How to change the way you work
It was the Roman philosopher Epictetus (50-130) who said. ‘Your will is always within your power. Nothing really stops you. Nothing holds you back, for your own will is always within your control’. Epictetus’s message is particularly relevant today when addressing the issue is ‘change’. You can change if you want to change! Old ways of doing things don’t always work. Be prepared to try new approaches and find new ways to work and to live your life. Here are some approaches to consider.
1. Change the way you think.
Constant adaptation to an ever-changing environment is critical for successful people. The invention of the micro-chip (c. 1965) has changed forever the potential for change and the speed at which it occurs. According to Downes and Mui (Unleashing the Killer App, Harvard Business School Press, 1998), the micro-chip has contributed significantly to unleashing what they call ‘the killer app’. We have come to realize that we can’t think about problems today in the same way as we did previously and expect different results. As Peter Drucker said, ‘Knowledge has to be improved, challenged, and increased constantly, or it vanishes’. A change in your world view and the way you think about work and life will inevitably lead to different behavioral options.
2. Reward yourself.
Incentives are an established way of rewarding performance and achievement. Rewards, however, need not come from someone else only: you need to reward your own achievements. And those rewards can involve learning new skills, traveling to different places, meeting and working with different people, and taking time out. Recognizing and rewarding your own achievements helps to replenish one of your key energy sources. After all, if your aim is to continue to improve on your own performance, rewarding that improvement seems like a logical approach to take.
3. Make changing a habit.
Whether it’s trying something new—pursuing new knowledge, reading a book, or playing a new sport—make change a habit. You can’t stop what you’re doing and expect to remain in the one spot. And while you’re making change a habit, extend the change process to include your world outside of the work situation as well. Your success in making change a habit will be enhanced when change becomes part of your whole life, not just a work- related element. Be flexible. Experts tell us that in order to claim a new behavior as our own, we need to use it three times only. Taking on new habits is a straightforward process.
