Leadership Actions to Build a Resilient Organization
It's not just about having a better map to achieve a better normal; it's also about having an agile team, resources, and processes that allow us to thrive before, during, and after the change (especially adversity). It all comes down to having a solid organization. This is achieved through leaders who take on practices that hone on employees, teams, and crucial dimensions that help organizations reach a desirable level of resilience.
Beliefs
Resilient leaders understand that it takes more than survival to respond to disruption with agility. It's all about finding value. Discontinuities present challenges, but they also provide discoveries and value creation opportunities. Market structures, business models, ecosystem interactions, and customer needs are all being significantly changed, and the winners are writing the screenplay for the future.
Remind Employees of the Wider and Higher Purpose of Their Labor
Gritty teams are made up of people who put their heads down and work hard to attain their objectives. They show tenacity, a clear sense of purpose and objectives, and an unwavering determination to succeed despite setbacks. Employees can see the broader purpose of their work, which leads to an emotional connection. Employees can stay motivated during difficult times if they have a clear company vision and an investment road plan that reflects their ambitions. As a result, dedicated employees are willing to go the additional mile and make sacrifices to achieve higher goals rather than taking the easy way out.
Attitudes
In the interim, the leadership attitude switches from innovating business models to a pioneering ethos, in which you focus on inspiring and enabling your team to follow you. During recovery, management focuses on sustaining or surviving to develop the resilience and agility to return to business as usual. The 85 percent of global CEOs who stated the crisis has considerably expedited digital transformation and the 40% who are rethinking their supply chains make the argument for agile management.
Encourage a Positive Work Environment
Unsurprisingly, 95% of corporate respondents agreed that staff learning and development should be top priorities and key aspects of their overall business strategy, according to a BCG survey1. A corporation that invests in its employees and combines their intrinsic interests with work tasks boosts morale and productivity while igniting people's drive to develop their craft and improve their ability to bounce back from setbacks. According to Stanford professor Carol Dweck2 , those who feel their talent can be developed via learning have a growth mindset, perceive setbacks as good motivation, and achieve more in life than people who believe their talents are fixed, inborn gifts.
Organizations should invest in appropriate development programs and encourage mentoring and work shadowing to motivate employees and foster a lively culture. Employees acquire enthusiasm when they are intellectually challenged while also obtaining the required skill sets to succeed. NASA, for example, has created an internal talent marketplace to allow employees to apply to a variety of part-time, non-competitive projects and leadership development programs. Its lifetime learning initiative aims to break down departmental silos, mobilize careers, and build a stronger and more resilient workforce.
Encourage Your Employees to Work Independently
Empowered teams gather regularly to solve problems, track progress, and set new goals for growth. These people see the big picture rather than the details, and they understand that they can accomplish more by working together.
A self-organizing team selects how to best complete its responsibilities improves collaboration, ownership, and productivity. The team's creative thinking and problem-solving ability are crucial when dealing with adaptive difficulties. 3
Resilience is essential for an organization's long-term viability. It helps employees respond to change without the stress and frantic behaviors that come with longer periods of regressive behavior. It also contributes to the scientific understanding of organizational adaptability by focusing on coping with the effects of uncertainty and mistakes. Building resilience within organizations is no longer a luxury. The COVID-19 pandemic has proven it as a mandate to continue. The more an organization can swim through the unknown, the higher its resilience, hence, its sustainability.
1Accessed 8 Mar 2022, https://www.bcg.com/publications/2020/turn-your-company-into-a-learning-powerhouse
2Accessed 8 Mar 2022, https://www.forbes.com/sites/forbestechcouncil/2021/03/22/how-to-cultivate-organizational-resilience-before-the-next-crisis/?sh=14f5de6145f2
3Forbes, 29 May 2021, Punit Renjen-Deloitte, The Journey Of Resilient Leadership: Building Organizational Resilience, Accessed 8 Mar 2022, https://www.forbes.com/sites/deloitte/2021/03/29/the-journey-of-resilient-leadership-building-organizational-resilience/?sh=5d35d441458f
Forbes, 22 Mar 2021, Christopher Yang, How To Cultivate Organizational Resilience Before The Next Crisis, Accessed 8 Mar 2022, https://www.forbes.com/sites/forbestechcouncil/2021/03/22/how-to-cultivate-organizational-resilience-before-the-next-crisis/?sh=14f5de6145f2
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