Lessons in Leadership – Sample Section 2

Resilience and Adaptability

Elements of this leadership standard

7.1 Manages their time effectively and prioritises tasks to achieve goals.

7.2 Develops a clear vision and action plan to achieve goals, breaking them down into manageable tasks.

7.3 Uses time-management techniques such as scheduling, prioritising, and delegating tasks to achieve goals efficiently.

7.4 Demonstrates resilience and adaptability in the face of change and uncertainty.

7.5 Adapts to new situations and is able to bounce back from setbacks and failures.

7.6 Embraces change and uncertainty as opportunities for growth and learning.

7.7 Continuously evaluates their own performance and seeks feedback to improve.

When we are considering self-leadership, there are several elements which come under this which may be considered self-management.  Self-leadership and self-management are as closely linked as outwards leadership and management.

One of the first things we must consider is ‘resource management’ when it comes to ourselves, there are two key resources which we have to allocate when we are working: energy and time.  We have a limited energy and time budget which we can spend every day, and one thing to be aware of is that each day we may have different amounts available to us depending on how we feel, external factors which we cannot control, and the demands placed on us within our wider lives.

Let’s consider our budget in each of these areas as a stack of coins.  At the beginning of the day, we get our “daily allocation” depending on the quality of our sleep, our general health and wellbeing, and the time at which we wake up.  Our energy budget replenishes throughout the day whilst our time budget can only ever decrease.

How can we address our low energy budget, replenishing our energy store and ensure we reach the required level of productivity.  It may sound counter intuitive but the way to replenish our energy budget is to spend some of our time budget.  These techniques have been known for a long time:

• Taking a short break away from ‘work’, clearing your mind and slowing down, taking time to relax and clear the mind.

• Exercising, this can be as little as taking a short walk or as much as taking time to complete a work-out.  It may sound counter intuitive but exercising spends some energy and time in order to gain more energy.

• Reconnecting with nature or the world, this works in the same way as taking a break, however it is far more effective.  A large aspect of the practice of mindfulness is rooted in this. 

• Eating, it is a fundamental need of the human body to have fuel, however it is important we consider what we are eating in order to replenish our energy stores.  Sometimes a quick win such as a sugary treat may ‘spike’ our energy levels, but very quickly leads to a ‘crash’.

Why is this?  A healthier mind, body and soul can achieve far greater things than a drained vessel.  When we take time to look after ourselves, we reap the rewards of our efforts, as this benefits those around us, as well as ourselves.

When it does come to spending our time and energy budget throughout the day, we must consider the type of tasks which we can spend these on.  If we consider a four-quadrant model around time and energy, we find there are four different types of tasks.

• Tedious tasks – these are tasks which can be done in a fairly short amount of time and with very little energy requirement.  Sometimes these are known as admin tasks.  Examples may be signing off on something, scheduling a meeting, and checking your emails.

• Onerous tasks – these are tasks which take up larger allocations of time yet require little energy to complete.  Examples of which may be a phone call which needs to be made to follow up on something or an email which needs to be written to summarise the action points from a previous meeting.

• Arduous tasks – these are tasks which can be done in a fairly shot amount of time yet require significant amounts of energy to complete.  An example of which may be having a difficult conversation with a member of the team.

• Strenuous tasks – these are tasks which require both a significant amount of time as well as a significant amount of energy to be completed.  These tasks are big ones, the ones which take up the most amount of our budget in one go.  Examples of which may be holding a team meeting around a new task, initiative, or project, as well as casting a vision or having those regular one-to-one meetings (rather than a one-off meeting which would require less time allocation) with members of your team.  Each of these requires active input of energy and time, and they cannot be rushed or done half-heartedly in terms of achieving the same results.

Another of the four-quadrant models which is often used to help allocate our time budget over longer periods of time is the Eisenhower matrix.  This matrix does not use the time and energy dimensions, instead it uses urgency and importance.

