What's the mirror exercise?
I’m starting with the man in the mirror.
I’m asking him to change his ways.
No message could have been any clearer: If you want to make the world a better place
Take a look at yourself and make that change.
Michael Jackson
When any change occurs, you first need to look at yourself.
Take a few moments to write your answers to the following questions in your reflective journal.
Think about a time when you have experienced either work or personal change. Who instigated the change?
What thoughts did you have about the change?
What feelings did you have about the change?
In your opinion, how did you behave throughout the change process?
In the opinion of others, how did you behave through the change process?
What were the specific stages you went through? Describe your thoughts, feelings and actions at each point in the process.
What impact did you have on those around you at the time?
How did your behaviour affect others?
If you could have your time again, what would you do differently and why? As you begin to reflect on your thoughts, feelings, and behaviour, seek to understand yourself more deeply. By doing this, you will be able to develop greater self-awareness, making you a stronger leader and putting you in a better position to understand others.
The mirror exercise
The more you do this exercise, the easier and more comfortable it will become, so be patient even if it is difficult when you start doing it.
1. When you stand in front of a mirror, what do you see, feel and hear (this refers to what you are saying to yourself or what is often referred to as your self-talk)? Write down all the good things you see, feel and hear.
2. Next, capture all the negative things you see, feel and hear. Write this down too.
3. Finally, imagine what another person or an audience might see, feel and hear.
4. Assess your responses: are you casting a shadow, or are you generating sunlight? There is no right or wrong answer to this question – you just need to be open and honest with yourself.
Here is my own answer to what change means to me:
“It’s an opportunity to demonstrate my leadership and coaching skills. It’s an opportunity to prove a concept and gain valuable feedback along the way. I will be totally exposed with nowhere to hide, which excites and scares me all at the same time. I know I am going to go on an emotional roller coaster, and this will be a test of my emotional resilience.”
If I ask myself how I know whether a change is good for me or not, here is my answer:
“I don’t know whether it will be a good change or not; however, failure is not an option, so I am going to give it my best shot and prove how powerful coaching can be when you have the skills and knowledge to deliver”.
As a leader, you have to remember that change happens all the time.
Sometimes it is a big change like a restructure; other times, it is a small change like someone new joining the team. There will be times when you instigate the change yourself and times when change is passed down from above. Whatever the change, you will need to have the skills and knowledge to lead your team through it effectively.
Inevitably, some members of your team will not be engaged in the process, so you will need to manage them through it. When you go through change, you need to identify where your individual team members are in the four stages of team development (Forming, Norming, Storming and Performing). The individuals who are not ready for the change will very quickly move into the Storming phase, and whether you like it or not, you may need to challenge them about this and have some potentially difficult conversations. If feelings are left to fester, disruption will very quickly develop in your team. Encourage those who are comfortable with the change to bring others along with them by offering support and encouragement, and by sharing the positives of the change and helping to reframe any negativity. It is important that, throughout any change process, you effectively communicate what is happening and why. Be open and honest and tell your team what is good about the change and what they will notice as they make progress. For example, your team might notice frowns turning to smiles and energy increasing as more people get on board with the process. The team will start to have fun, so there’ll be more laughter and smiles. Everyone will notice that the team is achieving goals and is not afraid to challenge poor performance. The whole team will become an encouraging and supportive environment. As soon as they start to see the positives of the change, you should hear your team’s language change from negative responses to positive. At the same time, you need to be aware that not everyone will see the change as a good thing, and you need to respect this, but assure the team that, as the leader, you will support, listen to and encourage them individually. At this stage, some people may decide to get off the bus because they don’t want to proceed with the journey, and that’s fine. However, as the leader, you need to help and support them with whatever choice they decide to make. Remind your team that change creates opportunities as well as challenges, so whether they like change or not, it’s an opportunity for them to try something different. A big part of your role as a coach and leader is to raise their awareness of what your team are going to experience along the Way.
Mood Boards
During the change process, it is important to make your team aware of the impact that change is having on their feelings. I do this to get the team to use a mood board. It’s a fun and quirky way to get the team to reflect on their feelings and share them with others in the team. The mood board is divided into three zones: green, amber and red. Each day, team members put their name and an emoticon in one of the zones so the rest of the team could see how they felt.
Here is what the three zones and emoticons indicate:
Bright green with a smiling face - indicates they were happy, motivated, learning new things and feeling positive.
Amber with a straight face - indicates their mood was changeable. Sometimes they felt happy, engaged and positive, and other times they felt they were struggling and ready to give up.
The red zone has a sad face / indicating they were unhappy, demotivated and lacking passion. This was the danger zone.
By making the mood board visible, the whole team can see how each other is feeling, and this gives them the opportunity to challenge one another and offer support. As a leader, this was good because I couldn’t be with everyone all of the time. It allowed the team to recognise their own and each other’s moods so they could work on changing them as a team.
Reflective Journal
I use a reflective journal on a daily basis to capture what has gone well throughout the day and why. It helps me understand what I need to do more of and which skills I need to continue to use and develop. I also use it to capture what has not gone so well (and why) to understand what happened, and make adjustments the following day.
Complete your own reflective journal for a few days before introducing the process to your team.
