What do you do if your career in Change Management requires adaptability?

It involves reflecting on how well you respond to change, whether you are able to learn from new experiences and incorporate feedback, and if you can adjust your methods and mindset when faced with unforeseen challenges. It requires looking at past instances where you have had to deal with change, gauging your comfort with uncertainty, and examining your willingness to develop new skills. By evaluating how you manage transitions and solve problems, and considering how you navigate the dynamics of various situations, you gain insights into your level of adaptability.

Self-awareness is a critical skills to have for any change manager. Understanding your preferred style, the way you like to receive information, feedback or process data and knowing what gives and drains your energy can be hugely beneficial not just in managing yourself but also in highlighting potential blind spots you might have as you are deploying change. Self-assessments are great and tools like MBTI or FIRO-B can provide great insights into your preferred style and link with adaptability. Gathering feedback from people you've worked with on previous change projects can be really helpful. How did they see you adapting throughout the project or see you flex your style?

Navigating change involves managing stakeholders with varying involvement, moods, and influence amid shifting timelines and resistance. Change managers must be flexible, adaptable, and able to absorb chaos to drive impactful changes for users. It's crucial to assess one's comfort with constant change and ability to flex, ensuring readiness for the role and smoother transformations. This introspection helps gauge readiness to handle dynamic change, preparing managers to approach their roles with a balanced perspective and drive positive outcomes.

It involves stepping out of your comfort zone and actively seeking opportunities that differ from your usual environment. By engaging with diverse experiences, you can develop a more comprehensive understanding of the world, enhance your problem-solving abilities, and cultivate empathy and cultural sensitivity. This can lead to increased creativity, as you pull from an expanded repertoire of knowledge and ideas. In a professional context, such learning can lead to more innovative approaches to work, improve collaboration with a diverse range of colleagues and stakeholders, and ultimately make you a more adaptable and well-rounded individual.

A great way to learn is also to learn from others. Seek out people who are highly adaptable and observe them in action. Use them to get feedback and talk to them about their thought processes and how they balance being adaptable with driving progress against a plan. You can do this informally or via a formal peer coaching arrangement. You can also experiment and practice adaptability in low risk/low stake situations (maybe in your personal life or in a team setting where you feel safe). By exposing yourself to situations where adaptability is required, you are starting to break down what's holding you back and start to build that muscle.

For me diverse experiences are critical in change management. Build a portfolio of transferable skills and working case studies. Listen and learn from the people around you, every action is a learning experience whether you learn from it and replicate it, improve it or reject it. Be observant, do what you see and what you hear/read match up? Question everything in a positive frame or mind and assume nothing (it's harder than it sounds) taking care not to judge or be led your own prejudices or background. Reflection is a key skill and feedback is a useful tool. Accept learning with gratitude.

Instead of seeing your talents as fixed traits, a growth mindset encourages viewing challenges as opportunities to learn and grow. This perspective fosters resilience in the face of obstacles, motivates a love for learning, and supports the courage to persist in the journey toward mastery. It allows individuals to thrive during times of change and to continually evolve their skills and understanding. Cultivating a growth mindset is particularly valuable in dynamic professional environments, where adaptability and continual improvement are key to success and fulfillment.

The first step is to notice and try to identify the emotion you are feeling when a situation is stretching or requires you to adapt. What are you feeling? Try to name the feeling. Then ask yourself questions like: - What's causing me to feel this way? - What's triggering this feeling? - What assumptions am I making and are they true? - What's the worst that could happen? You can also use questions from the GROW model to coach yourself with questions like: - What's my goal? What's my desired outcome? - What is true about this situation? - What options do I have? - What's a small next step I can take?

Managing your emotions involves recognizing, understanding, and appropriately expressing your feelings, especially in high-pressure or challenging situations. It is a vital component of emotional intelligence that aids in maintaining balance and clear thinking. By effectively managing emotions, you can prevent them from negatively impacting your judgment and actions. This self-regulation fosters a more constructive and empathetic approach to interactions with others and helps to build strong, collaborative relationships. In professional settings, the ability to manage emotions supports a healthy work environment, enables better decision-making, and enhances leadership capabilities.

Mastering emotional management demands profound self-awareness. Understanding one's position and how actions and reactions impact processes and user experiences is essential. It necessitates practicing self-restraint and maintaining composure to navigate the turbulence of change management effectively.

It involves actively soliciting input from others to gain insights into your performance and areas for improvement. Feedback can provide a fresh perspective and highlight blind spots, allowing you to refine your skills and strategies. Meanwhile, seeking support, whether it's for advice, mentorship, or collaboration, can bolster your resilience, provide guidance through challenges, and open doors to new opportunities. Embracing both can enhance your adaptability and effectiveness, as you learn to value constructive criticism and lean on your network when navigating change and pursuing goals.

Please consider… Revising the question… scrapping it. Or what would you think about a diver, should they know how to swim and does it help to be comfortable with water?

As change professionals, we are the king and queens of adaptability! Being adaptable and leading others through the unknown is the job!