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Inspired by HBR’s 10 Must Reads on Mental Toughness

Sometimes people come to an understanding that they have reached a limit in what they do. It may happen in various areas: project or job overall, personal development, sport, etc. A natural solution is getting a coach to help you to cross the chasm and take you to next level. Actually thinking about a coach is better even before the limit is reached, better to be proactive and not to lose time.

But is the coaching option suitable for everyone? How many times did you come across the feeling that what ever the coach (or any interlocutor) is suggesting has already been known to you? It just has been hiding inside your brain somewhere? Or did you feel like simply telling about the problem or an issue to somewhere has presented a solution to you? It is actually not by coincidence that the first thing people are taught, when they take coaching corses, is the art of listening.

So what do you need to overcome the hurdle, assuming it is under your control and within your decision power? One may say there is always a way to get out of boundaries, to change the landscape of the problem, to alter the rules of the game. Those are valid statements and there are books and techniques available to address them. I want, however, to focus on practical aspects of the situation, rather than the theoretical ones. If you can really get to the next level by yourself — how should you do it?

I have over 20 years of experience in large corporations, like HPE, Symantec, Commvault, and I have learned a lot from it. The beauty of those experiences is that they span across countries, job types, and levels, covering both internal and external aspects of company’s operations. In those companies, you often find yourself with desire to change things, happening within the area you are accountable for, but those things are not directly under your control. Normally you use influencing and inspiration techniques to encourage responsible people to work on it. But even assuming people are willing to tackle the problems, it is not guaranteed they are able to find a solution. How could you help them get there without directing them?

You may simply encourage them to present you their way of thinking. Starting as far back as it makes sense, probably going back further and further, to understand all parameters or assumptions for the initial setup. I actually came across this approach long time ago, when I was a kid in school. Do you recall being stuck at the math or science problem and not able to see any way forward. Although still having a will and desire to go forward? What helped me personally was the opportunity to explain my way of thinking to someone else. And very often the solution was coming to me even before I finished my explanation. The people around me frequently found it difficult to understand how did they manage to help, when I thanked them.

As we grow older most of us are not getting better at problem solving. Our minds become more and more constraint with our own experiences and often suggest us the most obvious solution, which it not what we are looking for. So in order to facilitate more flexible approach it is necessary to create an environment to enable our brains to function differently. Some people are capable of doing it by themselves and some may be helped to do it.

Using 3rd party to facilitate the creation of suitable environment, be it coaching, getting feedback, or bouncing ideas is the right thing to do. But, assuming there is a solution available inside ourselves, one may consider challenging those ways or use them just as a tool, ignoring the main purpose of respective exercises. In the end is might be that all we need is a listener or a mirror in human form to retell our story to ourselves and choose a different route on the way. I do not suggest it is always the way, but sometimes we become too much obsessed with getting a feedback and making sure we act on it, that we forget about who we are.

Today’s environment is also unhelpful in those situations. Due to the pandemic restrictions the opportunity to talk about something over a cup of coffee has been taken away from us. Some are trying to replace it with various virtual meetings without an agenda, but it rarely serves the purpose. Some modern social networks, focused on pure voice communication and the possibility to talk something through, have already been developed. Clearly the security issue prevents from using them for corporate purposes. Although it is only the matter of time until suitable enterprise solutions are coming.

Another aspect of today is technology development. If the only thing we require in certain situation is someone to listen to us, there is a possibility to automate this process and use Artificial Intelligence for it. There are already solutions on the market, including those with voice capabilities, so connecting them to existing social networks may do the trick.

So next time when you stumble upon something — do not hesitate to talk it through. Ask someone to join you and just walk them through your thinking process. Chances are you are going to find a solution yourself!