As I’m writing this, it’s my husband’s last day of work before his retirement. It’s also the day before his 70th birthday. The past few weeks have included signing up for Medicare, applying for Social Security benefits, and fitting in medical appointments that may not be covered after his health insurance ends. And that doesn’t even include being on the verge of starting construction on our house.
Reduce the Pain of Organizational Change
Quick question: As a leader, how many change efforts are you currently part of? Chances are, it’s at least one. Maybe your organization is switching to a new technology. Or scaling up, down or restructuring. Adjusting to a hybrid workplace. Rolling out a new DEIA initiative. Even the loss or addition of a team member can be a considerable change since it requires realigning roles and relationships.
What are the chances that any one of these efforts will be completely successful? Pretty slim, actually. While there are many contributing factors, one of the most fundamental is human resistance to change.
How to Reduce Resistance to Change
Every day, it seems like the taken-for-granted foundations of our lives are crumbling. Sometimes, it’s a sad loss and other times it’s an opportunity for a fresh start. But the initial reaction to this persistent uncertainty—threat, fear, resistance—is pretty much a given.
The human brain strives to maximize certainty and predictability as a central driver of behavior. In the presence of ambiguity, people fill in knowledge gaps with fear. Even the smallest change can be experienced as a threat and activate the flight or flight response.
What's Your Engine for Success?
December 2001 was a time of great turmoil in the world and in my life. The world was still reeling from the events of 9/11 and its consequences. I had just learned that the nonprofit training and consulting business I ran was about to lose the majority of its funding literally overnight. I was faced with the question of whether to stay and rebuild the organization or go out on my own.
How to Get Your Family to Clean the Attic: A Leadership Lesson
Meet Jeanine.
Jeanine has a really big change initiative in the works. Here she is in her own words:
“This may not sound like a big deal but I need to rally my family to clean out the attic before winter comes. We’ve got 25 years of stuff stored up there: Christmas decorations, luggage, the kids’ old sports equipment, and who knows what else. We haven’t been able to move around up there for years. Plus it’s really dusty and we’ve got mice and birds in there.
I’ve tackled organizational change efforts with fewer moving parts than this one!
Why Feedback Goes Awry and What To Do About It
Have you ever offered unsolicited feedback and had it blow up in your face?
Or spent hours preparing what you wanted to say then had it land badly even though you sugarcoated it?
Or tried time and again to get your point across about how someone’s behavior negatively affected you…only to end up in yet another “groundhog day” argument?