A good way to capture this information in your journal is under the following headings:
Successes – What has gone well and why?
Challenges – What could have gone better and why? I use this as an opportunity to set new goals for the next day.
Opportunities – If you could have your time again, what would you do differently, and what outcomes would you expect?
Development – How have you grown as an individual, and what have you learnt about yourself? How does this support your career plans?
Self-reflection always needs to start on a positive note, so first, think about the challenges you have faced throughout the day and what it was specifically that posed a challenge for you. This will then become the starting point for a new goal. Look at the challenge and use it to form a goal for the next day, making sure it is specific, measurable, achievable, realistic and has a timescale. Next, brainstorm all the opportunities that have come up during the day, pick two actions you can commit to and use them to help you meet your goal. It is important at this stage for you to capture how this goal fits into your personal development plan and record what can be gained from achieving it.
In other words, you need to answer the question: “What’s in it for me?”
If practised daily, this whole process can be finished in 15 minutes. I complete my own self-reflection journal before I go to bed at night.
GROW is goalsetting model is simple yet effective.
Answer the questions associated with each part of the model to help you form and test your goal.
G – What is the Goal?
R – Where are you currently (what is your Reality), and what is the gap that needs to be filled?
O – What Options have you got for filling the gap and achieving the goal?
W – What is the Way forward? What actions will you commit to?
It is very beneficial and therapeutic to take time out at the end of a busy day to reflect on what has gone well and why. It slows everything down and will help you clear your mind, so you no longer have to think about work when you arrive home. I find this helps me maintain a good work/life balance. There is no right or wrong way to complete a reflective journal. In mine, I use words as well as pictures because this helps me to use both sides of my brain: the logical and the creative. When completing their own journals, encourage your team to capture all of their successes from each day, no matter how big or small they seemed.
You can access my GROW Coaching Model Worksheet for FREE at https://www.accendocoaching.co.uk/resources
The Personal Transition Curve (Change Curve)
The other mood-recognition tool I have used is John M. Fisher’s Personal Transition Curve or change curve. The Personal Transition Curve offers a visual representation of the journey that an individual goes on during any period of change. I love this tool because no matter what you are experiencing, you can plot where you are on the diagram and identify how your thoughts, feelings, and behaviour relate to where you are in the change process. It allows you to take a look in the mirror and decide whether you are willing to take the next step towards change or not. Fisher’s Personal Transition Curve can be used to understand personal and organisational transitions and is a free resource that you can get from www.businessballs.com. You can also read the theory behind the Personal Transition Curve and explanations of how it works at Business Balls (www.businessballs.com/personalchangeprocess.htm).
The different stages someone goes through when they progress along the change curve are:
Anxiety – Can I cope?
Happiness – At last something’s going to change!
Fear – What impact will this have? How will it affect me?
Threat – This is bigger than I thought…
Denial – Change? What change?
Guilt – Did I really do that?
Depression – Who am I?
Disillusionment – I’m off! This isn’t for me.
Hostility – I’ll make this work if it kills me!
Gradual Acceptance – I can see myself in the future.
Moving Forward – This can work and be good.
The key to using the tool effectively is complete honesty. If your team members are not honest, the only person they will be fooling is themselves. No one wants to be in the depression stage of change; however, if that’s where you are, that is where you are. You may dislike the fact that this is where you are, but you will have much more respect for yourself if you acknowledge it and use the information to move forward with integrity. By identifying the next step in the change process, you might just get the push you need to move to a better place. When working with your team, it’s important to remember that we all have a choice about whether to change, and we each individually need to decide whether to embrace it or resist it. There is no right or wrong about it; we all have to decide if a change is right for us on a personal level. Remember, not everyone will want to change. Some people like to play the victim role, so choosing to stay where they are serves a purpose.
Think about your own team for a minute and answer these questions:
What proportion of your team are mood hoovers? (e.g. they suck all the energy out of you, they’re negative Nellies, or they love to be the victim.)
What proportion of your team are energy givers? (e.g. they are the life and soul of the party with high energy, high enthusiasm, and they ooze positivity?)
What proportion of your team just turn up, do what they need to do and then leave? (e.g. they are reliable, see being ‘good’ as being ‘good enough’ and exist in their comfort zones but may be viewed by others as not pulling their weight.)
Using your answers to those questions, plot where each individual member is in relation to their comfort zone and the Personal Transition Curve.
Next, answer the following questions in relation to your team’s level of engagement?
What are the consequences of doing nothing?
What are the benefits of making a change?
What’s in it for you? x What’s in it for them?
What’s in it for the business?
Reading books
If you want to learn more about the change process, the book I find the easiest to read and the one that I find most thought-provoking is Who Moved My Cheese? by Dr Spencer Johnson. This book has been used by many corporations who want to get across the message to their staff about change in a more entertaining way. Books will help you all move through the process of change more easily by explaining the different stages that individuals and teams go through when they are experiencing transitions and challenges. This book will get you to think about how we each respond to change and how you can recognise the impact change is having on both yourself and your team.
You could also read Empowering Employee Engagement https://www.accendocoaching.co.uk/store/ignite-book by yours truly for my full Ignite programme.