Dancing With Change
Martie Adler, American Student Assistance

On any given day, I have the opportunity to observe how change affects me and those around me. As I see the variety of responses to change, I begin to see the dance. Sometimes we have a partner, sometimes we do not. At times it is like the quick step, or maybe a tango or even a line-dance. How gracefully we move with the change determines the quality and length of the dance. And, how we approach it determines how we experience it. Just as in dancing—when we allow ourselves to move freely in rhythm with the music with no thought of how we look or how good we are—the level of enjoyment and freedom is high. When we approach dancing with fear or trepidation, we don’t enjoy the activity and may not even hear the music. Then there are times when we want to sit out the dance!

The Dancing with Change training series was developed in response to a request from some of my clients. They understood that change was inevitable (especially in the financial aid industry) and even welcomed it at times, yet they wanted to know whether there was a more positive and less stressful way to deal with it. One client said, “I thought I was getting better at dealing with change when I noticed that it wasn’t causing such an emotional upheaval in my life. Then I realized that it hadn’t gotten any easier, I was just too exhausted to respond.”

The real question is, why is it that so many of us have a difficult time with change (whether we acknowledge it or not)? If you read even a few of the books available on "change management", you can quickly begin to identify and understand that our responses to change are tied to psychological and emotional triggers. Triggers like, the need to believe we have control, disagreement with the change, a belief that there is a better way, and of course…fear. Even if we acknowledge that these types of personal responses are a part of our life, how can we begin the process of responding in a different way? We begin by observing our response, acknowledging and owning our response, identifying the underlying beliefs that triggered the response, and looking at change as an opportunity for growth and self-awareness.

Shall We Dance?
The emotional responses we experience when facing change are actually the initial invitation to the dance. Our beliefs, and the resulting fears, are the catalysts for our response to change. Our beliefs are often so ingrained that we may not be aware of the influence they have over us—even after we have responded—yet those very beliefs are behind our reaction to change. Let’s look at a few examples of triggers. In our industry, change mandated by the government happens frequently, and quite often we may not agree with it. In cases like this, we may not react, simply because we believe that there is nothing we can do about it. If this type of change does not trigger an emotional response, could it be that after years of experience we have come to believe that we have minimal or no control over these changes? If the belief that we have no control in a particular situation results in little or no emotion in our response, what happens when an event forces change to something we thought was in our control? That’s when the emotion starts to rise and the dance really begins! What if a Director from another department began to assign work to one of our team members without our knowledge and agreement? I suspect there would be an emotional response of some nature. Why? Because in this circumstance we believe we have control. I also suggest that in both of these examples, our beliefs are so ingrained that we wouldn’t even be aware of them—they would simply trigger our response. Our beliefs about control will play an active part of learning the dance.

Learning the Steps
As we begin the dance, we start with learning the steps. Once we have practiced them long enough, we no longer have to think about the steps—we simply allow ourselves to enjoy the movement and music. It is exactly the same experience when we practice modifying our response to change. Lesson One – begin to observe yourself (the emotions that arise) as opportunities for change come your way. An employee wants to change a process, the government wants to change part of a financial aid program, or your boss wants to reorganize the office. Lesson Two – as you begin to observe the thoughts (and subsequent emotion) that arise when faced with these changes, simply acknowledge that the emotion is present and identify the nature of the event that triggered the response for later contemplation. This step is an important one because it will assist you in determining why you are resisting the change. Lesson Three – you then start the process of identifying your underlying beliefs and companion emotions that are being triggered. This process sounds quite simple but in reality, it is the most difficult step for most of us because it requires a level of objective self-study and some pretty radical honesty. When you begin to see how your beliefs influence your responses, you can then move toward modifying them. And finally, Lesson Four – you begin to view change as an opportunity.

The management of change always begins with the individual and then can be moved to the team, departmental, and organizational levels. With the strength of resistance many people have toward change, it is critical that we begin with ourselves and then coach others along the same process. A work environment where each team member recognizes and understands dancing with change creates a platform for creative and positive interactions and, increased productivity and teamwork. It also allows us to spend our time focused on work and our customers, not the emotion.

In part two, we will review some dance routines that can be used to actively shift our “triggered” responses to ones that are more positive, healthy, and creative. We will also identify methods we can use to begin the process of modifying our response to change thus experiencing the dance in a whole new way. In part three, we will explore methods that can assist the entire organization in dancing with change. Until then, enjoy the dance!

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Martie Adler is a consultant with American Student Assistance, a FFELP guarantor. Martie is part of the Consultative Services team and provides consulting services to client schools in the areas of organizational development, change management, and leadership development. Martie has worked in the financial aid and student financial services industry for over twenty five years, and has been an independent consultant and coach for fifteen years. Martie can be reached at madler@amsa.com.

©2006 American Student Assistance. This article may be reformatted and reproduced for distribution by any non-profit or not-for-profit organization without obtaining the consent of the author provided that the copyright notice, author, and author’s biography are included within any subsequent publication.

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