This time of change is calling us to develop a new approach to leading ourselves and other people.
And as we learn the skills and competencies needed to achieve this, we will gain benefits on five levels.
First, by applying each tool individually, we will learn to solve the immediate problems we face: we stay calmer and more connected, we see the situation more clearly, we find more opportunities to move forward, and so on.
Second, by applying these tools in sequence we become more joined-up leaders of ourselves and other people: we become able to navigate not just individual issues but the whole process of change.
Third, as we repeat the process we learn that staying calm in a crisis helps us to see the situation more clearly, which helps us to find more and better opportunities, which makes us feel more inspired, so we stay calmer, and so on… We create a virtuous circle, a self-reinforcing loop that makes us antifragile. We become able not just to cope with change but to thrive because of change — able to use change to become stronger.
And there are two more levels of benefits still to come.
Einstein told us that we cannot solve a problem with the same level of thinking that created it. The volatile, uncertain, complex, ambiguous (VUCA) world that we are living in is the direct result of the leadership decisions we have taken in the past — both individually and collectively. If we want to create a less volatile, less uncertain, less complex and ambiguous world we have to change the way we take decisions. This happens as each one of us becomes antifragile. And the more people are antifragile, the more the world as a whole becomes antifragile and more stable. The VUCA times will then recede. This is the fourth level of benefit.
Finally, the fifth level of benefit is Joy. Because the more antifragile we are, the more clearly we understand what matters most to us, and the more able we become to inspire ourselves and others to achieve that. And that brings us Joy.
Which of these five benefits would be most valuable to you today? What steps are you taking to achieve that? Would it be useful for you to learn a simple framework of practical tools, whose benefits will build and grow across five levels?
Adapted from Inner Leadership: a framework and tools for building inspiration in times of change.
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