HOW YOUR INNER ALARMS IMPEDE YOUR TRANSITIONS
Organizational transitions involve risk. When you navigate change or engage a new challenge, you don’t know for sure what the outcome will be. Some initiatives succeed. Some don’t. That’s what makes them risks. Although organizational changes create uncertainty, they usually don’t generate dangerous, flesh-tearing outcomes.

When you’ve been trained to take care, your language, thoughts, and imagination will exaggerate the threat of danger. Notice the inhibiting, flesh-tearing connotations of these colorful expressions when you imagine a rapid, organizational change.

1. "The decision to down-size hit me like a ton of bricks!"
2. "We’re going at break-neck speed!"
3. "They’ll eat us alive!"
4. "We’re way out on a limb!"
5. "It’s a life-or-death decision!"

Those phrases are alarming. They portray imaginary violence with lethal consequences. When you think those hot images, they will impel you to take care. You will resist transitions and maintain the status quo.

Pause to examine those alarming thoughts. Those alarms are actually false alarms. Those misguided figures-of-speech do not denote what actually happens when you engage transitions at work. Like your alarming thoughts about workplace conflicts, they’re just your way of crying wolf to yourself. Let’s examine the physical evidence to overcome their restrictive influence.

1. "The decision to down-size hit me like a ton of bricks!"
An actual ton of bricks would certainly tear your flesh and crush your bones. This simply doesn’t happen during organizational transitions. It could possibly happen if you worked at an unsafe construction site.

2. "We’re going at break-neck speed!"
No matter how fast your organization is changing, you will not break your neck. Your head won’t spin either.

3. "They’ll eat us alive!"
No one will actually eat you and your co-workers. You won’t be the main course for anyone’s dinner. You won’t even have an opportunity to go kicking and screaming to the banquet.

4. "We’re way out on a limb!"
While your organization changes, you’re probably nowhere near a tree, much less atop a limb. You might climb on a limb occasionally if you work as a forester, a logger, or a botanist.

5. "It’s a life-or-death decision!"
Transitions may produce temporary uncertainty and awkwardness. You and your co-workers will not die. You can give yourself greater freedom to take risks when you view each decision as a life-or-life decision.

Can you think of similar, flesh-tearing expressions that you speak and think? What inhibiting expressions do your friends and co-workers utter? With some coaching and practice, you can learn new skills to use each transition to advance your career. TAKE R!SKS.
< back
< home