Is Resilience the Secret to Being Happy at Work?

Learning is crucial to resilience. We all experience some adversity and setbacks in our personal and professional lives; how we respond to such events can inhibit our growth or propel us forward. This is the thinking behind the Failing Well course at Smith College. A number of educators noticed that students who were used to being ‘perfect’ or ‘exceptional’ were ill equipped to deal with the ups and downs of campus life; they were struggling to cope with simple ‘failures’ such as missing a deadline by a few minutes. Similar initiatives also run in Harvard, Princeton, and the University of Pennsylvania.

Now that you’ve read about the traits and benefits of resilience, let’s look at the characteristics in a little more detail.

Resilience is also linked to how we explain setbacks to ourselves. A resilient person typically views a setback as temporary (permanence), related to one particular area of their lives (pervasiveness), and linked to external events (personalization). Here is a breakdown of how this looks:

Resilient Mindset/ Non-Resilient Mindset :

As you can see, having a resilient mindset brings a very different and positive perspective to our daily reactions and thoughts. Why not take some time to reflect on how you responded to recent challenges? Can you identify either of these mindsets?

I recently read you talk to yourself more than anyone else. Going a step further, our actions are linked to our thoughts so if we constantly tell ourselves negative stories, then our actions and interactions with others are likely to be affected.

Use a journal to track your thoughts and reactions for a few days to identify any patterns. Do you frequently think ‘I can’t or ‘it’s too difficult?’ If so, how does this determine your reactions? Is there evidence to support or contradict your thought? How do your thoughts impact on your energy and interactions with others?

It’s also worth looking at your wider network of family, friends, and colleagues; do they use positive or negative language when discussing a situation? It’s easy to adopt the thoughts of our peers.

By recognizing these patterns, you can now pivot to positive language and reactions. The next time you think ‘I can’t, ask yourself ‘Why can’t I?’ Phrases such as ‘always’ or ‘never’ may indicate you tend to think in permanent terms; replace these with ‘sometimes’ or ‘lately’.

Too often, we become fixated on negative events and emotions, which eclipse everything that is going well. Gratitude helps us to focus on the present moment and increases our sense of self-worth, which improves our ability to resist stress and negativity.

In your journal, jot down three things you are grateful for today — this could be music, a work colleague helping you out, a great cup of coffee. Big or small; it doesn’t really matter. Over time, this daily practice will shift your thinking towards positivity and also acts as a handy reference tool if you feel overwhelmed by an unexpected challenge.

In Option B, Sheryl Sandberg discusses organizational resilience, highlighting the importance of acknowledging failure and providing honest feedback at all levels. Using post-mortems or debriefs at regular intervals can lead to fewer mistakes and increased innovation as teams feel more comfortable when trying something new. She also suggests managers and team members not only seek feedback from their peers but reflect on how they reacted to this feedback.

REP is a personal change management approach we have developed at BrightWork and stands for Research, Execute and Post-Mortem. The idea is to tackle any changes in smaller, manageable chunks with time allocated to reflection and learning. Let’s take the example of self-talk to start with.

R: Use a journal to track your thoughts and reactions for a few days. You can also carry out some online research into the benefits and practices of positive self-talk.

After a week, review your journal and pick one or two habits you want to change. Perhaps you say ‘ I can’t frequently’ — can you improve this and how?

E: During the execute phase, start implementing your positive self-talk for a week or so. Keep recording your experiences in a journal.

P: After a few days, review your latest journal entries and take note of key learnings and improvements you need to make. You may also like to select another area to work on and start the REP cycle again.

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