Urgency is defined as the length of time in which we have to do a task, if it needs to be done very soon then it is immediately urgent, whilst if it can be put off in favour of other tasks then it is not urgent.  This is different to importance, as importance is a measure of the necessity of the task getting done on either ourselves, others, or the overall outcome of the work.  If the task itself does not resonate with any of these there is a question to be asked over the necessity for the task itself.  It could either be ignored and not impact on any of the stakeholders, or it could be used as a growth and development task for members of your team.

How importance is measured is a nuance in itself, this is in essence a measure of the value placed on the task by all those involved.  This could be an intrinsic value, where we have attached a level of self-description or self-esteem to the task, and therefore our self-reflection will take into account the outcome of the task.  Equally this could be an extrinsic value, whereby we recognise that others have attached a level of importance to the task, and therefore will feed into the measure of our self-evaluation within our self-reflection.The level to which we internalise the importance of a task depends on:

• The level of alignment of the task to our internal beliefs.

• The level of alignment of the task to the role in which we play within the organisation.

• The level to which we value the relationship with the individual setting the task.

• The level of influence, and therefore power held by the individual setting the task.

When all of these factors have been considered, it comes down to our self-management to determine how we allocate our time both in the short-term (today), medium-term (this week), and long-term (over the next month, quarter, year or even longer term).

One of the most common concepts which is used and shared around time-management is the concept of filling an empty jar using pebbles, gravel, and sand.  The analogy goes that if you were to fill the jar with sand first, then gravel and finally pebbles, you would not be able to fit as much in the jar as if you were to fill it with pebbles first, then gravel (allowing the gravel to fall into the gaps between the pebbles), before finally the sand (which will then fall and fill the smaller gaps the others could not).

Within this analogy, what are the grains of sand, the gravel, and the pebbles?

• Grains of sand – the low energy, low time tasks: tedious tasks.  Although these require the least amount of time and effort, they are the quick wins, and sometimes we can feel that getting these out of the way early helps us be more productive.  We also feel better getting things done and ticking tasks off our list, as such we can fall foul of doing these first and leaving the big, heavy tasks to the end.

• Gravel – the low energy, long time, or the high energy, low time tasks: either the onerous or arduous tasks.  These require more effort or time to complete and as such, more consideration needs to be put in to getting these done.  These tasks take more out of us to complete, and as such more consideration is needed to get them done.  We are more prepared to do these than the big, heavy tasks, but there is more commitment to be made before we will see results.

• Pebbles – the high energy, long time tasks: strenuous tasks.  These require a significant allocation of our budgets, and as such can sap away our budgets leaving little to no time or energy to get others done.  As such allocating fixed segments of time for these becomes very important.  If too much is spent on these in one go, then nothing is achieved, and this can be draining, and we can feel we are not being productive at all.

The idea of allocating our time (in terms of short, medium, and long-term) from the strenuous tasks through to the tedious tasks is obviously a very simplified view of things.  However, the concept holds a lot of weight and gives us an insight into the mindset behind how we might go about completing tasks.

In order to understand how and why we tend to avoid the strenuous tasks in favour for the tedious tasks, and therefore develop a process which may help, we must first ask the question, ‘what is the driver behind task avoidance and task completion itself?’

To garner a little bit of an insight, we need to consider our ‘happiness hormones’ (Endorphins, Dopamine, Serotonin and Oxytocin) alongside the two anxiety hormones (Adrenaline and Cortisol).  These six hormones are vital when we consider the motivations behind our actions.  However, firstly we need a brief (very simplified) description of what each does to our body and what causes their secretion.

• Endorphins – this is a short burst hormone, sometimes linked to achievement with regards to strenuous activities.  It is released when we feel pain or stress, and acts as a pain relief hormone, reducing the feeling of pain, reducing the feeling of stress and helps to improve our mood.

A common example of when this is experienced would be during or after exercise, it is responsible for the that boost we feel in our self-esteem when we a finished a workout.  This is also why exercise is vitally important to our stress management and therefore our productivity.

• Dopamine – this again is a short burst hormone and again is linked to the reward we feel from doing something.  It is released when we do something which we enjoy or complete a task.  It is also released when we enjoy a task, and therefore can be released when we feel relaxed as well as happy.

