As the modern workplace changes and adapts to the needs of employees, core values become more important than ever. This means considering the foundations of company culture; how do your operations work in favor of your people?
What processes can you establish to succeed? What really matters to your workers, and how does that align with the executives and decision-makers on your team?
These are big questions, and they're crucial to consider. One way to ensure success across your organization is to prioritize agility in the workplace. Let's break down exactly what that means and what it looks like in action for your team.
Agility refers to how you handle change. Are you willing to pivot when needed? Can you adapt your behavior to remain agile? Are you able to adjust to change quickly? If so, you understand the role of agility in the workplace.
As many companies have learned, the ability to adapt to whatever comes your way is incredibly important for overall success. With the recent rise in remote workers and hybrid teams, it's important to cultivate a team that can roll with the punches.
What does agility in the workplace look like for employees? Agility is improved and made possible by emotional intelligence. Since emotional intelligence is the ability to sense and understand emotions, it makes sense why this is key for agility.
Decision-making is far too often an emotional decision. People can become attached to their work and believe that criticism or alternative ideas are a direct judgment and commentary on them as people.
The emotionally intelligent worker understands that this isn't the case. By encouraging self-awareness (the ability to recognize and understand your moods, emotions, and drives) and self-regulation (the ability to control or redirect disruptive impulses and moods), leaders can empower employees to embrace strategic agility in the workplace.
By being able to quickly think about different points of view and consider the best course of action objectively, you can improve communication and resolve conflict more easily.
So, you know emotional intelligence is key to improving agility at work. What else can you do to stay flexible and adaptable?
Embrace a growth mindset! This perspective works with the idea that you can always learn to improve and make changes to support yourself, rather than not changing or learning out of fear of the unknown. (That's a fixed mindset, and it's one of the biggest roadblocks to success in the workplace.)
"If you're not making mistakes, you're stagnating. If you only stick to what you're naturally good at, you are hugely limiting yourself," we've shared before. By embracing continuous learning and growth at any opportunity, you can cultivate agility in the workplace.
Agility examples at work can also rely heavily on adapting to others. If you understand not only your behavior but the behaviors of those on your team, you can avoid conflict, overcome previous obstacles, and search for win-win solutions.
Beginning this process can be overwhelming, but the good news is that there are already specific tools available that will help you reveal the human potential within your organization.
Personality-based assessments will create a shared understanding and language within your team, allowing them to adapt more effectively to each other's behavior. This gives your team a competitive advantage; by embracing the insights assessments reveal, their ability to change will increase.
If you want to create a more successful, agile team, there are ways you can get started immediately. Here are a few ways to cultivate agility in the workplace.
Many organizations allow company culture to develop organically over time. This is a mistake, but it's not too late to course-correct.
Make sure that your company culture emphasizes the ability to change, open communication, and the exchange of new ideas from all team members. Award innovation, celebrate diversity, and make sure everyone on your team is always looking for your next big idea.
Using assessments to develop your employees will give you a competitive advantage when it comes to improving agility in the workplace.
Assessments bring a lot to the table; they create a shared language, improve communication and engagement, and help decrease conflict. Even more, they give employees a tangible investment in their success. By helping them understand themselves, you help them become more flexible and adaptable to their work environment.
While considering these intentional changes in your organization, you need to make sure that your executives and team leaders are actively demonstrating agility in their behavior and work style.
It can be easy for leaders to get comfortable with their styles and work preferences, but they need to model the behavior they expect from their team members.
Agility in the workplace can be your secret weapon or your downfall. By cultivating emotional intelligence growth mindsets in your team, utilizing tools like behavioral assessments, and intentionally developing your team, you will be able to dominate your industry.
Are you interested in using TTI SI tools to reveal human potential in your organization? Get started here.
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