Change: Desperation or Inspiration
We have a complex relationship with change.
On the on the one hand we desire it and it is demanded of us, on the other we resist it and detest it.
If as leaders and communicators we want to motivate change in our organizations or in our society we need to look at it with an anthropologists eye. We need to understand what has shaped our attitudes to change.
For most of our evolutionary and historical past change was definitely regarded as difficult and potentially dangerous. Centuries passed where life did not change from one generation to the next, what did change was small and incremental.
When change did occur it was from outside influences and it tended to signify extreme danger, being famine, pestilence or conflict. For many people change only occurred when the risks of not changing were clearly greater than the risks of change.
From a developmental perspective we are also programmed to prefer more modest short-term certainties, compared to more generous long-term risks. Perhaps that explains the origin of “A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush.”
We tolerate a significant amount of discomfort, before we take the plunge and decide to make a change, even when it is obviously and logically better to change. We will even defend a compromised system or situation simply because it is the one we are used to. Is that the origin of “better the Devil I know”?
Currently our society is going through another wave of change, accelerated by technology, recession and cultural impact, much of which is beyond our direct control.
Are you resisting or embracing change?
This is the first in a series of communications strategies on communicating and speaking about change.
I have been busy over the summer writing, testing and preparing new workshops, seminars all designed to help you succeed in this time of change.
More to come, all the best Geoffrey
