The more successful you are in business, the more you need problem solving skills.
Right?
This used to be especially true in businesses or organisations that dealt with crisis, when every minute counted.
Now times have changed and problem solving is a crucial skill for almost everyone.
Change is happening faster and faster in any job, so any industry and any position requires dealing with new problems. Such problems that no one has got answers for yet.
What is the most stressful in all of this? You never know where the next problem will pop up.
So, how do you ensure that you and your team members are giving their best efforts continuously? How can you ensure that they’re solving the right problem? And what happens if they don’t have all the information they need?
These are just some of the questions that organisations are asking about problem solving today. According to my experience, one answer – or more accurately, a set of answers – is adaptability and the skillset it provides.
Problem solving is the most important skill in business during change.
You might have noticed it already – problem solving doesn’t just apply to those working in technical roles or who are responsible for managing projects (or businesses); it applies to all employees, from the CEO down through middle management and junior staff members alike.
Everyone has problems they need solved on their own or with others on their team. So we better learn how to do it successfully, because the need for solving problems in business is not going away.
Adaptability is a valuable skill set that you need to excel at work.
Adaptability is the ability to quickly and effectively adapt to new problems, situations and environments.
AQ (adaptability quotient – read more in this blog) is an important part of problem solving. Why? Because it helps you see problems as opportunities instead of obstacles.
You can use this skill anywhere in your career! From sales to marketing, strategy planning or project management – and it will help you not only to solve everyday problems, but also innovate faster than your competitors who aren’t using their AQ skillset as much (or at all!).
What’s even beter, adaptability skillset allows you to build the confidence you need to act quickly. That allows you to grow even when you’re faced with seemingly neverending pile of challenges.
Because the most important competitor for each one of us is our own self, isn’t it? The best strategy is becoming 1% better than we were yesterday, every day. Adaptability allows you to do just that, in the long term.
Adaptability skills can help with problem solving and innovation.
How do adaptability skills help exactly? I’ll give you a more detailed look.
Adaptability skills help to:
– be open minded and see change as a good thing rather than something that threatens your sense of control or safety. This is the most crucial thing to begin with because it means you will actually put effort into solving the problem, and not ignore it, run away from the problem or give up.
– turn obstacles into opportunities like no one can. By improving your adaptability skills, you learn to see the challenging situation from multiple angles simultaneously. Because of that, you consider different perspectives at once, which allows us to come up with better solutions for your problems both on a day-to-day basis and on long-term challenges.
– change your approaches quickly and choose the one that fits the situation best. This doesn’t mean learning everything from scratch every time something goes wrong; rather, it means unlearning what no longer serves you well now that circumstances have changed so that you can adapt better next time around!
– be creative in a practical way that serves the business and your career, rather than just being creative for its own sake (which can be fun but doesn’t really benefit anyone).
– bounce back from setbacks quicker, simply by trying again, and learning from the setback. You learn to “build healthier relationships” with mistakes, and understand the meaning of them more deeply – so they don’t hold you back anymore. Even more, every setback gives you more fuel to try again.
On a larger scale, if you’re the leader, this could mean changing your work environment in order to make the team more open, collaborative and proactive towards change. And thus creating an environment where people feel safe enough taking risks without feeling threatened by failure and setbacks.
Because as a leader, you have a responsibility not only to set high standards but also to create an environment where people feel safe enough taking risks without feeling threatened by failure and setbacks.
How can you learn to solve problems with adaptability skills in your workplace?
The process is quite simple:
– understand your starting point,
– improve your skills by training
– practice the new skills in your everyday life and work until they become your default.
You understand your starting point by making a “screenshot” of your AQ – your ability to adapt to change. After taking an assessment, you’ll see not only the adaptability skills you have at the moment, but also your character traits and work environment that affect how you change and adapt at work. This allows you to understand your strengths and areas to work on in the most comprehensive way.
Then you train your adaptability skills, according to the results of your AQ assessment. The methods are truly practical and allow you to feel more vital after the first training already. After the end of the program there is a viable difference in how you approach change and problem solving.
During and after the training, you also learn how to integrate the new skillset into your everyday life and work. As you become more and more confident in your adaptability skill set, you also become more and more confident in solving new and bigger problems at work.
This is what I have done for more than 3 years now, and the results surprise even me.
What will the new skillset look like in real life?
Adaptability is about being open to change. It’s about being able to see things from different perspectives, having an AQ mindset – that is, believing that change can be good and lead to good outcomes per se – and being able to handle stress well.
If you’re adaptable in your work life, you’ll be more successful at problem solving because:
– You have a better understanding of the situation as it stands because you recognize more angles of the situation than anyone else;
– And you are more confident to do something about the problem – test, experiment;
– You become unstoppable, because you learn from setbacks quickly, continuing to move forward and improving while everyone else is giving up;
– After improving your adaptability skills, you actually start to enjoy problems, because you know you will handle them, and the confidence fuels you, allowing you to take on even bigger challenges that you never even dreamt of.
Conclusion
If you want to be more successful in your career, it’s important to have adaptability skills.
These are the skills that will help you solve problems and innovate in a changing environment. Adaptability is also a valuable personal trait that will give you confidence and make you more successful at work, as well as improve your life outside of work.
If you’re ready to explore your adaptability skills, consider taking an online assessment. A good place to start is simply booking a short call here. I’ll tell you more about it, you’ll try the training method, and see if this is something that is truly for you.
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