Are you a “new year resolution type of person”?

This is the question one of my mentees asked me as we started our first 2024 session. “Not quite” was my response, in short. I take time to reassess what I want to change when there is the need to do it, which does not follow the calendar of a year. 

New Year is yet definitely a time when I reassess my health and well-being habits because it is a natural reminder that, well, the clock is ticking. The problem with “new year” resolutions is they don’t work, at least not for me. Given the success of dry January I may not be the only one. Isn’t this a brilliant invention for us to feel good about holding on to at least one resolution for a month? 

Big changes, small changes, which one wins?

Big personal changes, and triggers for change, are sometimes taken for one another in our language. For instance, some of my triggers for personal change include the last one of my three children soon taking off from the nest, us as a family relocating back from the US to France a bit more than a year ago or realizing as a business leader that sustainability is part of my core job and I need to learn more about it. A change in your environment doesn’t necessary become a personal change unless you decide you need to adjust to it and act on it. To change you need a trigger, you also need to make a resolution, a commitment or set up new goals: this way a resolution can be a trigger for big change. Yet change is actually much more about the process of changing and the place you are on the other side of it, than the trigger itself and even the initial resolution to do something about it.

All big changes I have navigated well in my life are the results of many consistent and deliberate small changes that came after that resolution. And I found there’s more chance to stick with small continuous changes to get consistent results than trying to revolutionize one of my practices. This is the power of routines or habits. The only challenge is as you are on these small iterative 1-to-5-degree shifts, you may not be able to see how far you are going, unless you stop from time to time to look back on it. And see how much you have travelled.

How did I switch from seeing routines as boring to considering them as a critical way to become the person I want to be and helping me find the creative space I need?

One of the most transformative books I have read is Atomic Habits: Tiny Changes, Remarkable Results by James Clear. I will not try to summarize it here, as it is a 5-hour audio read and worth it from beginning to end, and it has profound implications. I’ll share how leveraging this, I made it work for me when it comes to personal well-being practices, which are high on the typical January agenda! Here are some practices for personal change derived from this reading, that worked for me.

 1 / Focusing on the first step.

I go for a long run once a week. Most of the time, I don’t have to push myself for it, however when I’m jet lagged, it’s cold and rainy outside, or I am like this weekend travelling for a conference, it’s hard. Reminding myself of my good resolution won’t work here. I only and solely focus on putting my running shoes on. Once they’re on, the process has already started and before I know it, I am outside running. 

2/ Making it enjoyable no matter what.

I have associated running with something I love, and I don’t have enough time for: listening to podcasts or reading books. 

If the weather conditions are poor, I am thinking about which book I am going to read. 

3/ Making it work for the life I have.

It’s important to know what’s good for me, for whom I am and with the other things that are important for my balance.

I used to run two to three times a week. At that time, I was working hard, had young kids but I was travelling far less. Since then, I also had an accident and running too much doesn’t work well with my knee. I have been putting my trainers in my suitcase, watched my colleagues go to the hotel’s gyms or for outside run with a mix of envy, frustration, and guilt. Reality is, I so rarely did go for a run when on travel, it is anecdotal. It just didn’t work for me. I stopped trying to mimic how others were managing it. I found that doing yoga in my room with an app that gives me different length options is what unlocked my ability to recreate a healthy routine. This has now become my healthy travel routine, it’s a great complement to my weekend run for my knees. And it works for me!

How audio reading this book again is fueling my thinking about leading enterprise- wide change?

1/ Rooting change in our own identity.

Just like for personal change, enterprise-wide change needs to be rooted in our identity: who are we as a company and how do we evolve into an ever-better version of ourselves fitted for our new scale and the ever-changing environment we are in? As James Clear reminds us in the book the “habits are how we embody our identity” they are daily votes of who we want to be. What we do repeatedly creates and transforms who we are. 

2/ Centering long lasting and effective change can only happen through people centered change.

The thousands of actions performed everyday by all of us make up our collective habits and end up defining who we are to each other, and who we are to our stakeholders as a company. Some are working, some have been in the past but are not anymore, some never worked. Driving change is then fundamentally about enabling new standard routines to be an upgrade or a replacement to existing ones. And habits, effective or ineffective ones are sticky. Changing company processes and systems therefore is about changing a massive sum of individual habits. That is why it must be people centered.

3/ Defining steps of intermediate value will refuel trust and energy tanks when things are tough.

This is key especially on a big multiyear transformation program. Whether you are driving a transformative type of change or a continuous improvement one, finding a way to identify quick wins and milestones is critical. To create confidence, to keep the energy going, to sign post the direction of travel, to have as many easier changes behind you to make space for the bigger ones, everyone will benefit from this ability to design big changes into manageable chapters, that you will have prepared upfront. Being able to turn back regularly and see how far you have progressed feels like when being on a hike and contemplating how much higher the peak is but also being able to look down on how much you have travelled (and take the time to pause and eat your well-deserved picnic!). When you restart the backpack is also lighter.

4/ On your path to change, get support through mentorship and remember it is a two-way street!

This is the real conclusion. Had my mentee not asked her question, I may not have formalized and furthered my thinking on change leadership and what is needed from me right now in this area.

Thank you to all my mentees who make me grow through their questions!

How are you starting your year? Are you making new resolutions? What 5-degree shifts are you onto? Are you mentoring someone and how does this make you grow?

With my best wishes for positive change!

“No change occurs if we just let our habitual tendencies and automatic patterns of thought perpetuate and even reinforce themselves, thought after thought, day after day, year after year. But those tendencies and patterns can be challenged.” Matthieu Ricard.

#PersonalDevelopment #Change #Mentorship