3 Ways to React to Change - Act, Freeze, Question
Written by: Saskia Kremer, Executive Contributor
Executive Contributors at Brainz Magazine are handpicked and invited to contribute because of their knowledge and valuable insight within their area of expertise.
What do you do when things don’t go to plan? Now, maybe more than ever, plans change, schedules change, people drop out, last-minute… Sounds familiar? When this happens, there are two main reactions: take action to solve the problem straight away or freeze. Are you the leader who takes action, or do you withdraw, overwhelmed, not knowing what to do, waiting for the issue to ‘solve itself’?
We all know the one who, without thinking, hits the road and runs like a superhero on a mission to save what can be saved. Or quickly finding solutions to the following questions:
Where are the priorities: what has to be done, what can wait?
Who is going to take care of the things which need to be done, no matter what?
How are we going to make up for the lost business?
Is that you? Or are you rather the one who becomes really quiet, withdraws and seems absent, one who hardly gets anything done, creating a bubble in which you can cope until the storm settles. One reaction is not better than the other. They are just different, and both part of the fight/flight response when you are facing challenging situations. One may seem more ‘effective’ than the other, since there is a more tangible result.
"You don’t need to have an answer straight away, be open to surprise."
However, both reactions may cause you more energy than necessary and will eventually wear you out. Those are re-actions rather than being actions in which you are in the lead. Do you recognize a certain pattern in the way you act? Or a certain similarity in the kind of events happening to you over and over again? Are you wearing out because you feel you are only running from one emergency to the next, rather than building slowly but surely?
There is another invitation at a deeper level, an opportunity to look at your business and team from another perspective: re-aligning yourself and your business. The questions that arise are coming from a deeper level and are inviting you to reach beyond that obvious, practical answer. They are an invitation to dive deep in the undercurrent, beyond the visible and tangible, yet a leading power within your life and business.
So when situations call for change, create that moment of quietness and receptivity, switch off your judgment mode, just be. You don’t need to have an answer straight away, be open to surprise. Ask yourself the following:
What is this issue really about?
Do I need something else?
What will change for me personally?
If you accept to dwell in the ‘not knowing’ for a while, the answer to the question becomes less important. It will take you on an unexpected journey and can surface at its own pace. Do you want to take this invitation and have a deeper dive into your business, create that bigger vision, so you can increase performance and focus?
Send me a message and we will talk soon!
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Saskia Kremer, Executive Contributor Brainz Magazine
As an Executive Coach and Trainer, Saskia helps successful, time-challenged high-level management, directors, and business owners increase their performance and their teams' productivity, without the stress and the overwhelm. Once a Missionary, working alongside Mother Teresa herself, made her live all around the globe, helping people discover their meaning in life in sometimes heartbreaking circumstances. After leading multiple projects and International communities, she left the missions following her own experience of burnout. Starting her own business allowed her to combine her philosophical and theological research together with her rich multi-cultural experience. She places the human person at its center, allowing it to find its unique place and thrive. In 2016, as a single mum of 2 young children, she moved from Holland to Ireland and specialized in working with business owners, directors and managers, showing them how to create a bigger vision for their business and life, freeing up their own time so they can excel in what they are best at and increase their profit and satisfaction, without the stress and the overwhelm.
