Yellow, the colour of happiness.
Everyone gets joy out of the things they love. Whether that’s martial arts, gaming or just watching the non-digital clouds drift by in the skies above.
People also tend to feel…something when they “must” do things or when things change. They can get frustrated while learning a new technique, or feel sad when they try their hardest but just can’t get it right at that moment. It’s like we human beings are wired to feel something at any given moment.
It’s here, in this intriguing sea of the human thing we call emotions that I see another similarity between martial arts and IT-adoption.
I remember many faces. Tense, happy, sad, curious… Eyes big with either interest, or fear. Mouths set with either concentration, or frustration.
These faces all apply to both people within dojo’s as well as people that experience a change in their IT-environment, their way of working about to change. Some are welcoming these changes, having been fed up with the old way of working, frustrated with checking documents in or out, unable to reach important documents from their phone or having to walk unnecessary long distances to a computer. These are the kind of people who will pay attention during training, maybe even contribute to your adoption causes either by fulfilling an ambassador role, spread the word or just by providing helpful real-life scenario’s to their colleagues.
If you could, adopt these people. Not literally, but embrace their enthusiasm for the change you’re about to bring. Give them a role to partake in, offer them a little pedestal but never forget to guide them on their way atop of it. Because if these ambassadors are guided, they will enhance the success rate of your change project.
And maybe you’re thinking: “But if these people are so naturally enthusiastic, why should I focus part of my attention to them? Couldn’t I just let them run their course and concentrate this time on the hard-to-gets?”
You could, of course. But the thing with emotions, even if they’re positive ones like enthusiasm and energized joy, is that without guidance and purpose they can overwhelm people who don’t feel that way. I have experienced some, dare I say, over-enthusiastic people who kept on bringing ideas, stacking thing-upon-thing and thus trying to add onto the project, loosing its focus point. Without regular updates and check-ins and the guidance of keeping their task simple, I fear the purpose of the project would have been buried in a sea of (unrealistic and out-of-scope) add-ons. It would have meant noise in a well-thought-out communication strategy if I hadn’t set some boundaries. And noise in communication is one the main causes of a failed change project. So yeah, positive emotions are great for your project, but some guidance is needed.
To make a little bridge to martial arts. I know the grin when someone is handed a new kobudo weapon, like…the tonfa for instance. Great piece of wood, resembling a police baton and definitely a pair of weapons that sparks imagination to the point one just starts to wave it about with great fervour.
You can probably already guess what can happen if a sensei doesn’t guide that type of enthusiasm.
Now how about to spill some tea? People do seem to enjoy asking questions about the juicy parts of my job. Like: “Do you ever have to deal with emotional melt downs?” and “What is the worst person you had to deal with?”.
Well I guess the first thing I came to understand about both my job and my martial arts, is that people can fear all kinds of things and that this fear results in different emotions. Anger is an outlet of fear, but so is a complete shut-down, or nervousness. How these are expressed differ as well. Tears, sighing, the physical slamming of things and even grinning or joking can be a way of letting out some of that fear, either by putting up a front or just venting. The best thing is: Neither in IT-adoption, nor in martial arts do these “negative” range of emotions have to be negative. If someone expresses anger because they fear their inbox with all their precious e-mails might disappear, or because they believe certain machines or apps will stop working, often letting them vent and really listening to their concerns can actually be beneficial for your project. Cause, they might be onto something you and your team have overlooked, or just because this person just feels heard in their underlaying concerns.
And layers…they are often there.
Personally I love to encourage those that are afraid to take to first steps, whether it is in IT or in martial arts. They might grumble a bit, warn you beforehand that they’re “not good with computers” or “clumsy”, or just carefully tap around either on their keyboard or on a punching pad, depending on the setting. But I often see these people grow fastest with just a few words of praise and encouragement. It makes me glow along with them and afterwards they do tend to encourage others after them, sometimes jokingly saying “Even I got this”. But it never fails me to hear the pride with which they state those words.
Guidance can both mean bending, or just deflecting. Sometimes you have to give into people’s emotions a bit, by actively listening, asking insightful questions, letting them come to their own conclusions of why certain changes are beneficial to either they way of working, or to their path of martial arts. You can just tell people to pin an important Word-file to their task bar, or to keep their wrist straight while punching, but it’s better they experience why these actions are beneficial in their own preferred processes. And yes, sometimes you need to deflect. Just like it’s better to deflect a blow that’s too heavy to block directly, it can be an unfortunate, but wiser decision to show someone with too much emotion the door. Why? Because we do often work in time slots. Because even though I often sum up this profession as “IT-psychologist” we are not someone’s personal mental care assistant. Because most of the time, we work with groups and sometimes it better to redirect the currents of such a dam break of emotions towards a place where the others in that group might not drown in some else’s emotions. This is also why I prefer to always plan in-between time during training sessions for instance, as it leaves room for aftercare. Whether that’s by readdressing such an emotional outburst, by sweeping away some lingering small fears by showing what has happened to your OneDrive data or by showing a little extra to ones that show an enthusiastic hunger for more.
So to sum up: it’s good to guide emotions towards your goal. Whether they are your own, or those of others and whether viewed a positive, or negative.
Just like a good punch emotions need a target.
So it’s better to point them towards your intended success than let it go astray and waste all that energy.
And if you’re curious about what type of energy you should bring to the (adoption) table, stay tuned for the next blog.
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