Resilience
A year ago, I wrote in this space that Pivot was the word of the year. This year, the quality that comes to mind is Resilience. Resilience is what we all need in order to rise to the challenges of 2021 and 2022. After more than a year of frequent pivots, we are finding new strengths and opportunity as we find the capacity to recover from difficulty. Resilience is defined as “the capacity to recover quickly from difficulties; toughness” and as “the ability of a substance or object to spring back into shape; elasticity.”
In my mind, the qualities of toughness and elasticity are both parts of resiliency. But, resilience is greater than the sum of those two qualities. Resilient people are able to face the reality of loss, trauma, and adversity, to integrate or come to terms with these realities - and then to refresh and renew - to find a new and better way than they had before. This is the ability that the app called Driven names as “advancing despite adversity.”
My clients, colleagues, and community have been practicing the pivotal moves they need to make for some time now. And, I am seeing so many expressions in various work settings of people who are rising above adversity to make something better than it was before. I have seen leaders who have created new ways to rely on their own emotional intelligence and positive psychology.
Those who have been able to use those practices during this time of crisis have brought stability to and appreciation from their workforce. And, they have seen workers inspired to rise to the occasion – to do their very best to go above and beyond their normal work tasks and work hours.
I have been honored to be a thinking partner with these clients. I, too, have tried to rise to the occasion to bring my very best wisdom and ideas for inspiring people, for thinking together about creative answers to truly thorny problems, and providing support to the leaders who are in turn supporting their people.
In late July, right after the Delta variant threatened to shut us down again, I found a new office space and began to work in person with vaccinated clients, with advised spacing between work chairs. I have found new perspective and energy by becoming a collaborative partner with Ann Beatty and her colleagues at Beatty Leadership. www: Beattyleadership.com. With my new collaborative partners, we are all striving to think with the leaders who are our clients about how they can transcend adversity and lead their organizations to even higher productivity and toward increasingly meaningful engagement with the people who work in their organizations.
It continues to be a great pleasure for me to work in partnership with so many to find new solutions to major challenges. I am eager to continue that work as we move through 2021 and into 2022. I invite you to join in thinking with me about how we can be resilient and inspire resilience among our colleagues in this dramatically shifting time. - Peggy Guest
The work I do with each client starts with you
Aspire clients are seeking to advance their understanding and skills to move to a higher and more satisfying level in their professional and/or personal lives. At Aspire, I counsel and coach clients to set new goals based on a deeper understanding of one’s self and one’s organization. Thinking together, we find ways of reaching one’s career development and family relationship goals through positive psychology and Asset Based Thinking™.
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