One of the characteristics I find most lacking in new managers is resilience; the ability to bounce back when things don’t go as planned.
All too often the sight and sound of an irritated, dissatisfied, or angry boss or customer, drives many young managers to thoughts of resignation. But it doesn’t have to be this way. By building up your eQ skills focusing on resilience, your life will be made immeasurably happier.
Overall more optimistic people tend to be more resilient- they view setbacks as temporary. That setbacks are a challenge to conquer. They don’t blame themselves when things don’t go their way. Such optimists take responsibility and address the situation but they never personalize the setback. If you have a high D or High I DISC profile then you probably have some resilience inbuilt into your behaviour preferences, but even those high D and High I could learn how to become more resilient.
Here are some ideas to build resilience.
1. Build Positive Beliefs in Your Abilities
Research has demonstrated that self-esteem plays an important role in coping with stress and recovering from difficult events. Remind yourself of your strengths and accomplishments. Becoming more confident about your own ability to respond and deal with crisis is a great way to build resilience for the future.
2. Embrace change as positive
Flexibility, with optimism, is an essential component of resilience. By learning how to be more adaptable, you’ll be better equipped to respond when faced with a life crisis. Resilient people often utilize these events as an opportunity to branch out in new directions. While some people may be crushed by abrupt changes, highly resilient individuals are able to adapt and thrive. If you are a high C, this may be antithetical to your behaviour preferences. You will seek to have control over your plans and any lack of control or change will bring some stress into your life. When decision making is outside of your ability to control, you can consider building the need for flexibility into your decision making structure. If you consider that there could be a change in plans as part of your plans you are then prepared to accept such a change. If inbuilt into your decision making- as opposed to a rigid single option- then you may be able to address the potential for change in a more proactive, less stressful, way.
3. Become more Optimistic
Staying optimistic during dark periods can be difficult, but maintaining a hopeful outlook is an important part of resiliency. Positive thinking does not mean ignoring the problem in order to focus on positive outcomes. It means understanding that setbacks are transient and that you have the skills and abilities (and if a high C the prepared alternate plans) to combat the challenges you face. What you are dealing with may be difficult, but it is important to remain hopeful and positive about a brighter future.
4. Develop better problem solving skills and use these
Research suggests that people who are able come up with solutions to a problem are better able to cope with problems than those who cannot. Whenever you encounter a new challenge, make a quick list of some of the potential ways you could solve the problem. Experiment with different strategies and focus on developing a logical way to work through common problems. By practicing your problem-solving skills on a regular basis, you will be better prepared to cope when a serious challenge emerges.
OK, so now you know how to enhance your personal resilience, how can you engender this in your team?
Here are a few suggestions.
1. Hire for Resilience
If you want a more resilient team, ensure those people you hire are optimistic, have a positive sense of their own ability, are able to cope with change and have great problem solving skills. So you are bringing in more resilient team members.
Additionally, these resilient team members will enable others to potentially display more resilience as the environment becomes more resilient.
2. Communicate your perspective and resolve.
Understand that leaders create meaning for followers. In times of trouble, team members will look to you for guidance. Help them to understand the new problem; communicate to them that a plan exists or will soon exist to address it; and communicate that they are part of the solution.
Should the challenge or problem affect the whole business, as the recent recession has, share your experience on how businesses have survived similar challenges in the past. Look for examples of how similar businesses coped in similar situations and share those. Illustrate your own personal resilience and reinforce your resolve to ensure the business gets through the challenge, with your teams help… its not just about you.
3. Support failure, and encourage people to learn.
Don’t meekly accept failure; ask what lessons can be learnt from it, and how can we evolve as managers or as a team in the face of this set back. Ask what could we have done differently- don’t second guess your team and criticise them. Informally, share war stories of how you have coped with failure in the past and how you have learnt from this. Remind people that failure is serious and should be avoided, but if failure visits, that its only temporary. Encourage your team to challenge how and why they think a certain way, then the resilience is likely to take root.
4. Be Prepared.
Ensure that the team is trained to consider what could potentially go wrong, so that they develop a skill of preparation both for going right and going wrong, and the flexibility in their plans to cope. At each meeting ask what could go wrong and what is the plan B for each likely situation (not every situation, but those that are probably going to happen and those high impact problems that could occur). Recognise that there will be potentially negative energy around a project or a customer or a situation, the team should not fall victim to this negativity but to re-frame this negativity as a spur to success.
Are you resilient, have your developed resilience, then why not share your war stories here.