Accepting Change Within a Job, Organization, and In Your Personal Life

Photograph by Denys Nevozhai

If it’s one thing that is constant in life, it is change. That is a factual external and internal process that we will all experience throughout our lives. We change as we grow, and we change due to the experiences we live through.

However, changes do not just happen to us. Organizations, jobs, industries, and systems change as well. Sometimes it’s a gradual, slow process. Sometimes the change rushes in extremely fast. Either way, one thing that seems to be a natural human instinct towards change is human opposition.

We don’t always like change, however, we have to prepare for it and ultimately accept it as best we can.

So why does opposition to change happen anyway?

1. Fear of losing job status or job security. (We’re not always eager to make changes that could potentially threaten our jobs.)

2. Fear of the unknown.

3. Peer pressure

4. Fear of failure.

Deal with the change head-on in stages. You might not be able to grasp it all at one time, and if you did so, it can be quite overwhelming. So first and foremost:

1. Take care of yourself. Maintain your emotional and physical health. The healthier you are, the better able you will be to manage change.

2. Keep an open mind and stay flexible. Let go of any and all expectations that nothing changes and things must stay the same. Be flexible with the changes. You may end up finding out that some of the changes you may be dreading will turn out to be improvements that you couldn’t do without.

3. Control your life. When one says this it means we ultimately only have control over how we react to certain events. Stay positive in the light of those changes.

4. Act, don’t react. Take charge of the change. Put yourself in a position that puts you ahead and leads in the change instead of opposing it.