We create a culture where there is constant mentorship.Why else do conventions get set up for CEOs and meetings get set up for university alumni? We naturally gravitate towards people from a similar environment who we can connect with, speak to, interact with, and learn from. It’s about creating an environment where we can learn from each other and ensure we are all positioned to succeed. We put a lot of value on teamwork and team successes. We place employees around key people whom they can watch and observe.With each incremental success, a new set of goals and tasks are issued designed to push and test the person and guide them to improve, grow, and learn. We implement an organisational system that allows people to prosper from their successes.What do we do as a company to ensure resilience in our staff? Resilience at an Organisational Level We’ve introduced a new company culture with a new set of values that accurately reflect what it means to work at Step Change - with resilience as one of the core principles. The result? A stronger and a more aligned business focus, expanded capabilities including a new digital division, and a focus on strengthening client relationships. This can be a quick walk outside, a coffee break, or just stretching in your seat.Ī few months ago, at Step Change, we unveiled our new 1,000-day plan where we turned our company inside out and really questioned the direction we were heading as a company - our goals, what we stood for, and where we wanted to end up. Schedule in short breaks during your work hours designed to shift your attention away from the task at hand. Have internal recovery through short breaks taken throughout the workday. That kind of endurance is a ticking time bomb that hurts you first and then begins to ripple and hurt those around you. Resilience is about not overworking yourself to the point of exhaustion and stress. It means you are at a higher risk of internalising issues and taking things personally, which may hurt your psyche and self esteem. Why? Well, if you’re cognitively overloaded and stressed, and if work has been on your mind in the past few days, not only are you a danger to drive with on the road, you have less emotional control and a decreased ability to rationalise situations.

It’s taking time for yourself so you can give more back. It’s being able to relax and unwind and be present in the current moment. When work, stress, and outside pressures put us out of alignment, we end up using a lot more mental and physical resources to restore our bodies back in balance before we are able to recuperate and move forward.īeing resilient means being strong enough to not fall prey to cognitive overload. It’s about pushing yourself to excel, to focus, to grow, and to achieve - and then stopping to recover before giving again. We praise people who don’t have a healthy work-life balance and often fall into the trap of attributing their successes to their ‘resilience’ or ability to carry through the tough times and do what appears impossible to the average human. Why else do we celebrate the 100-hour work week of Elon Musk? Where Did the Resilience Misconception Come From?Īs a society, we have always been amazed by people ’s abilities to push themselves to their limits. In other words, when “we sacrifice sleep in the name of productivity… despite the extra hours we spend at work… adds up to 11 days of lost productivity per year per worker”. What does this mean? Poor health means a decrease in the quality of our brain functionality and a decrease in our quality of work. Evidence demonstrates that there’s a correlation between a lack of recovery from stress and cognitive overload and an increase in health and safety issues. However, this form of ‘endurance’ is costing companies over 63.2 billion dollars in lost productivity. This stems from the ubiquitous belief that the tougher we are, the more successful we will be. It’s this idea of a soldier with grit - someone who can stand tall and endure through rough, stressful times. The first image that springs to mind when we think about resilience is quite militant. But is this what resilience is? Is this what we should all strive for? This kind of ‘grit’ is what a lot of people equate to ‘resilience’. Work is technically over, but has your mind stopped thinking about it? Are you still coming up with solutions to your work problems as you’re commuting home? It’s 5:30 p.m., and you’re just about to leave the office - but are you actually leaving?

Unpacking level 3