A change for the better

A change for the better

Adaptability allows leaders to cope with all situations and inspire others with energy, writes Chan Cudennec.






Chan CudennecUpdate on 15 Nov 2008



One of the biggest challenges for organisations is to meet or exceed targets, especially in today's uncertain economic climate. It requires leaders who are able to handle continuous change while displaying a personal steadiness that inspires the confidence of their team.
According to research conducted by the Forum Corporation, about 70 per cent of change initiatives fail. Those that succeed have "change leaders" with the following characteristics:
They are adaptable and have a high capacity for sustained high performance.
They know how to drive change to accelerate the impact of new strategies and priorities.
They understand the human side of change and how to manage the dynamics of human commitment.
High adaptability is an essential competency for leaders to build. A person with a very low level of adaptability may be risk-averse and respond to minor setbacks by overreacting. He or she may work at the very edge of his or her energy reserves. In contrast, a person with very high levels of adaptability may seem undisturbed by setbacks large or small, overcoming whatever comes along and inspiring others to do the same. He/she may seem to have endless stores of energy.Research into adaptability shows that most people have moderate levels. Only about 20 per cent have high levels.The good news is that adaptability is not genetic and can be learned. In today's high-stress environment, less adaptable people can even develop neurological problems. Highly adaptable people have characteristics that take them beyond resilience There are three core dimensions of adaptability which research suggests are somewhat independent of one another: Ambiguity threshold This refers to how much ambiguity you can absorb. By its very nature, change is filled with ambiguity. When change is constant, the world can seem ambiguous and turbulent. The higher your threshold, the more change you can absorb while performing at high levels Internal monologue This refers to your internal voice when something annoying, negative or adverse happens. For many people, change feels like adversity. If your internal monologue is negative, you will believe you have little or no control over what is happening, that its impact is pervasive and long-lasting and that someone else will have to fix the problem. You want your internal monologue to reflect the reality that solutions do exist, and optimism about your own ability to devise and implement them. Energy supply This reflects your ability to access high levels of physical, emotional and mental energy, especially when the going gets tough. The more you can do this, the better able you will be to handle the demands placed on you by a continually changing environment.
It is possible to have high levels in one dimension and moderate or even low levels in others. This can be addressed. You can raise your ambiguity threshold by:
Anticipating Make time to think about the future and its likely personal or organisational impact. Read broadly - do not limit your interest to organisational, role or industry-related publications. Think about how information, news, events or concepts from one domain relate to another, and particularly how those things may affect the future of your particular world.
Accepting uncertainty This involves cultivating the ability to make decisions with less caution or information than you might normally desire - and to accept the natural discomfort that may arise. Sometimes waiting for more information does not change the ultimate decision. Accepting uncertainty may feel risky, but it does not require doing risky things. Practise managing risks as experiments and be prepared to learn from them. View failure as an opportunity not to repeat mistakes. Practise using your intuition by finding a low-risk decision and make it based on intuition only. Look at both the risk itself - and the potentially bigger risk of doing nothing.
Applying flexibility This means making rapid course corrections when unforeseen events unfold while still focusing on and progressing towards a goal or strategy. Flexibility requires the ability to improvise by finding ways to move forward with what is available in the organisation, rather than waiting for more support.
Being tenacious This involves perseverance in the face of long-term horizons and/or setbacks. Adaptable people are tenacious, but not when the evidence tells them it is time to alter course.
Being curious Be open to the range of sources of information, ideas and opportunities that are available. By doing so, you can train yourself to look for the new and different. Building a desire to learn about the unknown helps one deal more effectively with ambiguity and uncertainty.
You can improve your internal monologue by asking what aspect of the situation you have control over. Focus on the smallest aspect that you can influence personally. Pay attention to your emotions, think before speaking and manage your emotional response. This allows you to manage the quality of your emotional response to even uncontrollable events. When an adverse situation presents itself, acknowledge the negative reality of the situation, rather than look for outside sources to blame. Look for ways to take control.
Ask if you can take ownership and make this situation better. If yes, take accountability. Asking "What can I personally do to make this better?" allows you to feel that you can improve things. However, there is no necessity to burden yourself with responsibility for the entire problem by becoming a martyr. Rather look for which part of a situation you can be accountable for improving.
Reflect upon the true scope of this situation and what aspects of your life will it affect? This helps to put events, even very adverse ones, in their appropriate context, by drawing boundaries around them and allowing for better management. This exercise will greatly reduce the number of events that seem catastrophic. When such a situation arises, imagine the best possible outcome in terms of the extent of its impact on you. Then, imagine that outcome being even better.
Manage the time span. Try to judge accurately the realistic duration of events. This gives a reassuring sense of scale - a beginning and an end - to even the most negative events.
By defining and managing the time span, you no longer feel as though there is no end in sight. Try to find out from a colleague, family member or friend who has been through a similar experience how long its impact lasted.
