15 Factors That Contribute to Creating Change Successfully
By: Ali Davies
Tags: Emotional Intelligence, Change, Change Management, Goals, Personal Development

The path to creating change in your life, work, or business can sometimes feel like a mountain to climb.

There can be many obstacles, setbacks, mistakes, and uncertainty along the way that can slow down progress and sabotage your results.

And on top of all of that, we have to navigate the many different emotions that creating or navigating change can trigger.

All of these things have to be dealt with effectively to set yourself up to succeed.

But there are many things you can do to make it easier to navigate the path of change successfully. Here are 15 of them to help you get started:

15 Factors That Contribute To Creating Change Successfully

1. Expect obstacles, challenges, setbacks, and mistakes. They happen. When they do, applying this simple three-step approach helps to stop them from derailing you:

Learn the lesson. Apply the learning. Move on.

2. Have a plan with deadlines but be flexible and open to the plan needing to be altered. It helps to have a regular planning and review process to be able to respond and adapt to how things evolve as you move forward so you can alter and tweak your plans as necessary and appropriate.

3. Break plans down into small steps and then just focus on the next small step. This keeps feelings of overwhelm at bay and helps build momentum and consistent progress.

4. Create reserves of everything — time, money, energy, support, etc. You will need them, and they make the journey smoother, easier, and faster. Your reserves will also support you and help you respond more effectively when you encounter challenges and setbacks.

5. Seek out people who have made the changes you want to make and learn from them. It will speed up your progress and help you avoid common problems, mistakes, and challenges.

6. Foster persistence and resilience. When the going gets tough, this really helps you get through and keep going.

7. Be careful who you surround yourself with. It makes a big difference. Surround yourself with positive, supportive people who encourage and inspire you. Steer clear of the BMWs (Bitchers, moaners, whiners) and negative, unconstructive people.

8. Change doesn’t usually follow a linear path. Accept that.

9. Get comfortable with feeling uncomfortable. Creating change takes you outside of your comfort zone. It brings with it feelings of uncertainty. That can feel uncomfortable. You need to be able to deal with the discomfort and uncertainty and not let it derail you or your progress.

10. Have an emotional management plan. When people work on change, they usually focus predominantly on the tasks required to make it happen. But change can also trigger all sorts of emotions that can either support you or sabotage you. Knowing what your emotional triggers are and having a way of dealing with them will help you not get in your own way.

11. It takes a lot of additional mental and physical energy to create change. Having a self-care programme that keeps you mentally and physically fit and strong makes a big difference. Identify energy drainers and deal with them. Identify energy givers and do more of them.

12. Create a haven — something that helps you step out of all the hoopla for a while and regroup. It doesn’t help to be always on. Take time out at regular intervals. It gives you a mental break so you feel refreshed when you come back to it. You will be more effective if you take regular breaks.

13. When the going gets tough focus on why you are creating this change. Focus on the positive outcome and benefits you will achieve once you have navigated your journey of change. Doing this will help boost motivation and determination to succeed when it feels hard.

14. Keep a sense of humour. It helps you enjoy the journey through all the ups and downs.

15. When the going gets tough and you wonder if it is all worth it, keep this in mind:

The permanent pain of staying stuck is far worse than the temporary pain of creating change.

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