© 2024
Resilience
Welcome to this eight module focusing on increasing your resilience so that you can bounce back from adversity and 'knock backs' during your job hunting campaign
Tackle the module in bite size chunks, don’t feel the need to do everything in one go and allow plenty of time to digest and apply the information covered
The module includes helpful ‘Activities’ for you to complete, it is strongly recommended that you undertake them to get the most out of the content and the key learning points
Allow yourself time to reflect and take on board the advice, key messages and suggested tasks contained in the module to enable you to move your job campaign forward
This module will
-
Explain what resilience is and why it is so important when job hunting
-
Provide simple, tried and tested techniques to improve your resilience
-
Enable practical and real opportunities to measurably improve your resilience
Resilience has variously been defined as our
-
Ability to bounce back from difficulties
-
Recovery powers from negative experiences
-
Attitude of mind to be both realistic and positive
-
Capacity to adapt and respond to challenging events
-
Aptitude to manage significant pressure without stress
-
'Triumphing in the face of adversity'
During adversity we focus on external reasons and external solutions
The adversity is a fact, but we can change how we respond to it
Resilience looks within and changes our thinking and responses
Resilience is about
-
Learning
-
Treating every adversity as a learning experience
-
Realising ‘what doesn’t kill us makes us grow stronger'
-
Feeling
-
Being able to emotionally 'bounce back' undamaged
-
Maintaining or enhancing self-awareness and self-esteem
-
Thinking
-
Have 'high frustration tolerance' – not being easily wound up
-
Being open, flexible and pragmatic – a good problem solver
Some of the common attributes associated with resilient people include
-
Welcoming change willingly, flexibly and openly
-
A positive mental attitude and determination
-
Learning and growing from failure, not fearing it
-
The ability to 'cut their losses' and move on
-
Being naturally pragmatic and practical
-
Realising the battles that can and cannot be win
-
Being values driven with strong self-esteem
-
'Reinvent' themselves in changing circumstances
Conversely, the absence of resilience often results in fewer risks being taken due to the fear of being unable to deal with the consequences of failure
Now that we have a sense of what resilience is and why it is so important for your job hunting success, lets start looking at three tried and tested techniques that will measurably help you to build your resilience, namely
-
The ‘ABC’ technique – an excellent way to reprogramme your thinking and your responses to adversity in order to generate different and better outcomes
-
The ‘Open Door’ technique – a powerful way of continually refocussing on new opportunities and possibilities as and when current options end or dissipate
-
The ‘Adversity Matrix’ technique – a compelling way to respond to adversities, depending on their significance and how much influence you have over them
The ABC technique is an established model to build your resilience
-
Adversity – the negativity, challenge or problem you are facing
-
Belief – the tape in your mind that determines your reaction
-
Consequence – the result or outcome of your reaction
You can’t do anything about A – the Adversity – it has already happened
But you can do something about B – your Belief – you can choose to change it
Changing B enables C to change – the Consequence – with a new potential outcome
The principle can be usefully illustrated by the following diagram
The original belief has resulted in the original consequence that happened
However, by changing the original belief next time, you enable a different consequence
Consider the following scenario
-
Adversity – you receive a rejection email following a job interview
-
Belief – you believe you embarrassed yourself and won’t seek feedback
-
Consequence – you fail to learn and repeat the same mistake at future interviews
Now consider the following alternative scenario
-
Adversity – next time you receive a rejection email following a job interview
-
Belief – your new belief is 'this is a learning opportunity' and you seek feedback
-
Consequence – you discover info that significantly improves your responses
Job loss can often feel like lots of doors are closing, for example
-
The end of day to day contact, communication and socialising with work colleagues
-
The end of your hopes and aspirations about staying in the organisation you are leaving
-
The end of your ‘psychological’ contract as well as your ‘employment’ contract
Similarly job hunting can feel likes lots of doors keep closing, for example
-
Making a job application or sending a CV that doesn’t generate an interview
-
Attending interviews or meetings that don’t go anywhere or result in a rejection
-
Networking with people who you thought might be helpful, who proved not to be
Being and remaining resilient is about
-
Feeling equipped to deal positively with the closing doors
-
Treating closing doors as learning opportunities and part of the journey
-
Continually refocusing on spotting and pursuing the next opening doors
-
Maintaining a positive mental attitude to exploit the newly opening doors
From the above learning and moving forward, using the following activity will enable you to manage yourself when you can see a door closing
Job hunting invariably involves dealing with an array of different difficulties and adversities
Some of the adversities will be highly significant, some will be relatively insignificant to you
Similarly, you will have lots of influence over some of adversities, and with some you will not
Resilience can be measurably enhanced by flexibly responding to adversities according to the extent of these two dimensions
Resilience is about recognising the degree of significance and influence of adversities you are experiencing and responding differently
Perhaps this is best illustrated by the diagram below
Park quadrant
By spotting that an adversity is of low significance and that you have very little influence over it, you can happily and justifiably give yourself permission to park the issue and move on, thus ensuring that you
-
Avoid festering or wasting time and energy on it
-
Avoid worrying about it or getting stressed out about it
-
Maximise your ability to bounce back from what really matters
For example, if one of five recruitment agencies you have contacted doesn’t return your calls, recognise that if the other four agencies have responded to you, then it isn’t significant and just move on to contacting another five agencies or whatever other tasks are before you
Learn quadrant
These types of adversities are significant to you, but you have also recognised that you have very little influence over them, so your energy and effort needs to be directed towards ensuring that you learn
-
What you can do for now to influence it as far as you are able to
-
What you need to do to become more influential on this issue in the future
-
Put a plan in place to build your ability to influence the next similar adversity
For example, after a short list interview you discover that the other candidate has been appointed and that you have been unsuccessful, so your learning response is to seek feedback to improve your performance next time and, if appropriate, keep the closing door ajar with the interviewer, just in case the other candidate doesn’t work out
Prioritise quadrant
These adversities are of low significance, but you have a high level of influence or control over them, so they should only be addressed after you have ensured that the ‘Focus’ adversities below have been, or are in the process of being, resolved and prioritised according to how much value they will add to your job hunting campaign
For example, at some stage you may need to do a bit of housekeeping on your campaign hard copy and soft copy administration, so you should schedule in some time to do it once you have resolved all of your ‘Focus’ adversities below
Focus quadrant
Because they are both highly significant and you have a high level of influence over them, these adversities should be right at the top of your ‘to do’ list to get sorted
For example, you have a second interview coming up for a job that you are really keen on, but you know that some of your responses at the first interview didn’t go as well as you would have liked.
So it is paramount that you do your research and additional preparation in advance of the second interview, so that you don’t repeat the experience second time around and reduce your chances of success, so that no other adversities or tasks interfere with you doing so
So, to summarise, by identifying which of the four quadrants your adversities fall into, and then responding to them appropriately, you will measurably improve your resilience to manage current and future challenges, difficulties and adversities
This module has enabled you to
-
Understand what resilience is and it’s significance in a successful job hunting campaign
-
Consider and adopt some key top tips and new techniques to improve and build your resilience
-
Seek current and future real opportunities to analyse and measurably improve your resilience