As organizations grapple with disruptive times to gear their businesses to Health and Growth. it’s important to reflect on the difference between
– Being Gritty vs Being Stubborn
– Courage for Course correction vs tinkering with BAU
– Conviction for Change vs Caving into pressures to execute I’ll-thought out strategies for short term survival
In our Change work at Capstone we often find organizations taking longer to shift the sails because
- Staying the course (often stuck in legacy thinking) is perceived as being Resilient
- Fighting against the tide seen as Courage to Persist despite difficulties
- There is often a secret formula at play here – the one that has worked in the past – and a stubborn refusal to accept it’s not working anymore
It’s what Carol Dweck calls Fixed Mindsets- inability to make efforts to view the challenge differently, and become aware through developing peripheral vision to spot new opportunities for learning, to a different way of doing things…
Staying with the Goal but remaining flexible on the path requires –
- Openness to Listen
- Inclusion of Employee Voice
- Courage to Experiment
- Courage to admit to self and others to allow early course correction
- Persistence to see Change through and review and tinker actions as you go along..
To also clarify that the Management is not confused or incompetent, but is exploring the best ways to find Generative solutions to wicked problems..
What has been your experience with the confusion between Grit and Stubbornness to stay in pursuit of recovery of performance? How have you seen Organizations handle this? What worked while they were trying to change course?
