TRANSFORMATIONAL COPING: TURNING STRESSFUL CHANGES TO YOUR ADVANTAGE

‘‘The significant problems we face cannot be solved at the same level of thinking we were at when we created them.’’ —ALBERT EINSTEIN 1 You have a choice as to the way in which you cope with stressful changes. The way of transformational, or resilient, coping is to: s Treat changes as problems to solve, s Take the necessary mental and action steps to solve problems effectively, and s Draw observations, insights, and wisdom from your coping experiences in order to learn and grow. Each time you cope in this way, you make yourself better prepared for the next problem as it arises. Specifically, at the mental level, you find a way to put the stressful circumstance into a broader perspective, so that it seems less daunting. Then, you are able to analyze the circumstance’s subtle features and deepen your understanding of it. The mental steps of broadening perspective and deepening understanding lead you toward an action plan that can decrease the stress and turn the change to your advantage. Carrying out the action plan can increase your hardy attitudes, which increases the likelihood that you will continue with transformational coping as other changes happen. TRANSFORMATIONAL COPING ‘‘In the middle of every difficulty lies opportunity.’’ —ALBERT EINSTEIN 2 Transformational coping is a proactive mental and behavioral cop- ing style that is fundamental to resiliency. Through coping in this way, the negative emotions around stressful problems diminish, and new ways of thinking open pathways for effective action. With this process, stressful changes can be turned into opportunities. But, to turn adversity to your advantage, you must put effort into finding new ways of understanding your problems in order to ar- rive at new solutions. This effort is difficult; that’s why, to some, it is easier to rely on old ways of understanding, as if there were nothing more to learn. When minor changes are experienced, this status-quo approach may be all you need to cope. But, when stressful changes require new understanding and coping behaviors to solve them, the status-quo approach amounts to coping regres- sively. Old ways of understanding problems often spotlight a stressful change’s obvious features rather than its subtle ones, which obscure pathways to solving the problem. Transformational coping’s procedures and skills help you to uncover the subtle features of stressful change. When you sort out the possibilities of a circumstance, you have a chance to turn change to advantage, grow in understanding, and make headway in carving a professional and personal path that moves you posi- tively into the future. To get you started, let’s look at the three key steps in transfor- mational coping: 1. BROADENING YOUR PERSPECTIVE. The transformational coping process begins at the mental level. Many of the stressful work changes you face today happen at an organizational level, despite that they affect you personally. It helps to solve these large- scale difficulties by placing them into a broader perspective so that they are more tolerable. You can then back up enough to get a bird’s-eye view of these problems, so you can think about them clearly and decide how to cope with them. For example, you might put a job loss into perspective by real- izing that internal and external conditions had reached a point where the company felt that downsizing was necessary to get back on track. And, of course, downsizing leads employers to terminate employees, not an act of personal aggression against you. You can now think through the pros and cons of the job loss and come up with a constructive plan of action. When you make the stressor tolerable by broadening your perspective, you are more ready and able to analyze the problem and search out a solution to it. 2. DEEPENING YOUR UNDERSTANDING. Once you gain per- spective and can face the problem, you immerse yourself in the problem-solving process by taking account of the ways in which you, others, and the situation contribute to the stressfulness of the circumstance. You try to understand the less obvious features of the problem. One way to do this is by appreciating the relational facets of stressful changes. You, and your problems, coexist with other people. For exam- ple, you and your supervisor may not get along, but because the work situation imposes upon you a collegial partnership, you must find a way to work well together. It helps little to chalk up your mutually shared uneasiness to having come from different worlds and letting it go at that. This is a regressive coping conclusion that gives you little reason to deepen your understanding of this stress- ful relationship. In contrast, the transformational coping process helps you to get the most out of stressful circumstances and changes, so that you seize opportunities that lead to insights and behaviors that positively service your life. By carefully analyzing the relational facets of stressful circumstances, hardy problem solvers are able to flush outgrowth-promoting opportunities. In the example used above, if you really analyze the difficulty you and your supervisor are having in working together, you may well be able to discern specific misunderstandings between you, and how they tend to accumulate without either of you realizing it. This will much more likely lead you to an action plan for cor- recting the problem than would the simple conclusion that you two just come from different worlds. 3. TAKING DECISIVE ACTION. ‘‘Opportunity is missed by most because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work.’’ —THOMAS J. EDISON 3 Gaining insight into what stresses you is good, but taking decisive action to solve the problem is even better. Once you gain perspec- tive and understanding through the mental part of the coping process, the next step is to map out a strategy for turning around the circumstance and decreasing its stressfulness on you. Continu- ing with the above example, if, for instance, you concluded that a series of mutual misunderstandings caused the problem, you can take actions to clarify both your understanding of it and your su- pervisor’s understanding of it. Your action plan might involve ways for you to explain yourself more clearly to your supervisor, and to ask for further clarification of his or her input. The result may well be a decrease in the stressfulness of the circumstance, and the personal feedback you get from seeing your- self solving problems in this way strengthens your hardy attitudes of commitment, control, and challenge. You will increasingly feel like staying involved in your life, trying to influence the outcomes going on around you, and continually learning from your experi- ences, so as to do better and better. Case Studies of Transformational Coping The following two examples of employees skilled in transforma- tional coping involve the mental process of putting the stressful circumstance into perspective, deepening your understanding of it, and formulating and carrying out a plan of action designed to turn things to your advantage. JOEY T.: ‘‘HOWEVER INVOLVED IN MY WORK I AM, I CANNOT JUST DETACH FROM MY COWORKERS.’’ Ever since his own high school experience, Joey had wanted to be teach youngsters. After college, he started working as a math teacher in his local high school, and threw himself into making a difference in the lives of his students. Soon, he became a really popular teacher, and students treated him as one of them. In his dedication to teaching, Joey made little effort to get to know his fellow teachers. Sometimes, he would not even go to faculty meetings, as he felt preoccupied by the effortful, time-consuming commitment to helping youngsters develop. It surprised him when he became an object of criticism for his colleagues. Even the school principal began to question Joey’s intentions and effectiveness as a teacher. There was a chance that he might be officially rep- rimanded for being too involved with students. Although the criticism surprised Joey, his hardy atti- tudes were strong enough to provoke the needed attention to his colleagues. He put the problem in perspective by recognizing that it was manageable, and could be solved. Thinking the situation through analytically, he recognized that it was his not having treated the other teachers as im- portant that had caused the problem. He had been too ex- clusively occupied with helping his students. His ensuing action plan set the goal of explaining him- self to colleagues, and drawing them into his dedicated ap- proach to reaching and influencing youngsters. He made sure never to miss faculty meetings again, and went out of his way to interact with coworkers, making sure they knew what he was trying to accomplish, and asking them about their own plans. Before long, the majority of his colleagues began to un- derstand and respect him as someone who was actually able to reach youngsters while teaching them. His principal asked him to carry out teaching workshops for the faculty. Joey did this with affection and humility, and before long he was influential in helping his colleagues to develop as teachers. In all this, he realized that he had been too one- sided as to the people he should reach. RUTH B.: ‘‘WHATEVER HAPPENS, I NEED TO MAKE IT TURN OUT THE BEST FOR ME.’’ Pursuing an English major in college, Ruth had always wanted to be a writer. After getting her bachelor’s degree, she found a job as an assistant at a large advertising firm. Her supervisor conceptualized advertising scenarios, writing a lot of them himself. He expected Ruth to carry out his plans, edit his scripts, and follow his directions. The advertising firm had essentially one huge client. The client paid so well and needed so much marketing that, over time, the advertising firm had given up other smaller clients and concentrated efforts on the one account. Picture what this meant when, in a time of economic recession, the client had to decrease its advertising budget. When the advertising firm had to downsize as a result, Ruth, who was, after all, a junior employee, lost her job. At first, Ruth was bewildered. She had been making a good salary. What was she to do now? Did she fail to con- vince them of her value as an employee? Soon, however, her hardy attitudes kicked in. She had falsely assumed that her company was solid and impervious to change, which in the past had made her feel safe. Realizing this, she recog- nized that she hadn’t failed the company, the company had failed her and itself by putting all its eggs in one basket. She remembered that she had taken orders rather than giv- ing them. And come to think of it, her work tasks had bored her, as they rarely expressed her talents and capabili- ties. Ruth’s thinking led to the perspective she reached, namely, that it is normal to shop around for jobs until you find the one that really works for you, and that it makes sense, too. Although her firm had gotten rid of her, losing her job may have been as much an opportunity as a loss. Thus, Ruth felt better and was able to analyze her situation more deeply and realize that she needed to find another job that encouraged and valued her talents more than the one she had lost. Soon, she had an action plan and was carrying it out by applying to other advertising firms, making sure that the job they might offer would permit her to express her capa- bilities, and that the prospective employer knew her talents. Before long, Ruth found what she wanted. A small firm searching for people who write well offered her a creative job. She enthusiastically accepted their offer. She’s doing very well in her new job. Her coworkers respect and value her work, and she values them as colleagues and mentors. She also fully realizes that if she had not been terminated by her last employer, the new career opportunity might never have happened. REGRESSIVE COPING ‘‘A life spent making mistakes is not only more honorable but more useful than a life spent in doing nothing.’’ —GEORGE BERNARD SHAW 4 A much less effective coping style than transformational coping is regressive coping. There are two expressions to this nonresilient coping style. In the first, most passive form of regressive coping, problems that stem from stressful changes are not thought about. Instead they are avoided by engaging in activities irrelevant to the task. Although this approach may bring some momentary relief, it does little to remedy the problems. Over time, individuals who take this approach learn to avoid any change that might expose their limitations and areas of needed growth. To avoid feeling awk- ward, out of control, and insecure, they would rather shrink their life down to the size of a postage stamp. Exaggeration of, and catastrophic reactions to, stressful changes is the second, more active form of regressive coping. Here, you feel like a victim and strike out against those who seem like op- pressors. People who cope in this way have a difficult time distin- guishing between type and intensity of stressor. They respond to a change or problem that makes them feel out of control with apprehension, fear, and anger. This can manifest as irritability, un- cooperativeness, and criticism of others. The more socially de- structive form of this regressive coping can involve violence and acting out, such as in sabotage or terrorism. Though they differ in terms of social impact, both of these forms of regressive coping limit your effectiveness and development. Case Studies of Regressive Coping The five people in the following examples used different kinds of regressive coping to manage stressful changes. This coping strategy undermined their ability to develop a broad perspective and deep understanding of the problem, and to take actions that give pur- pose and meaning to their professional and personal lives. These five examples illustrate how bitterness and self-pity prevent people from moving forward constructively. ALLAN H.: ‘‘LIFE STINKS, AND THERE’S NOTHING I CAN DO ABOUT IT.’’ The story of Allan that appeared in chapter 6 is a good example of regressive coping. Lacking courage and motiva- tion, he was unable to do the hard work of transformational coping and slipped further and further into regressive cop- ing instead. Because he was unable to establish himself in what he saw as a hostile world, his financial situation worsened. He could not bear to make his lifestyle more modest and hated all those fellow employees whom he saw as having done him in. He felt like such a failure. Before long, he fulfilled his prophesy through excessive drinking and drug use, so that he could feel better about himself and not think about what was happening to him. His wife finally left their marriage, which bewildered and emotionally hurt him. While driving under the influ- ence, he hit a teenage pedestrian, which led to his arrest and hospital-based rehabilitation. Nothing seemed to help him. When last heard from, Allan was unemployed, home- less, and down-and-out. As Allan’s example shows, regres- sive coping becomes a nightmare syndrome, even when at first it may seem like a natural enough way of avoiding pressures. Stressed out, we may think, ‘‘What’s so bad about having a few drinks or spending all my money at the mall if it helps me to distract myself from all this trouble?’’ Remember, one thing in regressive coping leads to another, and another, until before long, you have unwittingly under- mined your life. The answer to dealing with stressful changes in the workplace is transformational coping, because it helps you solve problems. Imagine how Allan’s situation would turn out if he coped in this way: At the mental level, he would have put losing his job in a broader perspective, making it tolerable. He could have done this by seeing his job loss as the same thing that is happening to lots of other employees like him rather than as a sign that he is just no good. This commonplace perspec- tive highlights shared aspects of stressful changes. Through this, Allan could have recognized that the frequent job changes prevalent in his industry means that, though losing your position is disruptive, it hardly stops you from getting another job, perhaps an even better one with another firm. We call this the manageability perspective. Had Allan approached his stressful circumstance from these perspectives, he could have assuaged his worries long enough to understand his situation more thoroughly. s What, specifically, did the company tell him about his job loss? How might it be willing to help him find another placement? s What severance benefits could he negotiate from the company? s How could he get helpful directions by networking with his colleagues, friends, and former customers? s Considering his assets, how much time did he have to find another position? s What other ways are available to him in searching for other jobs? s Is there some other job description or career he had thought of as attractive, or always wanted, for which this forced change could open the way? By asking these questions of himself, Allan could have broadened his perspective and deepened his understanding of his situation. This would also have prepared him to de- velop a decisive action plan and carry it out. Notice that we would not have wanted him to jump into an action plan without making the mental effort neces- sary to guide it well. The impulsive ready-fire-aim approach does more harm than good. Decisive plans for action in- clude a goal to reach and instrumental steps toward achiev- ing it. This all follows from a thorough understanding of the problem. Then, it would have been time for Allan to start taking the steps of his action plan, in the specified order, to reach the goal that seemed best for him. As he took the steps and reached the goal, that would have en- couraged him to use the feedback from his efforts to deepen his hardy attitudes of commitment, control, and challenge. All this would have led him far from bitterness and self- pity. GRACE H.: ‘‘THIS IS A MALE SOCIETY, AND I’M UNFORTUNATELY A WOMAN.’’ Now recall Grace, the example in chapter 6 of an employee low in hardy attitudes. Not surprisingly, she had sunk into bitterness, regarding herself a powerless woman in a man’s world, and into self-pity that jeopardized any effort on her own behalf. This all came about when her company failed to promote her. She worked hard on work tasks, finished them as soon as possible, and geared up for the next work project. Grace contributed a lot of effort, time, and exper- tise to the company at which she worked. In her view, she was a model employee and, as she built up tenure, had fully expected the company to promote her. It never crossed her mind that she approached the job as a follower rather than as a leader, or that leaders are more likely to get promoted than followers. Instead, she externalized blame, concluding that her male boss dismissed her as her father had done, and she could do little about this. It was quite painful for her to grow up with two brothers whom her father favored. Her father regularly supported his sons as the ones who would have productive careers. In contrast, he expected Grace to marry and have children. She felt her father overlooked her school success; something he never did with her brothers. Grace’s father, himself not having finished high school, was traditional and had little appreciation as to why she wanted to go to college. Without the support and guidance of fam- ily members, she did poorly in school, and, after only two years, decided to drop out to get a job with her present employer. To this day, her father cannot understand why she has not married and become a mother. To find a way to feel competent and valuable, she threw herself into her work, giving it all her energy. She assumed that the rest of the world did not share in her father’s anti-quated views of women in general, and of her specifically. The initial welcoming attitude of her boss led Grace to think she had finally found a place that valued her. If she followed orders and worked hard, she assumed she would rise up in the company. So, the only way that she could understand her coworkers being promoted over her was to conclude that her boss held the same male chauvinistic views as her father. She angrily decided that they were both male chauvinists. Grace knew too well this long-standing, chronic stress. She would have suffered less and found a more constructive understanding of her lack of advance- ment within the company if she could have embraced Elea- nor Roosevelt’s wise saying, ‘‘No one can make you feel inferior without your consent.’’ As time went on, Grace continued to cope regressively, which deepened bitter and self-piteous feelings within her. Fortunately, her church made our hardiness-training pro- gram available to its parishioners. The transformational coping part of this training program put her through exer- cises, like those in chapter 8. Through this, she searched for perspective and understanding of her circumstance, which led to a decisive plan of action that could solve her problem. It was hard for her to get going at first because she was so used to coping regressively. Once she involved herself in the exercises, however, and experienced some re- lief from coping constructively, her problem-solving proc- ess took on a life of its own. We will talk about Grace’s progress in the next chapter. MARTIN O.: ‘‘JUST KEEP BEING OPTIMISTIC; THINGS WILL TURN OUT FOR THE BEST.’’ Martin, also from chapter 6, exuded a type of optimism that actually interfered with his coping process and significantly differed from the preferred form of can-do optimism ex- pressed in hardy attitudes. His naive, complacent form of optimism obstructed his efforts to learn from his experi- ence. Instead, it led to a pattern of denial that ended up costing him one sales job after another. Astonishingly, he responded to these reversals in fortune with a tolerant atti- tude that accommodated his denial. The laissez-faire atti- tude shown by Martin is one telltale sign of regressive coping. In an effort to increase its customer base, one of the companies for which Martin worked put him and the entire sales crew through hardiness training. The company wanted its sales staff to develop resilient ways to cope with the stress of developing a larger customer base. Early in the group sessions, we asked course participants to jot down what they deemed the most stressful aspects of their jobs. They then shared this with the other group members. Martin went first. He saw his work task as doable and could not think of any aspect of it that felt stressful to him. But strangely enough, as others spoke up, Martin agreed with their take on what caused them stress in their jobs. He said repeatedly, ‘‘Oh, I have that too.’’ And then, he wrapped up his take on each stressful aspect with, ‘‘But, I can handle it because I keep a positive attitude.’’ At the least, he was able to acknowledge that he experienced the stress his fellow coworkers experienced, despite his need to put a positive spin on all of it. Martin observed his coworkers progressively working through their stress by using the transformational coping exercises. They took a broad perspective of their problems and made an effort to deepen their understanding of them. Their efforts were fruitful, as they found ways to positively resolve their problems and decrease the stressfulness of their circumstances. Martin did not progress in the same way. By observing others, he began to recognize this. Soon, he admitted that if he had taken what was happening to him more seriously, he might have been able to keep jobs and get ahead, rather than to shift from one company to another without success or advancement. A great insight came to him when he real- ized that he had approached hardiness training in the same way. Chapter 8 talks about how transformational coping exercises helped Martin to move beyond his limitations. HERMAN W.: ‘‘EVEN WHEN YOU HAVE THE CAREER YOU WANT, YOU MAY LOSE IT ALL AT ANY MOMENT.’’ After receiving his MBA degree, Herman started working as a human resources manager in a large, international com- pany. Many years of hard work moved him up slowly through the ranks. After twenty-three years of service, he became vice president of the company’s local branch and director of its human resources department. Above every- thing else, Herman valued stability and predictability in his professional and personal life. At this point, he had every- thing he wanted; he was stable and secure. Work peers and subordinates saw him as responsible, sincere, and straight- forward. Herman’s interest in and involvement with other people and his work situations showed his attitude of commit- ment. But, his excessive need for professional and personal stability, predictability, and safety undermined his drive to seek and learn from new experiences. This weakened in him in the hardy attitudes of control and challenge. Where did Herman’s need for safety and predictability begin? He grew up in a middle-class family, wherein he and his siblings felt secure, despite the regular absence of his parents as they were often away at work, ensuring the fami- ly’s financial security. He did well in school, and he is still in touch with former classmates. After casually dating two girls in college, he met and married his wife. They have been together ever since. Their two girls are now in late adolescence. They have a rich family life and regularly do things together, such as going to church, movies, and festi- vals, and on vacations. Generally, Herman built his life on stability, predictabil- ity, and security, as if change had no worthwhile role. His worries and preoccupations were few in the safe and un- changing life he had built. Imagine how he felt when, one fine day, the company’s Executive Committee called him in and announced that they had terminated the human re- sources function at that branch, and hence, he no longer had a job! Herman was devastated. He remembered all those job offers he had turned down over the years. Why would any- one want to leave a stable company? He could not under- stand how his peers, whom he had known for so many years, could do such a thing to him. He did not know what to tell his wife and children, who had become accustomed to a safe, predictable life. He began to reconsider all of his choices and judgments over the years. Now, he felt bitter and cynical about corporate America and people in general. The meaning Herman applied to his life began to un- ravel. After all, he had long since come to the conclusion that stability and safety is the essence of a good life. Shortly before he lost his job, his company offered employees hardiness training. Chapter 8 talks about what Herman learned by going through this training and the difference it made in his life. SUSAN M.: ‘‘I’M NOT PUTTING UP WITH THIS. IF THEY CAN’T TREAT ME WITH MORE RESPECT, I’M GETTING OUT OF HERE.’’ Each morning, Susan got ready for work. Besides her lunch, cell phone, organizer, and other work paraphernalia, she carried mental images of a model employee, coworker, su- pervisor, and employer. These snapshots stored well- defined ideas, themes, and story lines that strongly influ- enced how she related to work circumstances. Whenever she encountered stressful changes that challenged what she expected of a person or situation, she insisted on holding on to her well-defined models of the world. Susan was a vice president in a small mortgage com- pany that others in the industry regarded as maverick. It enjoyed several decades of success cornering its market share through this image. Like many of her coworkers, she enjoyed the boutique nature of the company and the busi- ness practices that stemmed from it. Her unconventional personality echoed the company’s image, goals, and moti- vation, which positively contributed to her professional success. Susan, caught up in the glory of the company’s good- old days, was unprepared when global economic trends forced the company into a corporate merger that subordi- nated its management and functions. The company identity and procedures changed through a move to standardize and streamline products. This changed the small maverick company that shaped and discarded policies with each new deal, into a conventional and predictable place to work. Susan felt lost and bitter about what she perceived as downward and sterile company changes. Management stopped inviting her to meetings. She knew less and less about company proceedings. In addition, her department had to do more with much less, which imposed greater workloads on those employees who survived the cuts. And, to add insult to injury, the new parent company no longer allowed vice presidents to come and go as they pleased. As in lower administrative echelons, she now had an eight-to- five job. Susan viewed such changes as disrespectful to her, especially because she had all along been a loyal employee. She was bitter and resentful. Rather than think through the changes that stressed her, she let angry preoccupations con- sume her heart and mind. Susan saw the merger as lower- ing the company’s principles and, self-righteously, she let them know this. She began to find any excuse to leave work early or to take the day off. She gave less of herself to her job and justified doing so by overemphasizing office scan- dals that, to her, confirmed the demise of the company’s morals. This she was clear about. But, when it came to her- self, Susan had less understanding. She knew what was wrong with the company, and how to change it, but never thought of changing herself. 1. What might Susan need in order to change herself? As a youngster, Susan had raised herself. Her father had left the family when she was five years old. And, her mother favored alcohol over the care of her children. Susan became her brother’s keeper, so to speak, and learned early on how to care for herself and others. The caretaking role eventu- ally became second nature to her. The combination of Susan’s intellect, talent, and take- charge spirit gained the favor of management at her com- pany, which helped her to rise up its ranks. Like the company, she was a maverick and flourished in work con- ditions that supported this expression. When the company changed, she did not take easily to being locked out of the game and made to feel like just one of the employees. There was no longer a match between Susan’s values, goals, and motivations, and those of her employer. Susan’s insecurities lie dormant in the shadows of supe- riority and excellence. It never occurred to her that she was the one who needed to change. Her previous successes ob- scured the possibility of changing herself in the midst of these difficult, ongoing organizational changes. 2. Besides the obvious stress of company changes, what was Susan’s problem? Susan faced company changes at the same level of thinking that once helped her to survive, understand, and take charge in unsupportive circumstances. She coped with unreasonable childhood conditions by taking over and eventually leaving home at the age of seventeen; she never turned back. If she could, Susan would leave the company right now. But, she is three years away from retirement, and if she left today, she would lose a well-deserved retirement pension. In addition, Susan faced the fact that she no longer had the energy she had when she was seventeen. She felt trapped by the circumstance, blamed the company for her woes, and saw little possibility in this bleak situation. Clearly, she was stuck between a rock and a hard place. In this situation, changing herself was the only feasible option. Susan did finally muster up the courage and found a way to make her job work for the next three years. She was still a valued employee, and she enjoyed fostering the tal- ents of those she supervised. She realized that it was the training and development of others, and the friendships she formed in the process, rather than the perks, that kept her at this job for twenty-five years. The transformational coping process helped Susan to recognize all of this. ‘‘I complained incessantly for months about the loss of my status, but when all is said and done, I’m a girl from Idaho who enjoys working with the ranks and making things happen.’’ From that point on, Susan fo- cused on work aspects that gave her pleasure and meaning. True to her leadership spirit, she used the knowledge and wisdom she gained to help those she supervised success- fully navigate ongoing company changes. What happened to Susan is an excellent example of how stressful changes can throw us off course if we are not resil- ient. But it also serves as a powerful case study of how transformational coping skills enable us to overcome dis- ruptive change. 3. What is the moral to Susan’s story? If we all agreed on everything, there would be little in- centive to question what we learned in the past and move beyond it. Such a scenario may be less stressful, but cer- tainly, it does not foster growth and fulfillment. Today, disagreements between you and your employer in values, goals, and motivations are much more likely, as ever- changing shifts in corporate structure and operations widen the gulf between organizational and individual needs. The workplace today bears little resemblance to the workplace many once knew. Now, more than ever before, disruptive changes bring to the surface disagreements and conflicts that provoke you to come to terms with what is really going on and what you need to do about it. WHERE DO YOU FIT IN? Take a few minutes to answer the following questions as ‘‘True’’ or ‘‘False’’ in order to get a concrete sense of your way of dealing with stressful work changes, now and in the past. Remember, no one will see your answers but you, so be as honest as you can. Transformational Coping 1. Do you immerse yourself in workplace changes to grasp their implications for you and your company? 2. Do you try to see how workplace changes can improve your functioning? 3. Do you try to see which directions workplace changes move you and your company? 4. Do you try to think through how you can plan to take advan- tage of workplace changes? 5. Do you try to carry out the plans to improve yourself in re- sponse to workplace changes? 6. If you try to carry out plans to improve yourself, do you open yourself up to feedback from your efforts to evaluate the effectiveness of your plan? Regressive Coping 1. Do you see workplace changes as an unfortunate imposition and try to keep functioning the way you have been all along? 2. Do you try to bring back the good-old days? 3. Do you engage in distractions, such as watching a lot of tele- vision, so that you don’t have to think about work problems? 4. Do you think that whatever is going to happen, will happen, and that you cannot really influence it? 5. When workplace changes happen, do you turn to others to find out what to do? 6. Do all of the ongoing changes make you wish you could just stop working? To score your answers, give yourself one point for each time you answered ‘‘True’’ to a question. In order to see your approach to coping, total your scores for each set of six questions. Which set gave you the highest score, Transformational Coping or Regressive Coping? Keep these results in mind as you read further.
SUMMARY
What the examples we have just presented show is that stressful circumstances can provoke regressive coping, especially if your hardy attitudes are already pretty low. This is the case with Allan H., Grace H., Martin O., and Susan M., who were not resilient under stress. Allan’s life deteriorated when he resisted finding ways to restore purpose and meaning. Although Grace and Martin fared better than Allan did, their bitterness and self-pity engulfed them, sapping their courage and motivation to deal effectively with their stress. Grace and Susan blamed others for their problems. Martin, on the other hand, arranged to look the other way. As shown by Herman’s case, even if your hardy attitudes are moderate rather than low (remember, he was strong in commit- ment), a very stressful circumstance can lead to regressive coping unless you are careful to avoid this. Herman was beginning to blame others and the system, rather than working to solve the problem through transformational coping. Clearly, when stressful circumstances confront you, you need to be ready and able to engage in transformational coping, as shown in the examples of Joey and Ruth earlier in the chapter. Otherwise, you risk meaninglessness, weakened resilience, and in- creased bitterness and self-pity. Chapter 8 shows you how to en- gage in the specifics of transformational coping. This form of coping is a useful technique to build yourself up by your effective reaction to stress, rather than by letting it knock you down.

PRACTICING YOUR ATTITUDES OF COMMITMENT, CONTROL, AND CHALLENGE

By now, you have a sense of how the attitudes of commitment, control, and challenge can help you to be resilient under stress. In this chapter, we’ll explain how you can deepen your own hardy attitudes. It’s always important to keep a hardy mindset, even in less stressful times. But, if stressful changes do come your way, they offer a great opportunity to test your courage and motivation to turn problems into advantage. Essentially, can you walk the talk?
STEP ONE STUDY PEOPLE YOU KNOW WHO ARE HIGH IN RESILIENCE
Begin by thinking about people you know who are high in the attitudes of commitment, control, and challenge, and who show resilience no matter what happens to them. Remember Lou Zamp- erini from chapter 1? His resilience was evident, as was his courage and motivation to overcome extremely stressful circumstances. He tried to influence the outcome of whatever challenges he met in life, and did so while helping other people. Do you know someone who is high in resilience and hardy attitudes? Whether this person’s stress demands large or small ef- forts, does he or she stay the course, engage rather than withdraw, and grow from the experience? Use the following five key ques- tions to analyze what this person has actually done to turn stress to advantage. 1. WHAT STRESSFUL CIRCUMSTANCES DID HE OR SHE EN- COUNTER? Was the stress acute (disruptive and time limited) or chronic (a mismatch between dreams, desires, and actual experi- ence)? Remember, sometimes an acute stress stirs up chronic stresses. 2. WHAT PROBLEM-SOLVING ACTIONS DID THE PERSON TAKE TO DECREASE THE CIRCUMSTANCES’ STRESSFUL- NESS? How did he or she do this? Did he or she follow up on opportunities stemming from the stressful situation? 3. DID THE PERSON’S COPING EFFORTS INCLUDE GET- TING SUPPORTIVE ASSISTANCE AND ENCOURAGEMENT FROM OTHER PEOPLE? Did he or she reach out to others as well in this process, and if so, how? 4. HOW DID THIS PERSON TALK ABOUT THE EXPERIENCE? When reminiscing, observing, planning, or evaluating the stress, did the person associate the experience with his or her life direc- tion, purpose, and meaning? Did the evaluation express new in- sights about circumstance, life, and self? 5. HOW DID HIS OR HER COPING EFFORTS EXPRESS HARDY ATTITUDES? Can you fit what he or she said or did into commitment, control, and challenge (thought the problem was important and worthwhile enough to solve, tried to influence its outcome, and used the experience to learn and grow from)? Case Studies: People High in Resilience The following two examples of clients we worked with can help you think about people you know with regard to resilience and hardy attitudes. ELENA S.: ‘‘WHEN LIFE IS HARD, YOU MUST TRY EVEN HARDER.’’ 1. What stressful circumstances did she encounter? Elena is a marketing manager whose company was step- ping up pressure on her to bring in more clients. Monthly, her anxious supervisor scrutinized her records. Under pres- sure himself, he was often irritable toward Elena, which amplified her stress. As if this work stress was not enough, Elena’s husband wanted more of her time and attention, and her eighty-eight-year-old mother had become too frail and forgetful to live alone. 