The release of this hormone acts to positively reinforce the activity or the completion of the task, however it is highly addictive.  Much of the modern world is built around this addictive nature of dopamine and therefore is keyed in to the ‘quick wins’ which release it in high doses and keeps us hooked to completing the task to experience more of it.

• Serotonin – this is hormone which is linked to the doing element of something.  This hormone plays a key function in regulating our moods, our sleep, our gut health as well as our general body health and repair alongside our sex drive.  It is released from a wide range of sources, including sunlight (and as a result is linked to season affective disorder), exercise, and our diet.

Serotonin is linked to happiness, focus and calmness.  The sudden rush of serotonin in our bloodstream is responsible for that feeling of a ‘runners high’.

• Oxytocin – this is a hormone linked to the feeling of belonging.  This hormone is associated with the feeling of trust, recognition, romantic connection, as well as sexual arousal.  Oxytocin also has a positive feedback loop on itself, in other words the increase in oxytocin within the body stimulates an increase in its production, whilst other hormones tend to do the opposite.

A low level of oxytocin is linked to depression.

Alongside these happiness hormones are the following two anxiety hormones which also come in to play in the workplace.

• Adrenaline – this is a hormone which is linked to our alertness.  This hormone is rapidly secreted into our body at times of stress and danger, this gets us to our fight or flight response.  Adrenaline is equally secreted during bouts of high anxiety.  The physiological response to adrenaline is a raised heart rate, faster breathing, a decrease in the rate of digestion as the body prepares for the glucose and oxygen in the blood to be utilised by the muscles, and an increase in alertness or tension.

Too much adrenaline, for too long, in our bloodstream can cause high blood pressure, an increase in heartrate, headaches, and increased levels of sweating.

• Cortisol – this is a steroid hormone which is linked to regulating our response to stress, and as a result is linked to our survival.  It helps the body to regulate its fat, protein, and carbohydrate stores.  It suppresses inflammation, regulates blood pressure, and plays an important role in our sleep cycle.

Some of the main physiological responses linked to cortisol, which is important here, is that after acute stress where the body has released adrenaline to become alert, the body may release cortisol to remain in ‘high alert’.  This increase in cortisol triggers the release of sugars from the liver to fuel this physiological response, equally it supresses the impact of insulin which is released by the pancreas to regulate the blood-sugar levels, which ultimately increases our blood-sugar levels, and if maintained for sustained periods could be a pre-curser to type-2 diabetes.

Additionally, although increased levels of cortisol reduce inflammation and can heightens the immune system, over short periods of time.  Prolonged periods of high cortisol can make the body used to these higher levels, and therefore leads to inflammation and a weakening of the immune system.  Equally, while the body wants to remain in homeostasis (have just the right level of cortisol), when cortisol levels are too high, this can lead to high blood pressure, whereas low blood pressure is linked to lower levels of cortisol.

A final element to consider here is the level of cortisol naturally should decrease in the evenings ready for sleep, and then peaks in the morning to wake us up.  High levels of cortisol in the blood can therefore disrupts the natural sleep cycle and can lead to disrupted and poor sleep, which is vital for a healthy body, such as damage repair, and in particular the healthy functioning of brain.

Dopamine and serotonin are closely linked, as serotonin is associated with the doing of a task, while dopamine is linked to the reward which comes from completing the task.  One of the key tell-tale signs of these two is our appetite.  Serotonin is an appetite suppressor as it helps us to get a task done without the ‘interruption’ or ‘distraction’ of eating, whilst dopamine is the opposite, it increases our feeling of hunger as it is linked to the completion of the task and therefore, we are biologically ready to eat.  Too much dopamine in our system and it can overpower our serotonin, and therefore cause us to binge eat.

When we bring in the two anxiety hormones, adrenaline and cortisol (which are also closely linked to each other), then there can be a large adverse health impact.  With high dopamine levels, and a consistently high adrenaline and therefore cortisol level, our bodies blood sugar levels are consistently high.  The body gets used to this level and therefore experiences massive ‘crashes’ which therefore increases the sugar cravings, which paired by the high dopamine in our body results in a positive feedback loop and an increased risk of type-2 diabetes.

