Getting ready to say "Hello" to 2021 and "Goodbye" to 2020

I think we can all agree we will be delighted to see the back of 2020 and, with hopes firmly focused on a vaccine led recovery, I am sure many of us are looking forward to the New Year.

So what have you learned about yourself and your habits during lockdown? Are you planning to make changes in 2021 or have you already started to do things differently with the intention to continue?

My husband always refers to “Stop/start/continue” as a great way to review performance and form strategy and this could apply to all areas of our lives.

Aside of the pandemic, we all experience life changing events such as:

• Education
• Leaving home
• Career changes
• Marriage/Co-habiting
• Children
•  House Moves
• Bereavement
• Retirement

Some of these events are through choice and others are inevitable but all require significant adjustment to our daily lives.

2020 certainly showed us how fast we can adapt and change when forced to. Some businesses have had to change in order to fix problems created because they didn’t change earlier. Others have avoided problems by making necessary changes ahead of time.

Some are feeling confident that their business proved flexible enough to make changes whenever they needed to and have achieved the results they wanted.

Some will say change is never easy. Others say there is nothing wrong with change, providing it is a positive one. Now we are looking back over this crazy year, how many of us would have made the same decisions in any event and when would we have felt the time was right?

Making decisions for ourselves is easy – we are the only ones affected. What about when our big decisions change the lives of others? Ask a teenager how they would feel about moving home or school or to try to persuade someone to try a new destination instead of the holiday resort they visit every year. You only have to imagine these conversations to visualise their adverse reactions!

The problem word is here is CHANGE.

No words can alter the fact that change and disruption are hard on individuals and teams. When faced with an unexpected or unwelcome transition, it's human nature to experience feelings of fear and doubt. No one wants their team to be paralysed by uncertainty so here are some suggestions on ways to make the changes you want with the least resistance possible.

1. Setting Expectations

By frequently communicating your vision of the business as a dynamic and evolving organisation, where progress and change are inevitable, you can prevent many of your team members from settling into complacency or assuming everything will stay the same. When a major shift happens, they're more likely to accept it as a matter of course.

2. The "How Will it Affect Me?" Principle

Whether your change is positive (you're growing so fast you have to move to a new building) or negative (you're facing a reduction in force), every employee will go straight to, "How will this affect me?” Accept the fact that any time there's a development at work--positive or not--there will be a natural dip in productivity as individuals and teams react and adapt to a new paradigm, environment, organisational structure or leadership team.

Your first message should be, "Here's what's happening, and we know you're going to have questions. Let's talk about them."

3. Embrace the Change Cycle

When it comes to change management, there's no one-size-fits-all solution, and there's no predictable timeline for when everyone will be enthusiastically on board. Each person will proceed at his or her own pace through "the change cycle," which starts with feelings of loss, then doubt, then discomfort, followed by discovery, understanding, and finally integration.

Rely on what you know about each individual member of your team, and after a while, reach out personally to those who seem to be stuck in doubt or discomfort. Allow them to voice their concerns, ask their questions, or even make their accusations. Seek first to understand, then to be understood as you try to help them make forward progress through the change cycle.

4.  Some People Will Remain Negative

Your chances of getting 100% of your employees completely on board with big changes can be slim. Once you've made the announcement, given people ample time to work through their reactions, and offered personal assistance to the stragglers, if you're still noticing hotbeds of resistance or negativity, then it may be time for a different kind of conversation.

Destructive attitudes can result in a small contingent, determined to make the transition fail to show they were right all along.

5. Patience is a Virtue

By the time you're announcing a new initiative to the company at large, you've probably already been thinking about it, working through the details, and processing all of the ramifications for a considerable amount of time. Your employees will have the same questions you worked through, they will have fears and uncertainties to overcome, and they may experience a temporary drop in productivity.

Your best approach is to create a culture that embraces change. Respect everyone's right to have their own reactions, communicate the news with authenticity and empathy, and give everyone time to work through the change cycle at an individual pace.