2. What did Elena do to decrease the circumstances’ stress- fulness? In what follows, you will see that Elena faced the reali- ties of these stressful circumstances, despite their painful- ness. She had little time for personal enjoyment, like reading. As much as this disappointed her, she had priori- ties that demanded attention. Elena sufficiently tended to her work and home pressures, and when plagued by doubt, panic, or anger, she tried hard to counter these reactions through solutions that serviced her best interests. So, each time she had a stressful interaction with her boss or hus- band, she reflected upon it, hoping to gain insight into what was going on, and then tried to communicate better or unilaterally suggest plans that would help. 3. Did Elena’s coping efforts include getting supportive as- sistance and encouragement from other people? Despite her boss’s irritability, Elena set up meetings with him to discuss ways in which they could build their client base. She resisted personalizing his frustrations, de- spite her own stress. Sometimes her boss opened up and talked about company troubles. With sincere interest, Elena listened to him and asked how she could help. This seemed to clear tensions between them so that their strate- gizing meetings became more productive. In a better econ- omy, the marketing department relied on long-standing clients who, year to year, gave them a tremendous amount of business. It was easier in those days to escape the atten- tion of upper management, because more-than-adequate quotas kept the marketing department below radar. At the end of the twentieth century, however, many of their stable clients went belly-up. No longer able to rest on their lau- rels, they developed a plan to open up new markets. Elena needed support from her boss to begin the problem-solving process, and it seemed like he needed the same of her. 4. How did Elena talk about the experience? Did the evalua- tion express new insights about circumstance, life, and self? Elena realized that she had initially responded to stresses by lapsing into a work routine that sapped her cre- ativity and energy. She began to act more like an account manager than like a market strategist. Through her com- pany’s dissatisfaction with her department’s performance, she realized she was in a professional and personal slump. She also realized how much she missed social interactions with friends, family, and coworkers, and how insufficient social opportunities contributed to her stress. By putting her work life into perspective, Elena was freer to focus on bettering her home life. This stressed her much less, although there were still work changes to deal with. She could pay more attention to loved ones, which her husband enjoyed, because she now had energy. He agreed with Elena that her mother should live with them and vowed willingly to help make this transition successful. Even though her mother now required assistance, Elena wanted to do everything she could to assure her mother’s independence. To do this, Elena and her husband planned to give Elena’s mother manageable chores to maintain her mental and emotional functioning. 5. How did Elena’s coping efforts express the attitudes of commitment, control, and challenge? Elena is high in hardy attitudes. She dealt actively with job and work pressures. Instead of running away, she sought the help of others, built rather than tore down brid- ges, and faced personal limitations that added to her stress. Along with this, she disallowed negative preoccupations and instead focused on assisting her boss. Elena clearly sees her life as important and worthwhile enough to engage in fully (commitment rather than isolation). She put energy into healing relationships and developing plans to increase the marketing department’s client base (control rather than powerlessness). And, she seized personally beneficial op- portunities to grow in the stressful work change (challenge rather than threat). HERMAN W.: ‘‘THERE’S A SILVER LINING IN EVERY CLOUD, IF YOU CARE TO FIND IT.’’ 1. What stressful circumstance did he encounter? Herman slowly moved up the ranks at his company. He worked as a manager in the human resources department for several of the twenty-five years of his employment. His company abruptly notified him that they were eliminating his department because of the need to downsize personnel and decentralize company functions. The long and short of it is that Herman no longer had a job. This news sideswiped and upset him, especially since it was a financially inoppor- tune time for this to happen to his family. Herman’s wife planned to retire when their children started college next year. Now, more than ever, they needed his income. 2. What did Herman do to decrease the circumstance’s stressfulness? At first, Herman felt victimized and angry at the system. ‘‘How could the people I’ve worked with and trusted for twenty years just call me in and tell me I don’t have a job anymore?’’ He worried whether he was too old to get an- other job of similar rank and income. When the initial shock faded, Herman began to think things through more calmly. Rather than continue to imagine the worst about his long-time colleagues, he approached them with questions and listened to what they had to say. He came to recognize that, as operating costs soared and revenues declined, the company needed to mollify investors by streamlining in any way that it could. Like many companies today, his company was beginning to outsource human resource functions. It was the department rather than Herman, they said, that was dispensable. It hurt, but Herman knew this was a sign of the times. 3. Did Herman’s coping efforts include getting supportive assistance and encouragement from other people? Herman knew his age, salary, and experience might work against him in the job marketplace. He loved his work and did not want to start at square one again. Herman calmly began thinking. He knew other companies would soon outsource their human resource functions too, if they had not done so already. Throughout the years, he formed good collegial relationships with his coworkers, manage- ment, and customers. It occurred to him that his years of expertise and success in this field would make him a valued human resources consultant. To move forward with this plan, he ran this idea by his former colleagues. They be- came Herman’s first client, which also lessened their guilt of having to let him go. Herman had just enough income from this initial client to cover the costs of starting his con- sulting company. 4. How did Herman talk about the experience? Did his eval- uation express new insights about circumstance, life, and self? Several successful years later, Herman was happier than ever. This new chapter in his life, he thought, was possible because of the stressful work change. He’s never bored and makes more money than before. And, according to Her- man, this opportunity added purpose and meaning to his life. His wife really came through for him too. She helped him pick up the pieces by working part-time with him. They had not collaborated like this for years and enjoyed the meaningful connection. Herman’s children started col- lege, and they are doing quite well. Even though it was stressful at the time, Herman sees leaving the company more positively now. He had the in- sight that the company disliked the push to evolve as much as he did. ‘‘By outsourcing human resource functions, they found a way to cope with change. I know it sounds simple, but until now, I lacked awareness of how closely their fears and tasks matched mine. It’s hard sometimes to see the big picture, especially when you’re hurting.’’ Herman has a greater sense now of the impersonal disposition of outside forces. Although he saw others come and go throughout the years, he expected to survive. Today, Herman appreci- ates the laws of change. ‘‘Although I will always try to posi- tively influence what happens to me, I’ll blame others less for doing what they have to do.’’ 5. How did Herman’s coping efforts express the attitudes of commitment, control, and challenge? Once Herman’s shock wore off, he sought out his col- leagues to understand what happened. He further con- vinced his company to be his first client. And, his coping efforts extended to his wife. Herman found a way for her to retire by working with him in the new business. His commitment, control, and challenge are quite clear. Strengthening Your Hardy Attitudes Can you think of a stressful change or circumstance when you showed hardy attitudes? Whether the stress demanded a large or small effort, did you stay on course, engage rather than withdraw, and grow from the experience when the going got rough? At the risk of repeating ourselves in order to emphasize their importance, use the five key questions to think through what you actually did to turn stress to your advantage. 1. What stressful circumstance did you encounter? Was the stress acute or chronic? Remember, sometimes an acute stress stirs up chronic stress. 2. What actions did you take to decrease the circumstance’s stressfulness? How did you do this? Did you follow up on opportunities stemming from the stressful situation? What did you do? 3. Did your coping efforts include getting supportive assistance and encouragement from other people? Did you reach out to others as well in this process, and if so, how? 4. How did you talk about the experience? When reminiscing, observing, planning, or evaluating the stress, did you associ- ate the experience with your life direction, purpose, and meaning? Did the evaluation express new insights about cir- cumstance, life, and self? 5. How did your coping efforts express hardy attitudes? Can you fit what you said or did into commitment, control, and challenge? Finally, imagine your future. How do strong atti- tudes of commitment, control, and challenge make a differ- ence in your experience and events? As you go through daily stress, see if your hardy attitudes make a difference in how you experience it.
STEP TWO BE AWARE OF THE DISADVANTAGES OF ISOLATION, POWERLESSNESS, AND THREAT
Another aspect of thinking in a resilient way is to maintain a keen awareness of the long-term disadvantages of withdrawing (rather than staying committed), sinking into powerlessness (rather than exerting an influence), and searching for easy comfort and security (rather than continuing to learn through change). Think of people you know who let stressful changes undermine them because they fail to be hardy under pressure. If you think through what they do compared to those who cope resiliently, you get a clear sense of the differences, and you can refer to this the next time a stressful change happens to you. People You Know Who Are Low in Resilience Make a list of the people you know who seem deficient in hardy attitudes, people who withdraw and feel powerless and threatened. Write down each of their stories. In this regard, it will be helpful for you to answer the same five key questions about them: 1. What stressful circumstance did he or she encounter? 2. What actions did the person take to decrease the circum- stance’s stressfulness? Did he or she follow up on opportuni- ties stemming from the stressful situation? 3. Did the person’s coping efforts include getting supportive as- sistance and encouragement from other people? 4. How did this person talk about the experience? 5. How did his or her coping efforts express hardy attitudes or the lack of commitment, control, and challenge? Case Studies: People Low in Resilience Here are three real-life examples of unfortunate people deficient in hardy attitudes. Mulling over their lives may help you recognize precisely how the disadvantages of nonresilient or low-resilient at- titudes overwhelmed them as they encountered daily life experi- ences: ALLAN H.: ‘‘LIFE STINKS, AND THERE’S NOTHING i CAN DO ABOUT IT.’’ 1. What stressful circumstance did Allan encounter? Allan grew up in a comfortable, upper-middle-class neighborhood. His parents overprotected him; they grew up poor, prospered, and desired to give Allan everything they had not had. He played soccer throughout middle school, and in high school, he was on the track team. In college, Allan spent more time socializing than studying, which most likely contributed to his average academic per- formance. Soon after graduating, he married, and shortly thereafter, he and his wife started a family. They have two daughters. Allan parlayed his college computer training into a job with a high-tech company as a software writer. He made a very good income with stock options. Allan had found his life’s work, which delighted him. It pleased him that his family was much better off financially than other people he knew. From time to time, Allan heard office rumors that the company he worked for had been over-reporting its earn- ings. Allan never took this too seriously; he trusted his em- ployer and the financial stability of the company. Before he realized it, his company’s stock plummeted in value. Allan lost his job, his health benefits, and had little financial assets to speak of. This dismayed his wife, a stay-at-home mom; Allan felt like a failure. It did not help that his chil- dren could not understand this reversal of fortune either, as they had always looked up to their father. 2. What actions did Allan take to decrease the circum- stance’s stressfulness? Allan had difficulty getting over what happened and kept seeing himself as the victim of others who were just jealous of him. He withdrew from everyone, sat at home watching television, and began drinking heavily. He made one or two half-hearted efforts to find another job, but he lacked sufficient energy to make this happen. Allan con- vinced himself those other companies too would use and take advantage of him. He tearfully reminisced about his happy childhood, when people were trustworthy. As evi- denced by his company’s deceit, Allan disbelieved in people’s genuineness and worried about the world’s deteri- orating condition. 3. Did Allan get supportive assistance and encouragement during this stressful time? Before long, Allan became deeply bitter, distrustful, and self-pitying. He lacked energy and imagination to find solu- tions to his problems, which lowered his self-esteem. Even- tually, a whole series of life reversals ensued. His mortgage went unpaid, and the family lost its sumptuous home. Al- lan’s desperate wife was unsuccessful in talking with him. His neediness exhausted her, and he refused to get help. To survive, she left, taking the kids with her. He was furious because she rejected him in his time of need. Allan’s use of alcohol to medicate his pain resulted in a driving-under- the-influence charge. As time went on, Allan failed to turn his life around. 