It is important here to understand that these hormones are (a) natural and (b) necessary for normal everyday living.  Therefore, we should not consider them ‘bad’ or ‘destructive’ to our health.  Instead, it is about “bio-hacking” and understanding how our bodies respond to different tasks.

When we consider our motivation to get tasks completed, and the types of tasks which we are motivated to complete.  When we consider these six hormones, we can see why it is we are more motivated to complete the tedious tasks than the strenuous tasks.

Let’s consider a situation where we arrive at work, we have our to-do list from the day before and an inbox waiting to be read.  What’s the first thing we usually do?  We open our inbox and see the unread messages, this is a quick and easy task to do, to settle us in to our day.  Our body responds to this with a dopamine hit, and with each unread message which is cleared we again respond with more dopamine.

Several of the emails are quite hard hitting, and the language within them can be taken as an ‘attack’, telling us there are ‘urgent’ things to complete and we must ‘prioritise’ and ‘complete’ these as soon as possible.  The urgent and important nature of these tasks triggers an adrenaline response, heightening our anxiety level and readying us for action.  The nature of some of these tasks could be longer term, lasting several hours rather than simply a couple of minutes.  The biological response to this sustained urgency is to trigger an increase in cortisol to increase the blood sugar levels and maintain this readiness.  This is all within the first few minutes of our day!

Now, let’s say we have also had a coffee that morning, this is important as the caffeine within the coffee acts to inhibit the uptake of adenosine, which is another hormone used to calm our body and relax the brain.  Instead, the caffeine has blocked the adenosine receptors in the brain, causing a sustained alertness.  Why does this matter?  Well, combine the high dopamine levels, which has triggered our cortisol levels to increase, and our blood sugar levels to raise with this high alertness, and we are close to peak performance!

Therefore, we are biologically within the “comfort zone” and potentially beyond depending on the level of adrenaline and cortisol we have in our system.  The extent of this could be impacted on by what else has happened before we even arrived at work, such as the commute or the morning routine with a young family.

This biological readiness is a natural response which we have evolved over millennia in order to be ‘ready for the hunt’ and is utilised by many athletes.  This biological response is perfect for sprinters, ready on the blocks, about to start a race.  Their alertness is up, their blood sugar levels are high, and their body is able to respond and perform at their peak.

An athlete moves from this ‘readiness’ to a ‘performing’ state, their body is therefore flooded with endorphins and serotonin.  Both of these hormones cause a positive response in the body, to ‘reward’ us for the action and “survival” as these are again happiness hormones.  The serotonin enters the bloodstream ready for when the action is complete, it is there to help repair the body from the results of the action itself and can produce the feeling of enjoyment for the action.  The endorphins flood the body with a pain reliever in order to be able to continue performing the action as well as a stress reliever, which reduces the levels of adrenaline and cortisol in the body once the activity is done.  These two hormones are our bodies natural systems to help reduce the level of stress and regulate it.  The physical act of doing also helps to reduce the blood sugar levels, as the ‘readiness’ of the body increased the blood sugar levels in order to actually perform a physical activity.

Unlike an athlete, sitting at our desk at work, reaching this ‘readiness’ state, we have no physical activity to do, we have no mechanism or physical exertion to reduce the blood sugar levels, and the endorphins and serotonin are significantly delayed and to a much lower level than an athlete.

The role of oxytocin is to encourage us to socialise, to do acts for each other and to work together towards a shared outcome.  This was biologically favourable for us to evolve, as working together we are more capable that doing things alone.  Human beings who worked together, were more likely to survive and therefore it was favourable to have this hormone as a motivator.  Team sports utilise this as well as some organisations, however the recent advent of remote working can cause a removal of this hormone being associated with our working lives and instead causes it to be solely associated with our personal lives.

So, going back to our situation, we have reached this ‘readiness’ state known as “eustress”.  This is good for being able to perform, however if maintained for too long can have detrimental impacts on our health.  Our natural response to “eustress” is to achieve outcomes in order to release endorphins, and to get on with doing something to release serotonin.

