Leaders adapt to change.
We have all heard someone say that leaders adapt to change, but there is a huge disconnect between believing in adapting to change and actually going through with it. Adapting to change can be the hardest thing you have to deal with as a leader, especially if you have to lead other people through a change.
1. Don’t make it personal
When change happens, a good leader does not take it personally. Often, change is outside of our control. Something happened in the outside world that has affected the way you do your job. If the change is part of a bigger trend, either in your organization or in the larger world outside of your corporation, there is nothing you can do about it and you need to accept that the world is not out to get you.
In other circumstances, change might be completely within your control and you have had to make the choice to make a change in your organization or team. It might be a change to a structure or a process, but it heavily affects the way you do your job. Even if it is within your control, change can still be difficult. As a leader, even if it is a difficult choice, you still have to own it, but that does not mean you make it personal. If someone disagrees with your change, do not make it a personal vendetta. I will be talking more in a future post about how to win your team over on large-scale changes.
Sometimes change comes from someone in leadership over you. Whether a boss, manager, or Board of Directors, this leadership figure dictates a change that directly impacts you and your team. Regardless of whether this change has a positive or negative impact on you, remember again to not make it personal. Business decisions are rarely (and should never be) made based on personal feelings toward someone else. Your boss is not out to get you, so don’t think that he/she is.
In very rare instances, a change might be made that affects you that is, indeed, personal in nature. For example, you may get laid off simply because you have a personality clash with your supervisor, or you have an emotionally-unstable boss who has made a rash decision based on personal feelings rather than reason. This is so rare that if you think this has happened to, it probably hasn’t and you took a business decision far too personally. But, in the rare cases where this does happen, my advice is, again, don’t take it personally.
When you make change personal, you are building emotional walls and attachments that have no place in leadership. Emotional responses lead to people getting hurt. If you make a personal connection with changes occurring in your organization, not only do you risk hurting yourself, but you risk hurting your team. Yes, you should take ownership and buy into the mission and vision of your organization, but do not make changes personal.
2. Remember to breathe
Change often brings stress. After all, people are hard-wired to be cautious of change and to desire consistency and routine. There is security in familiarity, and when your security is threatened, you experience stress.
The most important thing you can do in a stressful situation is to take care of yourself.
Sometimes you just need to stop what you’re doing and focus on breathing. You need to deal with this stress before it burns you out. You have enough problems without adding mental health to the list.
I have written about mental health before and will continue to do so because your mental health is vitally important. You cannot be a leader if you cannot take care of yourself. Sometimes simple breathing exercises are enough to help you manage the stress. Sometimes you might need to seek professional help. The good news is that there are many options available to you in between breathing exercises and professional help.
3. Imagine the opportunities
It is easy to get stuck on the negatives when considering change. While this is a common conception, it is a narrow-minded view of change.
With change comes opportunity.
In a new environment, you will have new opportunities available to you. Consider the story of Andre De Grasse, Canadian Olympic sprinter and winner of two Olympic medals in the 2016 Rio Olympics.
Before he became a world-class sprinter competing with the likes of Usain Bolt, De Grasse was a high school basketball guard in Markham, Ontario. In his final year of high school, his school was unable to put together a roster for a basketball team, so De Grasse’s senior basketball year vanished.
Without basketball, De Grasse ended up competing at a track meet, something he had never done before. He ran the 100 metre sprint in 10.90 seconds. His performance caught the attention of a professional sprint coach, and De Grasse’s whirlwind ride to the top of professional sprinting took off.
Change is inevitable. There will come a time in your career that something will happen that dramatically changes your situation, or even your career. Always remember that with change comes opportunity. Andre De Grasse would never have won two Olympic medals in 2016 if he had chosen to mope about his school’s lack of a basketball team. Instead he accepted the change and took advantage of a new opportunity. Today he is one of the world’s elite sprinters.
4. Maintain your vision
At the end of the day, your vision is what defines your success. Everything else can change, as long as your vision remains absolute.
The organization with which you work should have an overarching vision. Any changes made to organizational structure or processes should be made in order to better achieve the goals set out in the corporate vision. If you are bought into your organization’s vision, you need to frame these changes in a way that asks, “How will these changes help us achieve the goals set out in our vision?”
This can be a huge roadblock for some people. I have been in a situation where an organization I was working with went through a structural change that I did not support (this has happened to me several times, but I am thinking of one instance in particular). At the end of the day I had to get past my personal biases against the change and ask if these changes would help us better reach the goals we had set for ourselves. When I realized that the changes would have a positive impact on the vision, it was easier for me to accept and embrace the changes.
You should also have a personal vision for your own life, a place that you want to be with goals of how to get there. Ask yourself, “Will this new change have an effect on my personal vision?” If the change provides new opportunities, it may even help your personal vision.
There is still the possibility that this change will have a negative impact on either the corporate vision or your personal vision.
If the changes affecting your organization do not harmonize with the corporate vision, you should expect your organization to face an identity crisis in the near future.
This is an issue that needs to be addressed by the leadership, either in amending the corporate vision or removing the change. If you are not in a decision-making capacity, it is still your responsibility as a leader to express your concerns to someone who does have the authority to make these decisions.
If corporate leadership decides to not address the issue, your corporate identity and vision could be in jeopardy. At that point it is up to you to decide if you want to continue working with the organization.
In situations where your personal vision conflicts with the new corporate policies/environment, you face a similar crisis. It is up to you to decide if you want to compromise your vision, change your vision, or leave the organization.
There are times, too, when your vision must change. For Andre De Grasse, he had to change his vision from basketball to sprinting. Even Walt Disney changed his vision several times; he began with cartoon shorts, which evolved into cartoon feature films, which eventually evolved into designing and building his own theme parks.
As long as you remain true to yourself, your vision can change.
Just remember that changing your vision will take a lot of work and a lot of soul-searching.
If you are in charge of a corporate vision, then there may be certain situations where your corporate vision must be altered to accommodate a new situation. Once again, such a change should only take place if it is in the best interest of the organization and if it maintains the spirit of the corporate vision.
Dynamics Lessons
In conclusion, I presented four ways that strong leaders adapt to change:
- Don’t make it personal. The world doesn’t have it out for you, so don’t act like a victim.
- Remember to breathe. Take care of yourself and your mental health.
- Imagine the opportunities. With changes come new opportunities. Don’t miss out on them just because you were focused on the changes.
- Keep your eyes on the vision. At the end of the day, your vision is what sustains you. The changes you are facing could have a positive, neutral, or negative effect on your vision. If you have to change your vision, make sure that you remain true to yourself (or your organization).
Have you had to adapt to a massive shift in corporate culture, environment, or processes? How did you deal with it?