4. How did Allan talk about the experience? When remi- niscing, observing, planning, or evaluating the stress, did he associate the experience with his life direction, purpose, and meaning? Did the evaluation express new insights about cir- cumstance, life, and self? Allan expressed his plight with bitterness about the world around him, and lots of self-pity. From his view- point, people either do not care at all about others, or are actually vicious. Organizations and social institutions were also described by him as bent on undermining the people within them, despite official presentations to the contrary. He was also preoccupied by the injustices piled on him, and how this victimization had destroyed his life. He would often cry when reflecting on these painful conclusions. 5. How did his coping efforts express hardy attitudes or the lack of commitment, control, and challenge? Note that Allan’s lack of hardy attitudes prevented him from making resilient use of the experience. He withdrew from rather than committing to the events and people around him, and sank into powerlessness, anger, and pas- sivity when the going got rough. To him, you avoid threat- ening changes rather than use them as an impetus for learning and growth. GRACE H.: ‘‘THIS IS A MALE SOCIETY, AND I’M UNFORTUNATELY A WOMAN.’’ Grace hoped to move up the company ranks in a small clothing firm that specialized in designing and producing women’s clothing. As an administrative assistant, she fol- lowed company procedures and policies by the book. Grace gave the company 110 percent of herself. She rarely complained, if at all, and valued responsible action. She had grown up in a poor family, and it had always been an effort to go to school and work part-time simulta- neously. After dropping out of college, she found her pres- ent job and threw herself into it. As the years went by, the company passed Grace by for promotions. She noticed that younger, junior men tended to rise up in the company. This particularly irritated her, as she had trained them in their jobs. Once, while talking with her boss, she summoned up the courage to ask him about this situation. He superficially responded, claiming that those who the company promotes possess particular capa- bilities. ‘‘If, you wait,’’ he stated, ‘‘your time will come.’’ This proved to be untrue. She did not bring the matter up again for fear that retri- bution would follow. Grace’s personal insecurities stopped her from looking for another job. She told herself, ‘‘I need the money,’’ so she stayed put. Over time, Grace lost her self-esteem. She carelessly carried out work tasks and gave very little of herself to her job and coworkers. She kept to herself. She felt stuck in a thankless job; this depressed her. Grace gained weight, slipped into poor grooming habits, and, to avoid pain, she watched television endlessly, over- spent at the mall, and occasionally got drunk. Grace felt her father favored her brothers over her. She believed her boss did the same thing to her. She expressed more and more anger toward men and a patriarchal society, which, she felt, conspired to put women down. Even though she could get angry when forced to think about her difficulties, she preferred to avoid it all and lose herself in distracting activities. ‘‘Why waste my time putting emotion and energy into this problem,’’ she stated, ‘‘this is the way the world works; it’s less painful to accept my life as it is today.’’ You can see Grace lacks the hardy attitudes to be resil- ient. When there are problems, she avoids them and just gives up trying. She suppresses angry feelings by losing her- self in self-destructive activities. Although it may be true that some companies advance more men over women, she uses her views as a blanket justification for giving up rather than as an observation that could lead to corrective efforts. Grace will have trouble turning disadvantages into oppor- tunities, unless her attitudes change considerably. MARTIN O.: ‘‘JUST KEEP BEING OPTIMISTIC; THINGS WILL TURN OUT FOR THE BEST.’’ Martin had similar beginnings to Allan. He grew up in an upper-middle-class family. His father, who grew up poor, wanted Martin to have every opportunity to make it in life. He made everyday life comfortable for Martin. Martin never struggled. Although he got through college, he did so un- eventfully. He performed poorly. He referred to his average grades as ‘‘gentlemanly Cs.’’ Martin had no experience with adversity. He felt optimistic about his future, even though he had no big plans or goals in mind. He was handsome, had many friends, played sports, and dated many girls. Martin showed little concern that life might turn out poorly for him. Upon graduating with a major in business, many com- panies offered Martin jobs. He took a job in sales, which seemed right to him because he always enjoyed meeting and talking with people. In job training, he superficially learned about company products and strategies for selling them. Martin relied on his charm and social skills to engage potential customers. Before long, while other sales repre- sentatives increased their customer base, Martin had little to show for his efforts. His supervisor showed more con- cern over Martin’s performance than Martin did. The super- visor talked to Martin about it and encouraged him to try harder. Martin took lightly his supervisor’s concerns and continued in his ways. He occasionally sold a customer. Nevertheless, his selling efforts failed more than succeeded. It pleased him to bring in a new customer, though it was a rare occurrence. Soon, his company terminated him because of his poor performance. Martin saw his termination as a temporary setback, and optimistically maintained that everything would work out in the end. Martin presented well. He eas- ily got another sales job, and his social skills always got him through customers’ doors, but his reluctance to give up unproductive work behaviors prevented him from making sales. Here, too, his performance was lackluster. This com- pany also terminated him for poor performance and lack of motivation to improve. Once again, Martin had little insight as to why the company terminated him. This pattern con- tinued over the years. Martin’s deficiency in hardy attitudes is more subtle than either Allan’s or Grace’s. His optimism at first may appear hardy, but superficial buoyancy can be a way of de- nying and avoiding problems. It’s difficult to solve prob- lems you fail to see. Martin’s cheerful ways and social interest makes him seem committed to influence life cir- cumstances. But, Martin’s naive optimism did him in. If you think changes and problems always turn out well with- out your effort, why put energy or time into working con- structively to transform them? Naive optimism prevented Martin from seeing how life’s changes, positive or negative, can be opportunities to learn and grow. His laissez-faire approach to life hurt him in the end. Avoid Vulnerable Attitudes By now, you are probably very alert to the disadvantages of re- sponding to stressful circumstances with the vulnerable attitudes of withdrawal, powerlessness, and threat. You need to keep in mind how these attitudes in the people you know, and in the ex- amples we have reported, undermined the process of turning stress to advantage through involvement, influential effort, and at- tempts to keep learning. Now it is time for you to observe yourself as honestly as you can to see if and when you have sunken into attitudes of with- drawal (rather than commitment), powerlessness (rather than con- trol), and threat (rather than challenge). Looking back: Think about your past. s Do you remember concrete examples or extended periods of time when you avoided or reacted catastrophically to changes that were disruptive and stressful? s Did you try to avoid the disruptive changes? s Did you get angry enough to strike out? s Did you give up trying? s Did you come to the conclusion that life just isn’t fair? Try to see behind these actions the nonresilient attitudes of with- drawal, powerlessness, and threat. Make yourself a list of the trou- blesome events and your disadvantageous reactions to them. Looking at today: Now make an honest appraisal of the present. s Are there concrete examples or extended periods of time when you have failed to express the attitudes of commitment, control, and challenge? s What are the particular characteristics of the stressful circum- stances that have this effect on you? s Is your inclination to withdraw, sink into powerlessness, and find changes too threatening to learn from? s Do you justify it to yourself with pessimistic conclusions as to what life is all about? Write down your observations concerning your present-day func- tioning. Looking ahead: How about your future? When you think of the days, months, and years ahead: s Do you hope that nothing will change and lack an elaborate plan as to what your life will become? s Do you think the world will get worse, rather than get better, and that there is nothing any of us can do about that? s Or, do you look forward to the meaningful evolution of soci- ety, the world, and yourself? Even if you have found signs that you can sink into with- drawal, powerlessness, and threat, don’t give up. Identifying these attitudinal problems is an important step toward getting rid of them. Remember how troubled the lives are of the people you know who are nonresilient and the examples we have given you here in Step Two, and resolve not to let this happen to you. In- stead, focus on the resilient people you know and the examples discussed in Step One. Try to follow in their footsteps of commitment, control, and challenge, and you will truly be able to say, ‘‘Whatever doesn’t kill me makes me stronger.’’
STEP THREE HOW YOU FEEL ABOUT YOURSELF WHEN YOU TURN STRESSFUL CHANGES TO ADVANTAGE
So far, we have tried to get you to immerse yourself in what hap- pens concerning resilience when you have or don’t have hardy attitudes. Whatever your present attitudinal inclination, you are trying to keep in mind the advantages of commitment, control, and challenge, and the disadvantages of withdrawal, powerless- ness, and threat. As you involve yourself more and more in this process, it should have a beneficial effect on you. There is yet a third way to increase your hardy attitudes. Of the three steps discussed here, it is the most powerful. It involves expressing the resiliency skills needed to turn disruptive, stressful changes from potential disasters into opportunities, and using the feedback you get from your efforts to convince yourself that you can make a meaningful difference in how your life unfolds and improves. In other words, you will have the courage to do what helps, and develop in the process. Chapters 7, 8, 9, and 10 deal with exercising the skills of transformational coping and social support. In transformational coping, you think of stressful changes as problems to be solved and take the necessary steps to achieve that end. When it comes to support, you arrange to give and get assistance and encouragement from those around you, so that you all can believe in yourselves and carry out the hard work of prob- lem solving. In the process of employing both coping and support skills, you get feedback from your efforts.Three Sources of Feedback The first source of feedback comes from the observations you make of yourself as you engage in your efforts. The coping exercises in chapters 7 and 8 guide you in how to structure stressful changes as problems, and how to go about turning them to advantage. As you observe yourself carrying out these exercises, you may well think, ‘‘Is that me? I didn’t know I could do that.’’ The social sup- port exercises in chapters 9 and 10 guide you in resolving conflicts with the significant people around you, and replacing those con- flicts with a mutual pattern of assistance and encouragement. As you observe yourself carrying out these exercises, you may well think, ‘‘I didn’t know how constructively I could interact with those people. It’s great that I was able to strengthen my relation- ships with them.’’ How does feedback from observing yourself in action benefit you? By seeing yourself cope and interact constructively, you strengthen your hardy attitudes of commitment, control, and chal- lenge. The second source of feedback is the observations that others make of you and tell you about. When you use the right skills to cope and interact, people will note the changes in you and may well communicate what they see. Or, you may ask them for their observations. Typically, they will admire the changes you are mak- ing toward greater incisiveness and constructive involvement. They may tell you about this directly, in such words as, ‘‘I respect what you have done so much. To tell you the truth, I didn’t think it was possible.’’ At worst, they may express jealousy toward you. But, behind this, of course, is envious admiration. How does feedback from others who observe you in action benefit you? Their comments motivate you to cope constructively again, reinforce your learning, and deepen your connection to them. This type of feedback deepens your attitudes of commit- ment, control, and challenge. The third source of feedback is the actual effect your actions have on the target events and/or people. Your actions that come out of the training exercises aim at turning potential disasters to advan- tage and deepening the intimacy of your relationships with those around you. As you begin to achieve these goals, you get concrete signs of how your life is improving, both in and out of the work- place. This feedback, too, will convince you more and more that it is worth involving yourself (commitment), trying to have an effect (control), and learning through the changes (challenge), rather than withdrawing and feeling powerless and threatened.
