanism, the flight-fight response, embedded inside us. This governs how we automatically react to the stress of change. What human beings have going for survival is that we’re adaptable. But the speed and demand for adaptation has generally outstripped our skills to keep up with the speed of change.
Did you know?
Younger employees may be more resilient to change and feel quite good about the exciting new developments, but in mid-life and for us “Baby-Boomers,” the resilience and flexibility might be giving way to the aches and insecurities of our decreased adaptation attributes. There are always examples of “genetic-immunes” who give most mortals a bad rap and feelings of guilt since they’re so good at adapting to change. Knowing this, the balance of the chapter will be spent on supplying advice and techniques for managing change more. We can’t stop it, or typically, control it, but we can learn how to respond more appropriately.
By being aware of how we react to change and engaging in preventive actions, we can minimize, if not remove, the signs of stress and overwhelm. Both keys will be consciousness and after that appropriate and beneficial self-care. First, know what transition and change could be like for you as a single reaction. You have to determine how you respond in your own private way to change. Do you feel anxious about the changes swirling around you? Do you lose sleep thinking about these events? Maybe you have become aware that you lose focus or are distracted more easily once you end up in a period of change? Is anger or frustration nearer to the surface when you’re in the middle of changes? Does your stomach act up or do your shoulders or jaw get tight as a response to external changes? Read or reread the first chapter of the “Guide to Stress Reduction” (Celestial Arts, Berkeley, CA) to better understand the consequences of stress and change. Take the self-guided strain tests.
Note this!
Note the physical and psychological signs of anxiety that you are most likely to manifest. This can enable you to understand which systems you’ll have to learn how to control to lessen the effects of change on your lifestyle and work. Remember these physical and psychological reactions are extremely primitive and all wholesome individuals have these responses constructed in for survival. Awareness of these routines and your particular way of responding can provide you some control over when you respond and how you react to change. When you analyze the Social Readjustment Rating Scale (in chapter one) notice that favorable, even enjoyable, experiences could be ranked as anxiety manufacturers.
Any adaptation, be it negative or positive, needs your habits or lifestyle to change and this can upset your crude response mechanisms forcing them in a stress reaction that may rob you of health or efficacy. As examples; a new job, a change in job duties, an addition to your loved ones, or perhaps change in your house may all be seen as very positive and these may prove stressful as you adapt to these new improvements. Since you can’t avoid the stress of change and you don’t want isolate yourself from favorable change, you need to learn how to control how you react to these new circumstances. Later in this chapter, there’ll be easy reminders of strategies about comfort, diet, and exercises you could adopt to minimize the effects of change. These are brief outlines from other chapters in this book that you might want to study.
The four phases
There are four phases of change which have been commonly identified: Denial, Resistance, Exploration-Emerging, and Commitment. Remember, with the phases of Denial, Resistance, and Emerging you or your company might be exposed to a devastating decrease in productivity. Regardless of whether you’re in manufacturing, customer service, or research and development; productivity, efficiency, creativity, communication, team work, and certainly “attention” can be diminished if not brought to a resounding halt for a response to change in your life or your business’s operation.
In the first phase, Denial, the common responses to modifications would be to pretend that things will only go on and be the same. Assumptions it will just”go away” or be over soon can become apathy or numbness. Managers want the problems to go away, but unless they are addressed at a pro-active manner, the procedure can take a long time and slow the entire process of change. The top managers will continue to convey about the change and what’s going to happen. Suggestions of effective actions can be provided and then allow time for them to sink . Then follow up with a planning session which will place the preparations for change to action. The next stage is resistance.
Symptoms of the stage surface in several negative forms. Increased anger or disagreements or worse a withdrawal from the group can happen. People can shed sleep. Workers may believe that they’re treated unfairly, having given their best and never make certain they will survive the coming changes. Self-doubt, anxiety, depression, frustration and anxiety often increase.
Productivity
It goes way down as the group flounders. Personnel complain and start to work on their resumes. Sickness, injuries, missed work can frequently increase. In a company with inadequate communication and weak direction, this might not be addressed in a direct manner. People will need to come together and communicate to not be isolated with their anxieties and angers. Each individual has to be made to feel part of the eventual change and understand their role in the successful results of change.
Managers should exercise decent listening and acknowledge the feelings expressed. Supportive, encouraging, and empathetic responses by managers is a really successful strategy in this phase. Be warned, that as a supervisor/manager, it doesn’t serve the business by slowing the change process by trying to talk people out of feelings or simply by telling them to”change” or”pull together.” People will need to vent their frustration and fear with no judgments made against them. Social activities like picnics, luncheons, awards can help enhance communication and community. Even rituals of letting go of the past and the elderly, familiar ways have to be acknowledged and released to make way for the new programs.
Remember
A wholesome acknowledgment that you’re all in the process of change together and that there are ordinary fears and distress as a response to these developments. Exploration/Emerging is another phase that follows immunity. It’s positive because the energy within an organization can start to flow again. The issues are with this released energy there’s often uncertainty and chaos. People suffer with frustration, confusion, a lot of new ideas, too much to do, over prep and lack of the ability to concentrate. For certain folks who need structure to work well, there’s little or none since the change has eliminated the foundations of older styles of work.
Creative energy is necessary to capitalize on the future developments. New teams can start to form with strong bonds forged by common confusion and uncertain focus. As a new form begins to emerge managers must focus on priorities, follow up on projects, provide needed training, set short term objectives, and run brainstorming, visionary, and planning sessions. This can help to lead to the last stage of Commitment. This can be viewed as the positive developments of teamwork, satisfaction, and clear attention take place. Teams are now ready to refocus on a strategy by recreating their mission statement and then constructing their action plans to achieve their objectives. Adaptation takes place and information ways to work collectively develop. New functions are established.
Success
Successful team members will identify with the new pair of goals and be more clear on how best to reach these goals. A good supervisor will now focus on team building and validate/reward individuals that are reacting to the changes in positive ways. To expedite the change process gracefully the skillful manager will be meticulous about great communication during this procedure. When people are unsure about the changes they’re experiencing, poor communication permits fears to grow and sends the wrong message.
Support and full, honest disclosure is important and can accelerate the change procedure. If you’re managing or supervising a group of individuals, you have the chance to develop your abilities and skills of communicating. Communication training should be a continuous procedure. New employees or jobs create continued challenges to the practice of excellent communication. The following suggestions are extremely short and do provide the experiential methods which are necessary for older, less effective patterns to be altered. If you’re in a position of leading your business, don’t neglect this most important societal area.
Final note
Good communication starts with getting and not transmitting. Most issues with communication, be they work associated or from personal relationships, come from the inability of one or more of those people involved to take part in the practice of listening. A distracting thought or schedule may keep people from focusing on what’s being said from the interaction. If you are thinking about your answer/response then you’re distracted from the current communication.
Good listening is difficult, particularly when there are tough psychological issues such as survival from the communication. To be an effective listener, you want to do more than listen to the words, you want to know about all of the non-verbal messages which are included. Body language such as facial expressions, shoulders/arms, voice tones and loudness, eye contact, even rate of respiration can tell you a great deal in a communication. People will need to be acknowledged and to be valued.
