Change Happens!

February 01, 2018

As a consultant, my life revolves around preparation and planning.  Yet on a daily basis I deal with change.  The change a client needs to make when they hire a consultant to help them improve.  The change we provide when we study an organization and offer our suggestions.  The change a Board of Directors makes after they go through training.  Change happens!  As we face change, and we all will in one form or another, here are a few steps you can take to prepare yourself to navigate change:

  1. Identify the change.  By naming the change you quantify it and give it substance.  It moves from ethereal to physical.  Once there, it can be dealt with.  Send time identifying the change with which you are confronted .
  2. Identify the impacts of the change.  How will this change affect your company, the way you conduct your business and how will it affect you.  While one can never identify all the ripples of change, preparation helps lesson the unanticipated surprises that change creates.
  3. Stay positive.  Change is always an opportunity, even if it is hard to see in the short-term.
  4. Decide how you will adapt to change.  The hardest part about change is that it requires us to act differently.  Identify how you will respond to the demands of change.  How will you learn new things, act differently, perform in a different way?  In other words, how will you change to embrace the change you are experiencing

Though I don’t know what they are, I can state with confidence that everyone reading this blog will experience  a change soon.  The secret for navigating change is to identify the change and the impact, stay positive and make a plan.  In this way, like most of our successful clients, you will come through change better and stronger.