Change? It does a brain good!

With the start of a new year just around the corner, I’ve been thinking a lot about the topic of change and how we respond to the prospect.  About 98% of the population does not like change.  In fact, research suggests that we are incapable of making major changes most of the time, even in matters of life and death.  I recently reread with interest a 2005 Fast Company, Inc. article on the subject that cited studies that showed 90% of heart attack victims when faced with the need to change could not do so. 

I am a process person.  I see life from a process perspective and, as a result, I see the beauty in change as a means to make life easier, more enjoyable and as a means to achieve desired outcomes.  Even as someone who enjoys change, however, as I look back over my life, it is clear that my attempts at making change far outweigh the number of times I have actually sustained changes and enjoyed the outcomes that were my target.  There are the multiple times that I have set out to improve my health by changing my eating habits.  Often, I have succeeded at one or more elements of change such as the content of my diet or the “what.”  Meanwhile, the “when,” “why” and “how much” elements of my diet have not changed through the years in spite of attempts to change most of these aspects.  The same can be said of my attempts to simplify life by exercising the use of the word “no” more often.

Neurologists suggest that making major changes are physiologically challenging for our brains.  Have you ever changed a piece of software on your network only to have three or four other systems start having problems?  Making a major life change may have an analogous impact on your brain as the change of software does to your computer network.  There are just so many connections and alterations that have to be readied for the change, that you are bound to suffer some speed bumps along the way.

There is a way to make change successfully and as painless as possible.  First, identify the psychological win for the people involved.  Dr. Dean Ornish has demonstrated the value of focusing on the joy that change can create in getting people to make dietary changes to impact their health.  Change is best when it has a logical benefit as opposed to change for the sake of change.  Once you have identified the rationale for the change, associate the logic to the emotional benefits.  If a needed change will make life easier on the people in the effort, then they will be happier and have more free time on their hands.  Make the emotional benefits real.  Paint the picture of the emotion that will persist if the change is not achieved.  Some people are motivated by movement toward pleasure; others are motivated by movement away from pain.  Lastly, slice changes into bite-size pieces.  Recognize progress, reward the wins and build momentum for continued change. The medical community suggests that learning new habits is one key to warding off brain malfunction.  So, if we give ourselves the opportunity to experience change we are fueling brain health along the way.     

5 Key Sources of Vital Business Intelligence

Your company has worked hard to achieve its success through some challenging times.  As the market volatility and uncertainty continues, many companies are wisely looking at the “what if” scenario that suggests that our world has a new set point.   Some call it the “new normal.”  This does not mean that your business has to consider its performance, the norm for the future.  What the current set point suggests is that this is the new perspective from which a company will want to establish its goals and objectives.  The resources that the company shed over the past few years may not be coming back.  It means that in order to increase revenues and profits, a company needs to look at its organization, systems, skillsets and processes with fresh eyes as the company embarks on goal setting.  This is particularly important where mergers, acquisitions, joint ventures and other collaborative activities are part of the strategic plan for surviving and thriving.   Now is a great time to assess 5 key areas which impact your business intelligence that likely have not received much attention over the past few years and could add value and insights that will help your company build on the progress that has been made through the creative responses to difficult times.  They are:

• ·         Integrated employee skills assessment and development
• ·         IT infrastructure audit and recommendations for legacy system integration/upgrade
• ·         Risk assessment
• ·         Order to cash cycle improvement
• ·         Sales cycle improvement

Attention to any of these critical efforts will positively impact revenues, profits or cash flow and possibly some combination of those. 

This is the second in a series of blogs on business intelligence.