Human Resources for Human Resources

If you’re an HR manager, 2020 is probably the most challenging time you’ve ever had to deal with.  First the pandemic: lockdowns, working from home, Zoom meetings.  Then the consequences: a global economic downturn, disappearing markets, redundancies. 

Experience of previous shocks like the financial crisis of 2008/9 shows that economies do bounce back, often faster than anticipated, but until that happens there will be much corporate hardship.  Resilience is needed more than ever, not just for negotiating the crisis but for moving forward when it recedes.  What can you do to help your people adjust to the huge changes affecting the way we work?  

Fortunately, resilience is not a characteristic that you either have or don’t have – like any other skill, with appropriate training it can be learned.  Our Challenge of Change Resilience Training programme is unusual in having a particularly strong evidence base, as well as a host of controlled studies that have shown how powerfully it can address challenging issues. 

Traditionally, training is delivered by an accredited trainer to corporate groups, and that’s also true for the Challenge of Change.  Trainers have adapted to the pandemic by delivering via virtual platforms, but that still means having the members of a group assemble at their workstations at a specific time.  Last year we developed and trialled an online version of the Challenge of Change which means the training is available for people to complete in their own time and at their own pace.  The Challenge of Change Online offers the full package, and is comprehensive: it covers all of the key elements of the standard programme, including the confidential psychometric Profile and the follow-up Refresher video 3 months later. 

The Online is not targeted at any particular level of the organisation, so is appropriate for managers as much as team members.  The economic downturn will inevitably mean redundancies, and it can equally provide those people you have to let go with the skills to move on: from our experience, if you’re able to provide the Challenge of Change as part of the redundancy process it will significantly reduce their upset, allowing them to begin to see it as an opportunity rather than a threat. 

Just as important is helping you to cope, not just personally but also with the culture shift you’ll be asked to implement.  Having to make people redundant can give you sleepless nights of worry, which we call rumination.  Ask yourself the question: does it help?  Ruminating about emotional upsets just makes you tired and less able to do your job well.  Maybe you think you’re learning from it, but learning and churning are entirely different!  Whatever the circumstances of the people you need to work with, the Challenge of Change shows how to learn rather than churn, and to avoid turning pressure into stress.