November, 2015

Building Resilience

Julia Lindsay CEO iOpener Institute

Scholarship tells us

1. Resilience mediates burnout and health in nursing staff (Arrogante, 2014)

2. Positive affect predicts adaptation to stress/resilience (Gloria, Faulk & Steinhardt, 2012)

3. Happiness at work promotes career success (Boehm & Lyubomirsky, 2005 & 2008)

4. Patient care suffers when staff suffer (Boorman, 2009)

Being happy and resilient is good for everyone

Resilience is therefore an inflection point

Capacity to withstand knocks and ability to bounce back in a psychologically healthy manner.

The Performance-Happiness Model

What we know about resilience: good news! And…

Doing difficult things exercises resilience

Much more resilient than we know

It’s domain and people specific

Some people are hardier than others

Not damaged by experiencing

bad stuff Some stress is good

Buffers to maintain resilience

Manage your energy

Loehr & Schwartz: energy check

Buffers to maintain resilience

Practice proactive coping

Manage your energy

Coping strategies

• Problem-focused

• Maladaptive

• Emotion-focused

• Avoidant

• Proactive

Coping strategies

Proactive coping

• Sets you up to expect and prepare for life’s challenges

• Transcends the problem/situation or emotional focused dichotomy.

• Is the most well connected with delivering results and personal growth

Behaviors associated with proactive coping

• Have resources at their disposal because they are widely networked

• Anticipate roadblocks by thinking “what if” ahead of the game

• See risks as avenues to success

• Interpret events in a more upbeat way to intentionally generate upbeat feelings

Generate upbeat feelings

But what should I do? A selection of tools to build and maintain resilience

Take a strengths based approach

to problems

Plan 5 routes to success: Hope ψ

Be kind to yourself: Headspace

Notice what’s happening:

mind and body

Compare down not up: Olympians!

Talk to the ‘edge’ of your network

Talk to the edge of your network

Plan 5 routes to success

Compare down not up

Notice what’s happening

Take a strengths-based approach

• Ask 3-4 people what they think you are good at

• Check with your partner

• Decide what gives you most energy

• Reflect on and prioritise this list

• (Do this with your team)

• Bring your strengths to a tough situation

It makes you look at things differently!

Be kind to yourself: experiences not stuff is what matters

Conclusion: build buffers to maintain resilience

Practice proactive coping

Try something new to see what works

for you Manage your energy