SUMMARY
We hope you can see even more clearly now why hardy attitudes provide you with the courage and motivation to work resiliently at improving your own situation and the lives of those around you. It takes courage to see change as natural, despite its stressfulness, and as an opportunity to grow and develop to your fullest at work and at home. To strengthen your hardy attitudes, keep practicing the exercises covered in the first two steps of this chapter. In this regard, remember to: s Keep reflecting on people you know who are strong in hardy attitudes and resiliency. s Keep reflecting on the disadvantages of feeling isolated, pow- erless, and threatened. s Apply this to your own beliefs as you struggle for the resil- ience to turn stressful circumstances to advantage. Further, to really deepen your attitudes of commitment, control, and challenge, engage fully in the coping and social support exer- cises of chapters 7, 8, 9, and 10, conscientiously using the feed- back you get from your efforts to influence how you think of yourself, your job, and your life.

DO YOU HAVE THE RIGHT ATTITUDES TO THRIVE IN ADVERSITY?

‘‘When one door of happiness closes, another opens; but often we look so long at the closed door that we do not see the one which has been opened for us.’’ —HELEN KELLER
Most of us today can imagine a workplace undergoing disruptive changes. Perhaps you work in such a place right now. When a company is reorganizing to meet budget pressures or market op- portunities, when there are layoffs, mergers, and shifts in job defi- nition, employees often feel like there is nothing, and no one, they can count on anymore. Work changes may worry and preoccupy them so much that they have little interest or time to nurture satis- fying work relationships. In a rapidly changing workplace supervi- sors are often less and less accessible, and when they finally do have time, they may be less candid and supportive about goings- on. Employees may no longer recognize the company and cowork- ers they once knew. Unpredictable work environments and fewer self-development opportunities make it increasingly difficult to feel good about your work and yourself. Job insecurity, arising from a possible termination or a possible transfer, arising from new supervisors and shifting career paths, is today’s most frequently cited employee concern. 2 We all strive to gain mastery and predictability over our envi- ronment. We differ, however, in the ways we react to our fear of change. It’s difficult to completely eliminate the fear that comes with stressful changes, but you can learn to manage it and do what needs to be done anyway. By opening up to life’s changes through attitudes that marshal your coping resources, you can seize creative, satisfying, and inter- esting opportunities. The following three attitudes position you to embrace change resiliently.
A CLOSER LOOK AT THE 3Cs
As the IBT study first revealed, hardy attitudes—attitudes of com- mitment, control, and challenge—give you the courage and moti- vation to turn stressful changes to your advantage. These three attitudes are the key to resilience and must be learned and mas- tered. Now let’s examine them more closely. Commitment ‘‘Life exacts a price for less-than-full participation in it. We lose touch with human values and qualities that arise naturally from a full engagement with work and life that expresses responsibility, integrity, loyalty, and cooperation.’’ —TARTHANG TULKU 3 The attitude of commitment helps you to engage fully in work tasks and life. You are committed to the importance of your job, your family, and all of your life’s pursuits. It is your involvement with the people and events going on around you that lends mean- ing and fulfillment to your life. You stay involved to the best of your ability and continue to do so no matter how stressful the circumstances. Your dedication to an activity arises from your belief system and influences how you cope with stressful changes in key ways. When you appraise the people and activities in your life as impor- tant to your personal satisfaction and system of meaning, and your interaction with them as worthwhile enough to pursue vigorously, you are more apt to commit and dedicate yourself to them both in will and action. This attitude also applies to situations and circumstances. Your attitude of commitment shapes your understanding of the events around you and is the basis for evaluating situational outcomes. You ask yourself, ‘‘Do I have the interest to solve this problem?’’ If so, you are more apt to dedicate yourself to it. In this circum- stance, your attitude of commitment is high. If the opposite is true, however, you are more apt to deny or avoid the problem to mini- mize its damage to you. The reactions Charlie and George had to their company’s reor- ganization shows the importance of commitment. In its decentral- ization effort, the company’s headquarters, where both men work, is downsizing considerably. Strong in commitment, Charlie wants to stay involved with the work and his coworkers, and keeps thinking through what is happening, asking others how they feel and how they’re doing. He keeps working on things and partici- pating as much as, if not more than, before the downsizing. He continues to care about the company and its members. In contrast, George sees the reorganization as just another disruption. With little commitment, he quickly concludes that the company deci- sion makers are incompetent and not worth his loyalty, and that his fellow employees are fools not to see this. He detaches himself from everything that is going on and does as little as possible during the workday, preferring to lose himself in daydreams of more enjoyable times. Control ‘‘Lack of willpower has caused more failure than lack of intelligence or ability.’’ —FLOWERS A. NEWHOUSE 4 The attitude of control enables you to take direct, hands-on action to transform changes and the problems they may cause. This atti- tude helps you believe that stressful changes are important and worthwhile enough to dedicate yourself to influencing them in an advantageous direction. You are likely to say, ‘‘Let me find, or de- velop, the resources to solve this problem.’’ Sufficient personal coping resources make it easier for you to influence the outcome of the problem. If you believe that you can influence the outcome of a stressful change (control attitude), you are more apt to push yourself to cope with it. Of course, how much and in which direc- tion you can influence changes varies from one situation to the next. The strength and direction of your coping efforts depend upon your estimation of the likelihood of bringing about positive change. An attitude of control heightens this estimation, which mobilizes and sustains your coping efforts in the face of adversity. The added benefit is that this coping effort in turn strengthens your commitment attitude as well. Through your unremitting ded- ication to solving the task, you do what you can to make things turn out well. If the opposite is true, you may question your ability to turn stressful changes around and stop trying. Remember, however, that though it helps to have an accommodating environment that supports your coping efforts, you should try to influence change positively even in less supportive circumstances. Keep in mind that there are some things in work and life that we simply cannot control. An important aspect of evaluating the features of a stressful change is assessing what is and is not possi- ble. Some circumstances only permit change within us. You then need greater ingenuity and effort to move change in positive direc- tions. The greatest personal change can happen in such circum- stances. If you are high in the attitude of control, you fully grasp the directions in which life’s changes push you, events, and others. The importance of an attitude of control can been seen in the experiences of Linda and Allison. Both women work for a com- pany that is being acquired by another, larger firm, and are experi- encing all the reorganizational turmoil this brings. Linda gulps twice and throws herself into thinking through the likely implica- tions of the changes for her, for those around her, and for the company itself. She also tries to anticipate what additional changes may be coming. Through all of this, she keeps in her mind the downside of the changes, and the upside as well, and what she can do to influence beneficial outcomes. This attitude helps her take action to cope and interact in relevant, effective ways. By contrast, Allison panics and has a sense of powerlessness as the changes mount. She does not believe it likely that she can do anything constructive, so she tries to decrease her pain by detaching herself from what is happening. She concludes that whatever is going to happen will happen, so it is better to think that it doesn’t matter to her anyway. Whenever she is unsuccessful in detaching herself, her increasing anxiety gives way to anger, as she sees herself as the victim of the powerful and wealthy people who don’t care at all about her. Challenge ‘‘Our greatest glory is not in never failing, but in rising up every time we fail.’’ —RALPH WALDO EMERSON 5 The attitude of challenge lets you embrace change as a normal life process. You take an unbiased stance toward change that develops your ‘‘taste’’ for what satisfies you on a long-term basis. Positive and negative experiences are simply grist for the learning mill. This does not mean that you jump for joy when stressful changes come your way. Instead, you approach change as a meaningful challenge by seeing opportunity in every difficulty, rather than by seeing it the other way around. If you are strong in the attitude of challenge, then you stay motivated despite stressful changes, are especially able to learn from your disappointments to do better the next time, and main- tain that whatever does not kill you makes you stronger. Change is a necessary stimulus for self-discovery and growth, and provides you opportunity to further develop purpose and meaning. People who are high in the challenge attitude are very different from those who are low. Take the example of Bernice and Oliver, managers in a high-tech company that was increasingly going into the red. Bernice regrets the decisions, some of which she had par- ticipated in, that led the company on its downward spiral. But, she feels the company can learn from these failures, and she keeps struggling to see alternatives that could improve the situation. In- stead of panicking, she tries to see how to do better, assuming that there is a lot to be learned. In contrast, Oliver sees the failures as an unchangeable sign of his and the company’s inadequacy. He is overwhelmed with the pain of what is happening, and fearfully wants to keep it from becoming public. This leads him to entertain ways of covering up the financial mess, even if that means lying about it and breaking rules.
