MindForest and Sophie Zhuang are delighted to invite you to the webinar in English, which will take place on 11th November 2020 from 12:00-13:00 online!
In times of unpredictability and increasing insecurity, it becomes vital to adapt to ever changing circumstances. Here a flexible and centred mind helps.
In partnership with POST and EBRC, MindForest is delighted to invite you to its virtual “Cybersecurity: What about the Human Factor?”, which will take place during the Cybersecurity Week 2020 on 28th October 2020 from 2 pm to 3 pm online !
MindForest est heureux de vous inviter à son BrainBreakfast virtuel « Votre organisation vous donne-t-elle le droit à l’erreur ? Découvrez la « no blame culture » » qui aura lieu le mercredi 07 octobre 2020 de 9h00 à 10h00 en ligne !
Several months ago, when companies were thrust into lockdown at relatively short notice there was just enough time to get equipment sorted. Then the next important challenge to tackle was to ensure that everyone had access to some form of central data base, once these considerations had been taken into account, everyone concentrated on “getting the job done”. As no one knew how long this would continue for, there did not seem to be any need to start (re)defining communication strategies. As a result, many companies experienced the rise of usage of a multitude of communication channels both internally and externally. At internal level, staff resorted to methods they already knew, for example by creating WhatsApp groups, Slack channels or even in some cases Facebook groups. They needed to find a quick, efficient way of keeping in touch with colleagues. At an external level, some companies were sufficiently agile to be able to adapt to virtual methods, quickly setting up webinars to stay in touch with their client base and publishing online newsletters to share expertise and maintain interest in their products and services. Others were not able to follow suit, as their staff or internal structures were quite simply not able to adapt so quickly – and anyway “it would only be temporary…. soon everything will be back to normal”…. Several months later, most of us are still not able to attribute a clear definition to what is “normal”, but we have all come to appreciate that it definitely is not the same as it used to be. There is much talk about the “new normal” and this needs to be taken into account with respect to communication, just as is the case for personnel questions and company strategy.
We have all been in crisis mode for months, is there a risk that too many people are currently concentrating on the immediate effects of the crisis and are losing sight of any potential advantages there may be? To quote André Gide “When a door closes, there is one that opens. Unfortunately, we spend so much time looking at the closed door that we don’t see the one that just opened.” This may be easy to state when so many different companies are facing the ruins of everything they built up over the past years, but without this kind of approach no country would ever have been resurrected after a war or another kind of catastrophe.
MindForest est heureux de vous inviter à son BrainBreakfast virtuel « Back to Work !, but how ? », qui aura lieu le jeudi 10 septembre 2020 de 9h00 à 10h00 en ligne !
The recent crisis saw many workers obliged to change to digital working methods from one day to the next with very little time for preparation – in fact in many cases there was a scramble to even acquire the necessary hardware before shops were closed down for several weeks. Employees were literally thrown into a major change. In many cases, companies had probably previously rejected/postponed such changes on several occasions with the reasoning that the company’s processes and staff were not yet ready for such drastic change! All change specialists know that successful change needs to be well-prepared, so how could it be possible to achieve so much at such short notice? One answer is that under a crisis situation most people function in a sort of overdrive modus and rise to the moment, coping with challenges in the face of which they would normally have paled. Here the word to note is “coped”; they adapted, they fitted in, they showed great flexibility, but that does not necessarily mean that the outcome remains suitable as a long-term organisational structure.
This is not a geographical or recruitment question! It is far more a question of trying to predict the future of the office as we know it and how further changes are going to affect the world of office workers. Many of you will be surprised to know that the first idea of remote working was launched in the 1970’s by NASA engineers as a means of combatting the oil crisis, so what has happened since? To gain an understanding of this you need to assess a vast range of criteria ranging from the history of technical progress to the influence of social criteria such as prestige and office politics, the complexity of which means that it is difficult to ascertain where the future lies.
“Be prepared” is the well-known motto of the scout movement, in actual fact most of us like to prepare ourselves for what is in store, it is an automatic mechanism to cope with a specific situation. However, when a crisis like Covid-19 strikes it is virtually impossible to prepare oneself, there is no comparable “data” to process, which of course causes a feeling of great uncertainty in addition to the wide range of health issues and economic worries already being experienced. The need to get one’s bearings becomes even greater and so the spiral turns and anxiety increases. There are several potential sources of reassurance ranging from the family, to the work environment, some people even turn to social media or expert advice. No matter the choice of source, it must be able to “deliver”, as otherwise the situation may become even more serious.
MindForest est heureux de vous inviter à son BrainBreakfast virtuel « Votre organisation vous donne-t-elle le droit à l’erreur ? Découvrez la « no blame culture » », qui aura lieu le mardi 29 juillet 2020 de 9h00 à 10h00 en ligne !
As change management specialists, we help organizations to develop their capacity to achieve.
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