I read recently an article which questioned the reason to be positive, to have hope and to be optimistic. I think there are many reasons why being positive works.
As we are living in challenging times for employees and
companies and very often people are stressed out and look towards HR for advice
and inspiration. This can be difficult however research has shown that there
are answers. Fred Luthans (2009) has defined Psychological Capital which gives
a positive approach to developing staff members, managers and human resources
in today’s workplace.
Psychological capital includes
Hope, Resilience, Optimism and Self-Efficacy all attributes which are extremely
important in the current economic climate. We can all use a little hope,
resilience, optimism and self efficiency to keep going in these difficult
times.
Psychological Capital has been
defined as an individual’s positive psychological state of development and is
characterized by (1) having confidence (self- efficacy) to take on and put in
the necessary effort to succeed at challenging tasks; (2) making a positive
attribution (optimism) about succeeding now and in the future; (3) persevering
toward goals and, when necessary, redirecting paths to goals (hope) in order to
succeed; and (4) when beset by problems and adversity, sustaining and bouncing
back and even beyond (resilience) to attain success.
Positive organisational
behaviour is the study and application of positively orientated human resources
strengths and psychological capacities that can be measured, developed, and
effectively managed for performance improvements.
Managers who wish to enhance
the performance of their direct employees will derive some benefit from
exhibiting the attributes of hope, resilience, optimism and self-efficacy as
managers serve as role models for their employees. If managers persist towards
goal accomplishment and do not let setbacks deter them, employees will be more
likely to follow suit. In addition when adversity strikes or uncertainty
surrounds managers, how they cope will be observed and perhaps mimicked by
employees. In short managers are always on stage and followers are watching and
taking cues about how to handle situations, what is valued, expected and
rewarded. Managers who become more aware of how their psychological capital and
level of positivity in general influences their employees and subsequent
behaviour will be more likely to see positive performance outcomes.
Psychological Capital can be
developed through short training interventions, which last one to three hours.
These include activities designed to enhance the components of efficacy,
optimism, hope and resilience. For example in the hope component of a training
module participants begin by delineating key goals they will use throughout the
session. The facilitator then explains the need for a concrete end point to
measure success, a framework that allows participants to work towards goal
accomplishment as opposed to away from desired goals by using a ‘stepping’
method of identifying sub-goals as a way to reap the benefits of even modest
achievements. The participants are instructed to generate multiple proactive
pathways to the goal and reflect on and discuss the realistic options
identified. On completion of this training intervention participants have taken
ownership of a personally valuable and challenging goal and are prepared for
obstacles and are ready to implement multiple contingency plans to attain their
goals.
Psychological Capital training
interventions will help build resilience by having participants identify recent
personal and organisational setbacks within their work domain and employees have
learned new tools to deal with setbacks and create a plan to handle these.
Setting a positive agenda for
survival is important in these challenging times. The lessons we can learn from
Psychological Capital is that management can create and build a positive
environment in their organisation. It is essential that HR takes the lead in
this. Creating Hope, Resilience,
Optimism and Self-Efficacy in any organisation is of benefit for all involved.
We saw that management is a role model for all employees and that they are
closely watched by employees. If management is a role model than human
resources are the real leaders in this and it is essential that they show Hope,
Resilience, Optimism and Self-Efficacy on a daily basis. Pessimistic managers are the death knell for any organisation as they give no direction and
suck up energy.
More than ever this is a time
for positive managers who can create a positive environment and challenge
the rest of the organisation to improve, be positive and creative.