Resilience

Stuart Hunt

This session is concerned with how we maintain the energy and persistence that we need in the face of change, disorder and distress

What words or phrases come to mind when you think

about resilience?

This?

“A set of cognitive, behavioural and emotional responses to acute or chronic adversities which can be unusual or commonplace. These responses can be learned and are within the grasp of everyone....

.... the most important factor is the attitude you adopt to deal with adversity. Therefore attitude (meaning) is at the heart of resilience.”

Neenam and Dryden 2009

Please take a few minutes to discuss with a colleague how the many and varied changes you have experienced over the last few years (at work) have impacted on you

Robertson Cooper: i-resilience - 4 Components

• Confidence (personal resilience)

• Motivation (and a shared sense of purpose)

• Adaptability, and the way we view problems and uncertainty

• Social (and other) support systems

Confidence: Personal Resilience

• An awareness of personal strengths

• High order social skills, personal assertiveness and a willingness to accept and engage with conflict when it arises

• A focus on ‘positive’ emotions and positive attitudes like commitment, control, and challenge, while decreasing those of isolation, powerlessness, and threat

Purpose

• Our work must make sense to us

• It must be something that we feel benefits some greater good

(a vision?)

• It must provide a sense of self-worth

It is important to consider “people's sense of whether their lives have purpose” Carol Ryff, University of Wisconsin – Madison

Adaptability

• The quality that enables us to cope with ambiguity and deal with uncertainty

• It involves skills in terms of re-framing our current perception of ourselves and our situation

• A tolerance for risk and anxiety

"People who are high in hardiness enjoy ongoing changes and difficulties. They find themselves more involved in their work when it gets tougher and more complicated. They tend to think of stress as a normal part of life, rather than as something that's unfair.'' Maddi and Khoshaba, 2005

Social (and other) Support • We all need people around us – at

least some of the time. (Some of us need it a lot of the time!)

• The positive effects of social support have been widely studied and shown to buffer against the effects of distress

• Physical exercise, a good diet, active participation in activities outside work, getting into the open air and rest are also good support

The HSE Management Standards – 6 Key Risk Factors 1. Demands (balanced workload)

2. Control (influence)

3. Support (informed/equipped)

4. Relationships (collaboration)

5. Role (sense of purpose)

6. Change (well managed)

Organisational Resilience • A Consistent Culture:

– values, purpose, communications, style of decision making are aligned

• Inclusivity and Networking (learning)

• Emotional contract

• Ruthless prioritisation (a particular problem in HE?)

• Don’t try to avoid or hide real problems (it’s both patronising and self-defeating – beware the rumour factory)

Jenny Campbell, Lifetimeswork

Lessons from the nursery…

• A glass of milk and a biscuit is good to keep us going in the mid-morning

• A nap in the middle of the afternoon stops us getting fractious

• When we go out into the world, we should keep together and hold hands