HOW ATTITUDES INFLUENCE RESILIENCE
What is a person like when all three hardy attitudes are high or low at the same time? If they are all high, the person is courageous and motivated to take advantage of changes, however stressful they may be. This is the pathway to resilience. In contrast, if the attitudes are all low, the person is fearful and vulnerable, without any strength or motivation to confront stressful circumstances. The examples that follow show this difference. The Courage and Motivation for Resilience You may be familiar with the television sitcom Cheers, with its appealing and quirky characters played by an outstanding, diverse cast of actors and actresses. John Ratzenberger’s background was of particular interest to us, especially with regard to hardiness. Prior to playing Cliff on Cheers, he was a starving, unemployed actor residing in England. Thirty-something and down-and-out, John’s uneventful career had been sprinkled with minor acting jobs. John was literally a step away from homelessness when, in 1982, he came upon the Cheers script and read for the part of Norm Peterson. John saw himself in the role of Norm, the good- natured accountant who found a place to call home on a bar stool in a Boston tavern. The casting directors felt differently, however, as they chose George Wendt to play Norm Peterson. Faced with this defining moment, Ratzenberger, quite the op- posite of the man-child Cliff, who affected a blustery, boastful atti- tude in trying to hide his deep-seated insecurities from his friends, showed that he had a reservoir of resilient attitudes. He resisted succumbing to it’s-all-over-but-the-shouting and asked the direc- tors if the Cheers cast included a know-it-all bar character. To con- vince the directors of the value of such a character, John launched into a ten-minute, off-the-cuff monologue of useless information in the infamous style of Cliff Clavin. By fully engaging in a process he deemed as important and worthwhile to his life course, he con- vinced Cheers executives to give birth to the character of Cliff Clavin. No one gave John his good fortune; he created it on his own. He evaluated the features of the challenging stressful circum- stance and seized his professional moment. The end result of his failed audition was the role of his career. He is a fine example of how being strong in all three hardy attitudes provides the courage and motivation to thrive resiliently under stress. Denial and Avoidance Rather Than Resilience When change mounts, people who are low in the hardy attitudes feel isolated rather than committed, powerless rather than in con- trol, and threatened rather than challenged. The resulting emo- tional pain leads to either of two nonresilient behavior patterns. They engage in denial and avoidance, or they panic in the face of perceived ‘‘catastrophe’’ and strike out. These people deny and avoid by endorsing a rigid set of roles, rules, rituals, and relationships as the way of dealing with stressful problems. Rather than learn and grow from change, they try to fit into what others and circumstances seem to want of them. In other words, they want powerful figures to make the rules, set the pace, and tell them what to do. And, they look to long established norms, traditions, and credos to help them reject what seem like disruptive changes. All this may reduce fears and give short-term comfort and security, but it does little to open people up to new, growth-promoting situations and experiences. Individuals who cope through denial and avoidance believe that if they stop thinking about stressful changes, the unpleasant- ness will go away. They believe that, when the going gets rough, it is best to withdraw or isolate to stay below radar. They resist peo- ple and circumstances that could potentially bring them pain. And, to regain peace, they detach from the stresses at hand. They won’t let things upset them, trying to maintain the status quo at all costs. These individuals view change as an irregularity, an aberration, a needless imposition. They often dwell on things that they have little influence over and avoid changes in which the outcomes are unclear. Even at home, they tend to avoid talking about work in order to preserve their sense of calm. They can lose themselves in distracting activities, such as endlessly watching TV, shopping at the mall, drinking heavily, or extrarelational flirtations, all in an effort to escape life’s difficulties. You can find them saying things like, ‘‘Why try to change things? You can do very little about it anyway. I’m just doing time. Why should I care about what goes on here?’’ As employees, these people often think of themselves as ‘‘com- pany visitors,’’ and reluctant ones at that. They do what they have to because of others’ expectations, requests, and demands. Because they deny and avoid stressful changes, they engage only superfi- cially in work tasks and don’t believe that they can change or grow because of their participation. They are just doing time. As you would imagine, these individuals are low in resiliency. They sink into feelings of powerlessness, which leave them incapa- ble and weak. If they pull up stakes, they give up any sense of positively influencing their lives. They cherish stability and tradi- tion, and see anything else as undermining them. Their fears of change inhibit their personal evolution and growth, as well as op- portunities to enhance meaning by turning stressful changes into opportunities. Take Vivian’s story as a case in point. She was in her late thir- ties when the company for which she was an administrative assis- tant began to reorganize its product line in order to improve its market share. Soon, there were both new hires and layoffs, along with ongoing job redefinitions. All this seemed overwhelming to her, as she had always felt as if she had no influence and was vulnerable. She kept trying not to think about what was happening or listen to her coworkers’ relevant discussions of the changes. She just kept doing what she regarded as her job, even though the official sense of her tasks was changing. She had nostalgic memo- ries about previous stability, and saw the current decision makers as upstarts. Curtailing her work hours as much as possible, she spent more and more time at home watching television while drinking wine. Before long, she was terminated, as the decision makers saw her as recalcitrant and ineffective in their company’s changing times. Then, she spent even more of her time watching TV and drinking, and could not bring herself to any concerted, organized effort to find another job. She became increasingly dependent fi- nancially and emotionally on her aging parents, who were worried about her and mystified as to how to help her get back on her feet. Catastrophic Reactions and Striking Out, Rather Than Being Resilient Most of us want our coworkers and employers to recognize and value our contributions to the workplace. We have a core need for others to think well of us. Organizations often establish proce- dures and policies for recognizing their employees so they will stay involved, productive, and satisfied. In rapidly changing times of high workplace stress, however, these types of employee reinforce- ments are used less and less. It is therefore easier today to fade into the workplace woodwork, which can make employees feel insecure, powerless, and expendable. With strong attitudes of commitment, control, and challenge, you feel secure even in unsupportive work conditions. You know how to make use of work procedures and policies to guide your work tasks and behavior. This helps you to stay motivated, despite less frequent reinforcements, and to be resilient in finding new ways to renew job interest and value. In contrast, individuals low in the hardy attitudes are less resil- ient, needing more concrete guidance through well-defined work procedures and policies. There is nothing inherently bad in this, and in fact, many of these individuals make excellent supervisors and supervisees because of their appreciation of workplace proce- dures and policies. High stress and poorly delineated, changing circumstances, however, can leave them feeling alienated. To func- tion effectively, they depend upon smoothly run, well-defined work environments and clearly defined work tasks and procedures for getting recognized and valued. What is the downside to this nonresilient approach? These people overreact to changes that decrease their sense of support. Anything that disrupts routine and order is seen as a catastrophe, a sign that they are not valued and are being pushed around. Com- pany reorganizations, shifts in management and supervisors, and ever-changing work tasks and policies make it increasingly diffi- cult for these nonresilient individuals to pinpoint opportunities for coworkers, supervisors, and their employers to recognize and value them. They begin to classify events as nurturing or depriv- ing, which undermines them physically, mentally, and behavior- ally. By overpersonalizing workplace changes, they undermine workplace relationships. Their coworkers often avoid them in order to secure their own peace and equilibrium. What do these more vulnerable employees really fear? They feel weak and powerless through their inability to manage change effectively. To regain mastery and control, these hardworking, self- sacrificing employees become rigid and may begin to use the mea- suring stick that they use on themselves to evaluate coworkers, supervisors, and employers. At such times, others may see them as critical and competitive. There can be an extreme expression of this nonresilient coping position. Certain workplace conditions can make these individuals feel misused, injured, and wounded. Once on the defensive, they begin to view coworkers, management, and the company as adver- saries. Although there may be some reality to their complaints, they channel their anxieties, fears, and floundering self-esteem through a victim mentality. Odd as it seems, this is a way for them to protect themselves when other paths close. They adopt the ap- proach that the best defense is an offense. They recover the veneer of equilibrium and momentum by behaving contrarily. These employees make others responsible for their stress and unhappiness. Friends, family, and coworkers avoid them, when nothing they say or do can help. These vulnerable employees are low in resilient attitudes. They have difficulty thinking about new, more adaptive ways to bolster their self-esteem, and thus they fear change. By externalizing blame, they attempt to save face. And, in the most extreme, they may cope with difficult circumstances through increased work absenteeism, poor work performance, workplace theft or vandalism, and unwarranted threats to carry out legal action against their employers. The Importance of Attitudes in Resilience The two ineffective coping strategies just covered demonstrate why hardy attitudes help you face stressful problems with courage, and be resilient rather than vulnerable. To be courageous, you have to see the stressor clearly and avoid shrinking back, despite your fear of it. In addition, these attitudes motivate you, and lead you to figure out ways to turn change into opportunities and to take the necessary steps to bring about that advantage. Let’s take a look at a few common situations: s Suppose you have less job security today. Do you detach from coworkers and the company by giving a lackluster perform- ance, by cutting corners, or by being disloyal? If you have strong hardy attitudes, you sidestep these unproductive be- haviors. Instead, you cope constructively with job insecurities and accept them as today’s business norm. You throw your- self into work, perform to your highest capacity, continue to learn from your experience, and treat your coworkers and employer as you like them to treat you. That’s what it means to be strong in commitment, control, and challenge. After all, even if you lose your job, your ongoing diligence, conscien- tiousness, and professional development will make you all the more attractive as a prospective employee to other com- panies. And, maybe you can make your new job even better than the one you lost. s Suppose your industry or company is such that jobs, driven by technological advance, competition, or market needs, fre- quently change in definition. Do you hang on rigidly to current ways of functioning and grow more troubled and wary over less traditional changes? If your hardy attitudes are strong, you sidestep these unproductive behaviors. You in- stead see such changes as opportunities to continue your de- velopment and throw yourself instead into learning and training that make sure this happens. You increase your value and marketability to your current company or another com- pany by continuing to develop your knowledge. s Suppose work tasks, responsibilities, and deadlines increas- ingly inundate you as your company downsizes. Do you sink into resentment, detachment, and hostility? If your hardy at- titudes are strong, you sidestep these unproductive behav- iors. You strive instead to regroup and improve your functioning to meet the expanded requirements. If you need help in doing this, you ask constructively for assistance from your company. Before long, the company will rely on you more, and use you as a model for others. In the process, you will feel more competent and capable. s Suppose that with all the ongoing changes, your relationships with supervisors or subordinates in the company deteriorate through misunderstandings, arguments, and retaliations. Do you detach from others and devalue them? If your hardy atti- tudes are strong, you sidestep these unproductive behaviors. You try instead to understand relationship difficulties as a byproduct of stress. By encouraging and assisting others, you try to resolve workplace conflicts, rather than perpetuate them with impulsive, thoughtless actions. By valuing and helping others, and trying to improve your interactions with them, they in turn trust and value you.
WHERE DO YOU FIT IN?
When you examine your own responses to workplace changes, what do you find? How does your particular way of understanding circumstances drive your response? In which ways do you try to preserve your self-esteem during stressful circumstances? Does your pattern of response express the attitudes of commitment, control, and challenge? Take a few minutes to think through the following questions to get a sense of how you handle stressful work changes now and in the past.
Commitment, Control, and Challenge
1. Do you wake up in the morning excited by the thought of going to work?
2. Despite cherishing the past, do you look forward to a chang- ing future?
3. Do you feel that your input at work makes a difference in how things turn out?
4. Do you rely on yourself to figure out how to solve problems that arise at work?
5. Do you anticipate changes at work as bound to happen and normal?
6. Do you see both your company and yourself trying to grow and do better?
Denial and Avoidance
1. Do you feel most comfortable with clearly defined work tasks?
2. Do you feel most comfortable with little change in work task or environment?
3. To stay calm and happy, do you put work problems out of your mind?
4. Do you escape from work problems by distracting yourself with daydreams and other fun activities?
5. Does work stress you? If so, are you unsure as to why?
6. Do you work to pay your bills and nothing more?
Catastrophic Reactions and Striking Out
1. At times, have you tried to undermine coworkers by devalu- ing their work tasks or personal characteristics in front of supervisors or management?
2. When you are part of a work team, do others’ ideas and con- tributions threaten you?
3. Have you ever passed off as your own a coworker’s ideas or work products?
4. Do you overpersonalize workplace changes?
5. Do you feel unappreciated and hurt when a supervisor high- lights an area of work in which you need more growth?
6. Do you use problems outside of work to maneuver cowork- ers and supervisors into relieving you of work tasks?
To score your answers, give yourself one point for each time you answered ‘‘True’’ to a question. In order to see your attitudinal approach to stressful changes and conflicts, total your scores for each set of six questions. Which set gave you the highest score? Do you respond through hardiness, denial and avoidance, or cata- strophic reactions? Then, add your total scores on denial and avoidance, and catastrophic reactions, and divide this grand total by two. Compare this number with your total score on the hardi- ness items, and you will see whether you respond to stressful changes with hardiness.
SUMMARY
Do you see why hardy attitudes amount to the courage and moti- vation to thrive in the midst of stressful changes? Now, of course, you need to supplement courage and motivation with the specific skills that will help you transform these stressful changes into op- portunities. But, first, you need to deepen your resilient or hardy attitudes.

YOU CAN LEARN TO BE RESILIENT

Resilient people seem so capable that it is easy to think they were born that way. Certainly, some youngsters do show early signs of hardiness. Think of youngsters eager to learn everything and interested in everything around them, as compared to youngsters less involved in life. But, even if hardier adults report enthusiastic and purposeful childhoods, it may be a mistake to conclude that genes determine resiliency. After all, we know that some people emerge as hardy only later in their development. So where does resilience come from?
