Everyone is motivated by security to a smaller or lesser degree. This varies with age, personal circumstances and job roles. It certainly increases when we become parents and is an important motivator in highly regulated and process-focused roles such as engineering, health care and accountancy. It’s usually less important for managers and leaders than their teams and tends to be higher in corporates.
The COVID-19 crisis and Brexit have created uncertainty en masse, the housing ladder is harder to get on each year, and technological advancement has created a rate of change never seen before; Google has only been around for 22 years, but it is hard to imagine life without it! Given this, how do we create a sense of stability that motivates and reassures our workforce whilst innovating and adapting to ensure we thrive in today’s VUCA (volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous) business environment?
You might want to change the direction, marketing, or target audience of your business to better fit the current climate, but you can’t do that effectively without good foundations and confident employees. Before you make any significant changes, make sure your employees are feeling secure about what they should be doing and how can we expect them to support and back changes to the business. Communication is paramount at every stage in a business, whether it is the very first day or whether you are breaking into a new market or creating new teams.
The RNLI do this very effectively – crucial when you consider the thousands of volunteers who’ve supported them for decades. They publish their strategy and what won’t change as well as what will to provide certainty for everyone throughout the organisation. The result? They can create changes to procedures and direction with transparency, making sure that everybody is (both figuratively and metaphorically) on board!
Beyond communication, every business needs processes. It may not be the most glamourous aspect of a business, but if you can save time, energy, and stress by having clear systems whenever you get a new job/client/project, then everybody can feel much more secure and certain as to their next steps. Much like communication, it sounds simple, but even simple processes for taking on new clients/employees or running projects allow businesses to stay stable in a VUCA business environment. If you then want to adapt your business and change parts of it, you can keep these processes running to provide stability and certainty in times of growth or adaptation.
A need for stability is recognised in individuals by Motivational Maps® through the ‘Defender’ motivator and applies at a personal level as well as an organisational level. By practicing good communication skills and encouraging efficient and constant use of processes throughout the work environment, businesses can give themselves steady foundations to either stay safe in a VUCA environment, or to adapt to one without having to reinvent the (business) wheel.
Assistant Psychological Therapist by day, coach by evening and weekend! I'm a firm believer in collaborative working both clinically and more generally, and am keen to use people's expertise about themselves to make meaningful and energising changes in their life. Passionate about mental health, wellbeing, and self-care; determined to make a difference.
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