Acknowledging the anxiety

Many people are feeling it; the anxiety of returning to workplaces, crowds, elevators and common areas. 

Do you ignore it? 
Do you say something? 

If you say something, might you make it worse or bring into focus something that’s better left as it is? 

In tough times particularly, we must spend time interacting, engaging, asking and listening. 

It’s a facilitation technique to acknowledge what is there - not ignore it. 

I recall I was facilitating a corporate workshop on the day of the 9/11 attacks. I may have been in Australia, half a world away, but it was a global event. 

Our workshop started later, slower, a revised agenda, more breaks ... and less expectations. We talked a lot about the events of the day. 

We worked with what was there, not pushing forward with previous priorities. 

In these times of increased anxiety, you’ve got to say something. 

Go slower. 
Ask. 
Listen. 
Wait. 
Pause. 
Reflect. 
Wait. 

That means the rush and push of people needs to slow a little while we adapt.

This article about the ‘spectrum of feelings’ people have in the return to offices from Digiday outlines what’s making people feel anxious and some tips on how to respond. 

Running the perfect experiment

Have you got an idea to launch or run something? A concept or possibility that’s not yet real or tangible? 

Let’s take the idea and run an experiment. You know, test some of it out. 

Simple right? Aaah no, not so simple. 

Experiments may be all cool and startup-ish but we can so fear messing up or looking bad that we don’t even attempt an experiment at all!

For all the ‘fail fast’ messages blaring at us, we can find the action of testing something still too big a step to take. 

Are we expecting the perfect experiment? 

Do we keep working tweaking reading learning and writing until we become closer to 100% sure it will work? 

Where is the experiment part then?

Experiments are wonderful for discovery, to find out. If we don’t experiment we won’t find out. No matter how much thinking we put into it. 

It’s the ideal time to try some new and different things ... to discover what happens. 

If not now, when? 

There’s a hypothesis, hunch or idea on your list there. How about donning the lab coat, firing up the Bunsen burner and getting some feedback and insights from a petite experiment? 

I will if you will. 

Ready? 

Put the 'Changes Welcome' mat out

Do you put the welcome mat out during change or are you running off down a path with the gate locked behind you?

Welcome changes from customers, clients, end users, no matter what stage of the process of design, development, delivery or sale of your thing, product, change, transformation or service.

Welcoming changes is a philosophy of the software development field of agile. They welcome changes because they are on a path of iterating and editing and reviewing and releasing changed and improved versions of the software, website, app or technology. Even if it's later in the process, changes, comments, and responses are welcome. That means what they’re creating will be more useful, more suitable.

This is about acceptance, flexibility, adaptability. It's this input that keeps people engaged in what you're doing and makes what you're doing more tailored to the people who are using it.

When changes come to you today, tomorrow, next week, take a note of how you respond - if you're welcoming or you're locking yourself away from them.