5 tips to help your team ‘feel the pain’ and share the gain.
Diversity and inclusivity top today’s agenda – quite rightly: our points of difference are where the magic happens! We all want to bring our special sauce to work, yet we all have one thing in common: the desire to develop and grow. Which is where problems can start…
All growth requires some discomfort (there’s a reason they’re called growing pains!) But humans are hardwired to avoid that discomfort. Our brains have evolved to seek the path of least resistance (tired hunter-gatherers didn’t need more ‘productive challenge’ in their lives… ).
So, how do you respect difference – and different-shaped comfort zones – whilst encouraging your people into their ‘stretch zone’, where real growth happens?
At TCX we believe people need the freedom to create their own learning journey but, crucially, this journey must also be social and supported by everyone on the team.
We might all be starting from different places, but let’s share responsibility for helping each other reach the destination! Try our 5 tips to help you get there.
We can take different bites from the same apple!
Steve Jobs knew not everyone at Apple was motivated by the same thing—some loved design, others were tech-obsessed, and just a few wanted to change the world. But they all shared a clear goal: to create products that transform lives.
2. Pick Your Personal Growth Focus
Step 1 Ask everyone to identify their personal superpowers – and their kryptonite!
For clues to your superpowers, look at your past wins and struggles—what came easy, what felt like pulling teeth? What energised you, what left you wiped out? Get friends and colleagues to chip in – they’ll often spot strengths and blind spots you might miss.
Step 2 Pick a specific area where you want to develop.
We poor humans are delicate machines: try to fix everything at once and you’ll only blow a gasket! So, choose ONE thing that will really move the needle (and don’t always focus on flaws!)
Want a winning team? Follow Man United!
Famously Alex Ferguson didn’t ask his strikers to practise tackling. He wanted his strikers to hone their superpower: scoring goals. Players like Ronaldo were told to focus on perfecting their dribbling and finishing – the skills that made them great.
Ferguson didn’t want a team of players who were average at everything. He knew it was their differences – their unique superpowers – that made them brilliant together.
Step 3 Share your ‘growth goal’, and get your team on side!
When you publicly commit to a course of action (‘better time-keeping’), your team-mates can support your progress, (‘Congratulations! You’ve made it in before lunch’).
Signpost your intention – and how much you’ll welcome the right kind of feedback: data-based, positive reinforcement. ‘I’m working on keeping calm under fire’/’ Well done for holding it together when our presentation went Pete Tong.’
By sharing your goal, you tune up your team-mates’ selective attention. Suddenly, they can’t drop a pen without seeing HOW CALM you were about it.
Remember, it’s the people you work with day-to-day who are best placed to support you. In turn, you get to shake your pom poms for them. Come on, who doesn’t dream of being a cheerleader? (OK then, just me).
3. Embrace Discomfort (Can you pass the Karaoke test?)
Studies have been performed on groups of people stepping up to sing in public. While everyone exhibits the same physiological response (elevated heartrate and adrenaline), those who labelled their feelings as “excited” performed better than those who said they were “scared.” The success factor wasn’t singing ability, but self-perception. (Everyone felt the same, just interpreted it differently).
Next time nerves hit, don’t panic (about your panic!). Take it as a sign you’re doing something right… and then do it some more.
Find your Sasha Fierce
Even megastars get the (mega) wobbles! Beyonce used to struggle with such crippling stage fright, she had to create an alter ego, “Sasha Fierce,” to channel her nerves into power: “When I’m on stage, I’m aggressive and strong and not afraid of my sexuality… I’m fearless. I’m just a different person.”
This persona allowed Beyonce to embrace her discomfort, and perform with confidence. Eventually, she “retired” Sasha Fierce, having learned to embody that fearless energy herself.
4. Tackle one spider at a time…
Engineer experiences just out of your comfort zone. Treat it like exposure therapy: if someone wanted to conquer their fear of spiders, you wouldn’t put a tarantula down their neck!
In a research study at Ruhr University Bochum, participants completed exposure therapy to spiders (progressing from looking at a picture of a spider to letting one crawl over their hand).
When subsequently challenged to push their fear of heights, participants climbed far higher up a staircase than they’d managed before the spider exposure therapy. Facing one fear (spiders) helped them overcome a completely disconnected one (heights).
Push ourselves in one area at work, and we’ll build our resilience and courage for the next ‘discomfort zone’ along the way!
Top tip: Treat your capacity for discomfort like a muscle, then ‘do the reps’!
Actively seek out small, ‘stretchy’ challenges, eg raising your hand in a meeting or offering to write up a team report. Each step works like a ‘rep’, building your capacity for bigger challenges in future.
5. Quick navel check
Before ducking out of discomfort, be honest with yourself: what’s the real source of my stress? Are you being forced to go against your personal values (‘I’m a reflective person. If I let myself be rushed for a quick decision, it’ll be a bad one.’). Or are you being over-protective of yourself? (‘You can’t ask me to stand up and talk in a meeting!’ Why not? What will you lose?).
Know when you’re standing up for your beliefs – and when you’re merely doubting yourself – and your learning journey can begin. Enjoy the white knuckle ride!
Ask us how we brought all this together at the award-winning agency C_Space.
For their Big Growth Day, we –
- Created growth teams
- Helped every team identify their vision of success, then create their personal picture of success within it.
- We got people to identify what they wanted to develop about themselves
- We provided them with a technique for giving specific, data-based, positive feedback. So everyone could help each other grow every day.
Give us a shout at hello@thecultureexperiment.com – we’d love to share our part in the C_Space story!