However, when faced with the list of possible tasks, the quickest way to both do, and achieve are the “tedious tasks” which take little effort and time, and as such with each task completed will also provide us with the biological reward of a dopamine hit!  This is a motivational hack which our body has learnt, in order to experience an emotional boost from these hormones.  The primary hormone here is dopamine, as the level of effort for these tasks is low and therefore the achievement (endorphins) and effort (serotonin) are both low.

When we prioritise our tasks, we can utilise our biological response in order to be as productive as possible, as well as effective!  Let’s once again look at our four-quadrant model around time and energy, however this time looking at the hormonal response for each of these.

From here we have the following ideas:

• Dopamine is high for all task completion.
• Serotonin is high when energy required is high.
• Endorphins is high when either time is long, or energy required is high.
• When time is long, the release of dopamine and endorphins are delayed.

In our state of eustress which came about after checking our to-do list and our emails in the morning, alongside our added alertness from our caffeine intake, how should we look to prioritise our tasks and therefore “bio-hack” our productivity and effectiveness?

In this state of ‘readiness’, we should look to complete some tasks which produce high levels of serotonin, for example arduous or strenuous tasks.  This serotonin will motivate us to keep ‘doing’ and complete the task.  Should we be in a higher stress state, potentially in ‘distress’, we should look to reduce our anxiety hormone levels by completing some arduous tasks which will quickly release the happiness hormones, in particular the endorphins necessary to reduce stress.

As we complete these tasks, our ‘feel-good’ factor will increase due to the happiness hormone release.  When it comes to the strenuous or onerous tasks, which take a long time and delay the release of dopamine and endorphins, we should look to “chunk” these into smaller tasks, these could then end up being arduous tasks which result in a quicker release of the happiness hormones and a reduction in the anxiety hormones.

Should these strenuous or onerous tasks not be able to be chunked up, another way to “bio-hack” these tasks, particularly as a leader, is to make these group tasks, working with others and building a social connection with your team.  This will increase the oxytocin levels in our systems, increasing the happiness linked to belonging.  This will also have the added benefit of increasing the release of this within those in your charge!

When your energy levels are low, and you are short of time, and yet in need of a “pick-me-up” or a little boost of motivation, this is when the tedious tasks can get completed.  This will increase your dopamine levels, and therefore increase your motivation to complete some bigger tasks such as the arduous tasks, which can then be used as a motivational booster to move on to the strenuous or onerous tasks.

This “biohacking” has an added bonus of increasing our resilience.  If we define resilience as the ability to withstand adversity and bounce back from difficulties, then utilising the happiness hormones can increase our motivation to do just that; face challenges and ‘go again’.  Note here that resilience does not mean to never experience heightened anxiety or struggle, instead it is being able to work through it.  Biologically, high stress and anxiety is linked to high levels of adrenaline, chronic stress is linked to high levels of cortisol.  Therefore, biologically, we need to ensure we increase the extent and regularity of our body’s exposure to endorphins through achievement!

Outside of the workplace, it may seem obvious to say, but nearly all of these happiness hormones (in particular serotonin and endorphins) are linked to not only a healthy diet but also exercise.  Regular exercise is vital to a healthy body and mind, as well as emotional stability linked to the body’s response to these hormones.

Several organisations are now starting to see the benefits of encouraging their workforce to attend the gym and exercise as a perk/benefit.  Equally, some are actually building gyms on site and encouraging their employees to exercise throughout the day, this helps to regulate the bodies adrenaline and cortisol levels, and actually increase the resilience to high stress situations!

Another motivational factor which we must consider within self-leadership is that of the long-term plan.  When we consider our careers, most of us have an idea of where we want to reach and what we are hoping to achieve.  This ‘future-self’ is an extreme version of our ‘ideal-self’.  The real and ideal selves are a measure of now, whilst the future-self is where we are aiming to get to.

All three of these are transient, they move all the time.  We have seen in the first section of this chapter how our real-self and ideal-self are measured against one another, and how this leads to our self-evaluation.