EARLY EXPERIENCES THAT BUILD RESILIENCE
Our early IBT research gave us clues to the origins of hardiness. Years later, Debbie analyzed IBT’s employee interview data, as to early conditions that differentiated the resilient and nonresilient employee groups. 1 Researchers in the early study were blind to the employee hardiness levels of those with whom they interacted.
Interestingly, many of the employees who tested high in hardiness reported stressful early lives. Their stress included serious illnesses in themselves or family mem- bers, single-parent households, divorces, financial difficul- ties, unemployment, alcoholism or substance abuse in family members, and frequent, disruptive changes in residence. These early lives if anything were more stressful than re- ported by those employees low in hardiness. Another important feature of those high in resilience is that many of them recalled their parents’ singling them out as special in some important way. Talents, skills, maturity, or other unique, defining features contrib- uted to parents elevating these children’s role within the family. As such, the parents supported these youngsters’ capabilities through either encouraging their gifts and talents or assigning them family responsibilities, or both. These chil- dren developed a keen sense of purposeful direction in school, community, and work activities. In contrast to less determined youngsters, these children emerged hardier, re- sponsive to growth-promoting opportunities, and creative in carving out niches that fully expressed themselves. . In school, teachers or other adults spotted and nurtured these youngsters. This helped their confidence. These youngsters’ openness to and involve- ment with the environment must have gotten their teachers’ attention. In any event, the high-resilience employees had found learning stimulating and fun. They further expected their efforts to lead to good results and cherished their central roles at home and at school. When these hardier youngsters encountered personal frustrations or setbacks, they utilized the help and encouragement of others. What exactly did the resilient IBT employees learn about them- selves in their youth? They learned that they were important enough to fully engage in living (commitment attitude), they could influence positively much of what happens to them (control atti- tude), and they could use ongoing changes in ways that benefited their development and growth (challenge attitude). Their hardy atti- tudes helped them to embrace life and to develop resources to cope effectively with life’s circumstances.
EARLY EXPERIENCES THAT UNDERMINE RESILIENCE
In contrast, the nonresilient employees remembered their child- hood experiences differently.Some recalled parents who rigidly advocated to them about rules, values, and family norms. They recalled few times, if any, when their parents made them feel especially capable or talented. If they did, however, it was inconsistent, oftentimes the result of external pressures rather than personal sentiment. Many within this group only vaguely recalled meaningful family interactions and attributed much of this to outside preoccupations that undermined family functioning. For various reasons, in their youth, these adults recalled limited encouragement, help, and empathy from their parents. They also reported that, be- fore long, they began hiding their feelings, frustrations, and problems from their parents. The nonresilient employees in- sufficiently appreciated how school and other community ac- tivities served as stepping stones to a fulfilling life. Vaguely defined talents and goals undermined their ability to grasp the larger picture. As children, this group also shied away from teachers. They did what they could to get by in school, with little sense of involvement or influence. Even though some of them did well academically, they still felt socially inadequate. These employees reported more unhap- piness at home and at school than their more resilient co- workers. As you can see, the nonresilient IBT employees did not have hardy attitudes and skills. As youngsters, they learned early to avoid life’s problems (alienation as opposed to commitment), to re- frain from influencing the manageable aspects of change (power- lessness as opposed to control), and to fear changes that disrupt stability (threat as opposed to challenge). These self-defeating atti- tudes toward living prevented them from coping and interacting effectively under pressure.
CAN RESILIENCE BE LEARNED IN CHILDHOOD?
Genetic inheritance affects our performance and health on many levels, but you can learn resilience as a child. There are many examples of people, genetically disadvantaged and thus vulnera- ble, who have nonetheless overcome such limitations, sometimes in extraordinary ways. In contrast, there are also just as many ex- amples of people who, though apparently well-endowed geneti- cally, are surprisingly low in hardiness. 2 Our IBT employee-history interviews showed how early expe- riences can be a formative influence on resilience. The develop- ment of hardy attitudes and skills in children varies with certain characteristics of their environment and parental interaction. What is the gist of this childhood hardiness? Circumstances that provide children with opportunities to find purpose, direction, and mean- ing in dealing with stressful changes strengthen resilient attitudes and resources within them. The resilient IBT employees’ early losses, setbacks, supportive parenting, and teachings gave them numerous opportunities to learn how to turn change to advantage and to use constructively the support from which to accomplish this.
CAN YOU LEARN RESILIENCE IN ADULTHOOD?
As long as you can use life experiences to grow, psychologically and socially, you can learn to be resilient as an adult. Resist falling into the trap of thinking that once you reach adulthood, you are what you are, and nothing will change that. Hardiness research, detailed below, indicates that adolescents and adults can learn to be resilient.
HARDINESS TRAINING
Our efforts to foster hardiness in adults began at IBT, in the years following the deregulation upheavals. IBT decision makers came to us, indicating that they knew us as careful and determined re- searchers, but wondered if we could also help their employees to become more resilient. The company was then in the throes of massive downsizing and reorganization, with the aim of being competitive in the new telecommunications industry. These up- heavals were taking a great toll on the employees, and they needed hardiness badly. In the first practical application of our research, we put to- gether a hardiness training program based on our findings about hardiness we had found in the resilient group and the parent/child relationships they had reported. 3 Specifically, we devised tech- niques and exercises to help trainees handle stressful circumstances by turning them to advantage (rather than by avoiding or attacking them) and to help them interact with others by giving and receiving assistance and encouragement (rather than by deep- ening ongoing conflicts). Also, we included ways to use the feed- back from these efforts to deepen the attitudes of commitment, control, and challenge. In addition, the trainers tried to give the encouragement and support to trainees implementing the tech- niques and exercises that the resilient employees in our research sample had reported getting from their parents. As you will see later, the training was effective in helping trainees learn hardy cop- ing, social interaction, and attitudes. It is this training procedure that has led to the exercises you will encounter in chapters 6, 8, and 10. The beleaguered IBT employees benefited greatly from this training. The abiding emphasis of our hardiness training program is on transformational coping and supportive social interactions and using these to deepen the attitudes of commitment, control, and challenge. Through mental and be- havioral actions, you transform the features of stressful changes and use them to advantage. At the mental level, stressful circumstances are placed into broader perspectives, so they can be managed more easily. An example is the time perspective, which may help you realize that the deadlines are all this week, so that next week you can get back to nor- mal. You also learn how to deepen your understanding of problems, so you know what to do to solve them. An exam- ple is the recognition that the stress is based on unfortunate but resolvable misunderstandings between you and your boss. At the action level, mental insights are used to plan and carry out decisive courses of problem-solving actions. The feedback gained from carrying out these activities deepens your hardy attitudes of commitment, control, and challenge. This process leads to greater resilience under stress. . The other abiding emphasis of our hardiness training program strives to foster supportive interactions that can help solve problems. Here, you identify and resolve ongoing conflicts that exist between you and others, and replace them with patterns of sharing assistance and encouragement. In doing this, you learn com- munication, listening, and behavior skills that bring about supportive interactions to improve relationships. Often, the trainee has to take the first steps unilaterally in trying to im- prove the relationships. The training process helps you to both understand and accept this approach, by realizing that if you are helpful to a coworker, it will be difficult for him or her not to respond in kind. Trainees practice these coping and support skills in real- life circumstances and use the feedback they get from their efforts to deepen their hardy attitudes. They emerge with the knowledge and skills to turn potentially disruptive stresses into advantages. Once the program is over, they have devel- oped the courage, motivation, and strategies to approach stressful circumstances resiliently. s GAUGING THE RESULTS. By now, there are a number of research studies of working adults and college students, all of which show the effectiveness of this type of resiliency training. The general pattern of the studies uses question- naires to measure the hardiness levels in the participants be- fore the training begins and after it is over. In addition, we measure their job or school performance in relevant ways, before and after training. To clarify the relative effectiveness of our training program, we further compare the participants to people who receive other special training or no training at all. At IBT, we compared IBT employees going through hardiness training to other IBT employees still on the training wait list. 4 Those who had completed the training were hardier, performed better on the job, were more satisfied with their job, and had a greater sense of personal fulfillment than those still on the waiting list. Their stress, strain, anxiety, depression, and blood pressure also simultaneously decreased, and their supervisors’ performance evaluations of them improved. These group differences persisted over the six months following the end of the training program. There have been other studies of hardiness training for work- ing adults who are undergoing great changes. When these adults went through specific training for hardiness, as compared to other adult trainees who received more conventional stress-management training, the results matched those already discussed. These other studies of similar training programs reinforce the value and effec- tiveness of hardiness training. 5 When we do hardiness training in the workplace, we typically arrange for there to be an ‘‘alumni’’ meeting, roughly one month after the training is over. This is an opportunity for trainees to meet once again, share what has been happening to them after the training, and fill out a questionnaire about how the training has affected them. Across the various groups, 90 percent of the work- ing adults find the training of marked value and 93 percent feel that they have definitely improved in their ability to deal with stressful circumstances. By now, there are also research studies of hardiness training with college students. 6 In these, the training for resilience is of- fered as a regular credit course for students who need or want it. These courses offer similar training to that used for working adults, and show similar results. Not only does questionnaire- based hardiness increase as students go through the course, so too do their grade-point averages and retention in school over the next two years. Taken together, these research findings on the effectiveness of hardiness training show a number of beneficial results that persist over time: s Trainees become more imaginative about how to bridge the gap between their needs and those of their company and co- workers. They are no longer overcome with panic, anger, and detachment. They feel more self-confident, as they think through all the changes that are taking place. They no longer feel inadequate and vulnerable. s They feel more energetic and enthusiastic on a day-to-day basis. They have fewer headaches, upset stomachs, aches and pains, and don’t have trouble getting out of bed anymore.They feel more involved in the events going on around them, and think they can really make a difference. They don’t think of themselves as victims being preyed upon by those in power. s They have a sense of a better future for themselves, rather than thinking it is only other people that can get what they want in life. s They procrastinate and avoid less, and do less stress-related eating and drinking. s As they come to feel less overwhelmed and powerless, they cut corners and disregard rules less. s They feel more flexible, and open to whatever happens. It is less likely that they get stuck in old beliefs about how the world works, as they become more open to possibilities and how they can actually improve their lives.
SUMMARY
Developing resilience in people is our life’s work. We enjoy help- ing people to improve their hardiness and, as a consequence, to enhance their performance, health, morale, and conduct. It seems clear from the research on adolescents and adults that you can learn hardiness; it is not just in the genes. In this chapter, we have presented a rough outline of what our training program involves. In the pages that follow, we will take you through our specific training techniques that will help you to navigate successfully whatever work changes come your way.