MUCH has happened since I wrote my last column, and things now seem to changing on a daily basis. And that’s difficult for many of us.
Change at the best of times need to be managed properly, introduced in the right way, taking account of people’s fears and feelings and all the questions they will have.
Unfortunately we are not in that situation right now and the pace and scope of change to our daily lives is proving to be very daunting. Accordingly we must look at ways to manage, or control this as best we can.
The idea of ‘locus of control’ refers to the amount, or degree, of control that people feel they have over the outcome of events. People with a high internal locus of control believe they have a lot of personal influence.
They believe that what they do and how they act all directly affects what happens. If they go for an interview, it’s the answers they give, the experience they demonstrate or the confidence they project that gets them the job.
Conversely, people with a low internal and high external locus believe they are usually at the mercy of outside influences. Things that they believe have very little control over. They failed to get that job because the interviewer was tired or didn’t like the school they went to. There was a traffic jam that made them late (even though they didn’t leave early, or phone ahead).
I once played football with a fellow who would probably admit he wasn’t a Pep or Jürgen in terms of tactics, but what he did do was control what he could. The team was announced early so players could mentally prepare, shirts were hung up waiting for them on Saturday, training was on time, communications were prompt, there was water and Jaffa cakes at half time, kits were clean and so on.
It was then up to the players to deliver during the 90 minutes on the pitch. Win, lose or draw, he was happy he had controlled what he could and that he had affected the outcome of the game in some small way. That team did very well.
At work we might not be able to directly influence something like company strategy, but we can control quite a bit. We can control the amount of time we spend on something. We can choose how much attention to pay to it. The amount of effort we put into a project? That’s up to us. How we treat others, how we speak to people; all these are things we can affect.
All of which brings me to the current situation. We cannot possibly control everything going on in government, or the health service, so it’s important at times like this to focus on what we can actually exert control over in our own lives.
If we spend all our time speculating, worrying and constructing worst-case scenarios over and over in our heads we may lose sight of what we need to be doing each day. A little bit of worry can be a motivator, but we can’t let it paralyse us.
What we need to do is start focusing on things that we definitely can control (I appreciate it will be more difficult for those with an external locus, but hopefully at least this will help those folks recognise their leaning and try to pro-actively affect their situation).
We can control whether we social distance properly. We can control how much toilet paper, hand wash and sanitizer we buy. We can control where we go for our exercise. We can control how many times a day we go out to do that exercise. We can control whether we phone our relatives and friends to keep in touch.
If we are lucky enough to be able to work from home, we can control the effort we put in. We can control whether our children run free in the streets and whether we spend time with them doing something educational each day. We can control how we treat others.
Wayne Dyer once said: “You cannot always control what goes on outside. But you can always control what goes on inside.”
At times like this, let’s apply it not just to our minds, but also to how we live at home during these unprecedented times. Stay safe.
:: Barry Shannon (bshannon@cayan.com) is human resources director at TSYS Cayan in Belfast.