Short term self-actualisation comes from closing the gap between our real-self and our ideal-self through incremental learning and development.  However, as an individual and a leader, we should be looking at a development plan for ourselves which we can measure our ideal-self against.  This requires a clear personal vision for ourselves, a future-self.  This allows for a greater level of self-actualisation and a sense of purpose.

If we now consider the same concept of real-self, ideal-self and future-self, but now on a timeline towards an over-arching vision we hold for ourselves.  We can build the following model:

Within this model we have the following components:

• The island on the left: this is where we started our journey.
• The island on the right: this is the over-arching vision we have for ourselves.
• The cloud: this is the uncertainty which naturally shrouds the future, making it slightly unclear and over time reveals that our perception of the future may have been incomplete or inaccurate.
• The water: this is the ongoing challenge which we need to navigate, and is transient in nature with respect to the daily ‘weather’ and changing ‘conditions’.  In terms of our lives, this “choppiness” is caused by all the interconnected nature of the world we live in.
• The sharks: these are the big challenges and dangers which can crop-up along the way, these come and go and are things we need to be wary of along the way.

Within the model, the path from where we started to where we are going is represented by the dashed line.  This is our developmental process which is required to get us to our over-arching vision.  Along this path lies different steps, which are associated with changes we need to make; these changes could be knowledge, behaviours or skills.  The “now” represents our real-self, the “next” represents our ideal-self, and the “soon” represents our future-self.

Depending on how far into the future we cast our minds, our future-self will move further towards the over-arching vision, however it could equally get clouded by the uncertainty represented by the cloud itself.  Also, by moving this further away, we also find that a greater extent of challenge lies between (more water) as well as more of the big challenges.

So, how can we make these small changes along the way?

These small changes along the way require intentional development and will not happen without effort being put in.  In terms of the change here, there is a cyclic process which must happen for each step, involving learning new knowledge, developing new behaviours, practicing to develop new skills and the process of self-evaluation, which we have seen measures our real-self against our ideal-self.

This process I have used to develop what I call the LAMDA Way.

• Learn:  this first step covers the learning new knowledge phase and can take place through reading, workshops or even observing others.

• Experiment:  this second step covers the develop behaviour phase, and involves applying the new knowledge within our contexts, seeing where this knowledge can become behaviours which we can identify with.

• Adapt:  this third step covers the first part of the practice skill phase, where our experimenting with new concepts and ideas turns into internalisation, where we have developed individualised behaviours.

• Develop:  this fourth step covers the second part of the practice skill phase, where we have not only internalised the ideas, but through continual practice we have identified with the behaviours, and they have become part of who we are and what we do.  In essence we have changed our real-self.

• Empower:  this fifth step is where, as a leader we have learnt through our development, that we must encourage others to develop.  This covers the last part of the practice skill phase, as a leader is never developing themselves without developing others.

• Reflect:  this sixth step covers the self-evaluate phase, where we reflect on our development and measure real-self against our ideal-self.  Only when this is done can we achieve a measure of self-actualisation and then consider moving our ideal-self closer towards our future-self.

As mentioned in the empower section above, it is important as a leader to understand the role and importance of empowering others.  This is a key element of self-leadership, as it requires acknowledging that our development as a leader is intrinsically linked to the development of those in our charge.  

The higher levels of leadership which we must look to develop, increases the level of “interactive influence” which we foster.  We therefore need to acknowledge several factors which contributes to this “interactive influence”.

• All leaders are incomplete leaders:  we can only develop as a leader when we acknowledge that we will never be the best at everything, and ultimately, we do not need to be.

• Effective leaders are secure leaders:  a secure leader surrounds themself with those who compliment them rather than conform to them.  We must acknowledge that we all have a skillset, which when the right combination comes together can create a complete team, and surrounding ourselves with others who are just like us brings nothing more to the team.

• The team develops when the leader develops:  when we develop as a leader, we develop our avenues of influence, and therefore the extent to which those in our charge can develop.

• The leader develops from the team:  the greatest source of development is from those in your charge.  Leadership is ultimately down to the building, nurturing, and maintaining of the relationships which you have with those in your charge.  The best way to learn how to lead an individual, is from that individual themselves.  Actively listening, observing, and reflecting, will reveal a greater depth of knowledge than from any other source.  Utilising this avenue of learning as a cornerstone of your development will propel your development exponentially.