Finally, you can improve your energy supply by finding meaning in life. Be it your family or your own spiritual development, meaning in life is now recognised as a critical factor for performance and for health and well-being. It rests on personal values and sense of purpose and involves seeking the personal meaning in all situations.
By aligning personal meaning with "doing what matters most", you create a focus and source of energy that can stabilise you in all situations. People who find meaning in life move past minor irritations and major adversities to a better future, making the present more manageable. This protects them from being overwhelmed, even in extreme adversity.
Pay attention to your health. Physical well-being is the bedrock of personal energy. It is impossible to sustain high performance without it. An increase in physical fitness reduces time off the job, error rates and on-the-job accidents and grievances, and improves complex decision-making and general productivity. Lack of well-being risks fatigue, problems with concentration, emotional control and possible loss of a sense of purpose.
Get enough restful sleep and provide your body with high-quality nourishment. Improve your physical and mental well-being by practising regular exercise. Meditation can help to reduce your sleep requirements and improve physical, mental and emotional performance.
Chan Cudennec is managing director of Forum, Greater China, a Boston-headquartered consulting and training firm that helps organisations achieve business results by transforming performance.
All about coaching: Building relationships to achieve goals What is the connection between effective leadership and effective relationships? Consider the following: it is not possible, regardless of an individual's capacity for work, for one person to do everything, and one person's thinking is limited. From this we can suggest a definition of an organisation: a group of people who come together to achieve collectively what they can't individually.
This suggests that it is only through an ability to develop and maintain mutually beneficial relationships that an individual can be successful in an organisation. Building relationships is a necessary rather than desirable skill.
There are four primary "purposes" of a relationship:
To produce results: the relationship is a means to an end. It is concerned with agreeing goals with another person and meeting expectations.
To develop intimacy: the relationship is concerned with support, closeness and connection.
To achieve autonomy: the relationship is concerned with individuality and independence.
To develop trust: the relationship is concerned with commitment.
These four purposes can be viewed as independent dimensions which can be expressed in relation to each other and thereby create a relationship "space". At any time a person's perception of their relationship with another can be mapped as a point in this space.Relationships are also dynamic. Productive relationships change and develop over time. A new relationship typically starts with the purpose of achieving a result, but there is also a degree of provisional trust as a basis for building rapport. As the relationship develops, the purpose is about creating a sense of genuine care and concern for the other person, apart from the specific goals they may wish to achieve through the relationship. As the relationship develops further there is a need to assert one's individuality and sense of difference and this move towards autonomy also brings a judgment about the degree to which the relationship is achieving the desired results.If the sense of autonomy and difference can be achieved successfully the relationship can move towards trust - the basis for resilience in the relationship that encourages interdependence and personal creativity.Having achieved trust, the relationship does not stop. In a productive relationship the cycle is completed and new challenges and results are identified for the relationship, and the process begins again.The value of this model is that it provides a framework for making sense of leaders' relationships and for understanding the development challenge in moving relationships to the next stage. These relationship stages can be linked to four different styles of leadership: Transactional leadership is not characterised by a focus on relationships. It is primarily results focused. Although this may represent an early stage in relationships it is quite common to find leaders stuck in this style. They describe their relationships in pragmatic terms and do not expect to cultivate a meaningful interpersonal connection with others at work. This approach to relationships is usually based on a clear division between home and work. Home is viewed as the place for interpersonal connection, work as the place for getting things done. The development challenge is to encourage these leaders to consider the benefits of engaging more fully with others by cultivating intimacy and encouraging discretionary effort - which can be the difference between good and outstanding results. In compliant leadership leaders are caring and thoughtful and have a strong desire for recognition. They can be timid and need to develop their capacity for autonomy, which entails being more assertive and being prepared to confront differences. In defiant leadership leaders are independent and controlling, and can be critical of others. Although their uncompromising drive can get things done, they tend to evoke resistance and frustration in others. Their development challenge is to be more open to their feelings and those of others, and to find ways of relating to others that engages and inspires rather than coerces and commands. In authentic leadership leaders are flexible, matching their style to different people and circumstances, and offering a balance between challenge and support. Their development task is to maintain energy in their relationships by setting new goals and explicitly negotiating expectations. Authentic leadership can be achieved only from working through the transactional, compliant and defiant aspects of the relationship cycle. So, what is the connection between effective leadership and effective relationships? The higher executives rise up the ladder the more they rely on getting things done through others. This requires interpersonal rather than transactional relationships - to build trust, commitment and accountability. ?





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"Building a desire to learn about the unknown helps one deal more effectively with ambiguity and uncertainty"Chan CudennecForumIllustration: Winnie Ho