You have probably heard about manufacturing plants and restaurants who are pivoting during these challenging times and starting to make hand sanitizers, masks, and gowns. They are being forced to change, and they’re trying to find the opportunities among the obstacles that surround them.
Sometimes we, too, as individuals in our work life are being forced to change – as many of us are today. But there is some change that we can control.
What do you want to change? What do you need to change?
Maybe some of it is attitudinal. For those of us who are lucky to have a boss that’s encouraging and motivating, maybe not having that boss around requires us to be more self-motivated. Set your own daily goals. Pat yourself on the back when you reach those goals. Be the great encourager…to yourself.
Maybe the improvement needed is more of a technical nature. We should want to improve our computer skills since we’ll be using those so much more. Can we become expert at using the video conferencing systems and tools? Can we become more proficient at toggling between different functions on our computer for information, since we’re relying less and less on paper?
The improvement area could be communication skills, particularly if having that face-to-face interaction and all the body language and expressions are so much less available for emphasizing our points. You may want to improve your business writing skills – since you’re communicating more often via messaging to others. Maybe you need to improve your concentration skills since it’s easier to get distracted when you’re in a video conference with 10 people than if you’re in a face-to-face meeting in the same conference room.
Finally, we can look for improvement areas in how we do our work. Improving might mean that we’re more organized in our work since we can’t simply walk to the person in the next cubicle to talk about a project or chit chat with our office colleague about something. Those random or nearby encounters are less likely, so we have to be a bit more intentional about planning when to contact others.
Change is difficult – particularly when it’s thrust upon you. But if you can identify your own change – your own improvement path – you can give yourself some control.
Create the change that will help you improve.
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When I was growing up, I played a lot of golf. I practiced a lot, and I could score pretty well. However, when something went bad, when I hit a tee shot into the woods or dumped an iron shot into a lake, I would become unglued. Then every other shot, every other hole, was an emotional challenge. My attitude suffered, and my score suffered.