• Nothing is precious to an effective leader:  humility and transparency is vital to effective leadership.  We must not hold on to information which would benefit the team, knowledge is the root of all development and therefore sharing knowledge allows for the development of the team.  Additionally, no task requires the sole intervention of us as the leader.  Delegation allows for development, and thus a higher level of leadership.

• Effective leaders grow leaders:  the development of a leader requires them to develop those who will follow them on the development pathway.  This is encapsulated in the concept of developing your successor.  When you develop leaders, you have a much greater wake of influence than developing followers.

So, what is the greatest way to empower and develop those in your charge?  Effective delegation. When we do not hold any information or task precious, and instead look to grow and develop those in our charge, we reach much greater levels of leadership.

As such, a level of security in ourselves is needed, to acknowledge both our strengths and our shortcomings, and embracing the strengths of those in our charge.  We must realise that their skillset completes us as a leader, and we should therefore look to selflessly develop these individuals by empowering them, challenging them, and delegating to them.

As we have seen, being resilient and adaptable requires acknowledging the necessity for change.  All change, big or small, requires openness and acceptance. However, to achieve this, we must first understand where the resistance for change comes from as an individual.

The most intuitive model for this comes from the Kubler-Ross change curve.  This itself is modelled from the grief curve, as grief is ultimately a huge change.  When we grieve, we are coming to terms with a huge change in our lives, and the ideas and expectations we had for the future.

The stages of which are:

• Shock:  this is our first gut response as this brings in to question our ideal and future selves.  The news of the change causes surprise and there is a huge mismatch between our expectations of the future and the new, uncertain reality.

• Denial:  the first reaction after the initial shock is to question the necessity of the change, we are still tied to the vision of the future which we had initially held, and any deviation makes no sense initially.  We become defiant in this stage, and we become resolute in our conviction around the need for a change, increasing our measure of self-esteem.

• Awareness:  as we start to get left behind by the change, we become more aware of the need for the change to occur.  This added clarity can lead to self-doubt, as we question our self-image and our internal beliefs surrounding the change.  This questioning ourselves can lead to frustration, anger and confusion.

• Acceptance:  we are starting to get carried along with the change, as we do so we begin to let go of the past, where we felt comfortable and our knowledge of the way we did things was secure.  We begin to accept the uncertainty associated with the change and the need for our attitudes and behaviours to change.

• Experimentation:  upon accepting the necessity for the change we begin to work on changing our internal beliefs associated with the change.  We are now dealing head-on with the new reality by testing how new approaches and skills reflect our internal beliefs.

• Searching:  where new ideas and approaches do not reflect our internal beliefs, we start to look for meaning in the new change, looking to adjust our internal beliefs in the light of the change.  Here we look for an understanding for the reasons for the change, we start to form a measure of success and failure associated with the change.

• Integration:  finally, we have come to terms with the change that has been implemented, and in doing so we have developed new skills, attitudes and behaviours aligned with the change, and these reflect our adapted internal beliefs.

This process is universal to all, however the speed at which we progress through these changes varies and the length of time we spend in each stage equally varies.

For example, we might identify the need for a change within ourselves based on some feedback which we have received.  By this point, we have already gone through the first three stages of this change curve.  We would have initially experienced the shock and denial stages, this could have even occurred before the feedback was received, as potentially we went through these in our minds when we were seeking the feedback in the first instance.  We were open to needing a change and our shock and denial had been dealt with internally.

As a result, the feedback acts as a form of awareness (or even confirmation of an awareness).  We still need to address the acceptance phase, no matter how open to change we are.  We need to accept that a part of who we were and how we were doing things needs to change.  As a result of the feedback and accepting the feedback, which could all have happened within a few minutes, we then have an experimentation, searching and integration phase which could take a significant amount of time depending on the extent of the change needed and how unfamiliar or unaligned the change is compared to our internal beliefs.

Christopher Waters

Founder of LAMDA Solutions