Image courtesy Jill Katley
Heraclitus is known for saying "The only thing that is constant is change". We can especially see it in human and organizational development. We're not static, but in a continuous state of becoming. The question is: what are we developing into? An even better question is: how can we optimize our development?
This framework gets us going in the right direction:
What role should you or the organization be playing within the greater whole?
What would optimization look like at this stage?
How can that potential become reality?
Answering these three questions in detail is like the re-orienting of a compass. They point us in the right basic direction. Of course, getting there depends upon ongoing action mixed with re-orientation. Like navigating through dense woods, it involves looking up to take in surroundings and identify a marker, looking down to move through brush, then looking up to take in surroundings and identify the next marker, then moving forward, and so on. In each phase of looking up, we see more clearly where we are and learn more about where we're going. In each phase of movement, we experience new stresses which compel greater optimization.
Years ago, I watched as computer whiz kids, talented communicators, gifted teams, and others faced stresses and then chose to turn themselves from their potential. It deeply troubled me. The more I noticed, the more I realized it was a normal theme, and that was heart-breaking. It was troubling because (a) I often understood their situations and (b) I saw the gap between their reality and potential. You can surely relate with what you've seen.
One helpful way I learned to view it was through the lens of stress. I saw that each person or team always faced a unique and complex bundle of stresses, sometimes more heightened than other times. With this perspective, I noticed a difference between situations where they grew or faltered.
Those who faltered perceived the stresses more negatively than necessary, allowing great "distress", and this spread to become the dominant perception of the group. Their judgment was clouded, and they reacted by making misdirected decision which sent them on off-target development pathways. Even minor miscalculations, across distance, put them noticeably off-target. And, the longer they stayed on the path, the more deeply ingrained the misdirected habits became (and more difficult to change later when they realized their destination options).
On the flip side, those who tended to grow saw more clearly. They saw the stresses as positively as necessary to find the opportunities for improvement. Their challenges were experienced with greater "eustress" that propelled them toward their potential. More simply, and maybe more accurately, they saw challenges as opportunities.