Ask the expert: How to cope with change

Helena Cooper Thomas, an organisational psychology lecturer at Auckland University, says employers should help staff cope with changes at work. Picture / Graeme Sedal

In the early nineties, Phil Marais had been in the printing game for 15 years.

His job was as a compositor - he cut bromides, and using light tables and a scalpel cut newspaper stories into the layout as required.

But Marais says at that time he was getting worried.

"I saw the arrival of layout computers. I realised early on that these new gadgets would be able to do my job and I would no longer be needed."

It was then that he decided to stay an extra hour at work each day in order for someone who had been trained on the computers to teach him informally.

"I saw the writing on the wall - that I had to make an extra effort to keep myself employable," he says.

Now, more than 15 years later, Marais is still working in the newspaper industry - he has made himself indispensable by learning things about the computers that no one else has bothered to know. His former colleagues are long gone from a fast-changing industry that simply spat them out.

One could argue, in 2006, that the changes we face in the workplace are not nearly as drastic as what Marais faced with the changeover to computers, but as Helena Cooper Thomas, an organisational psychology lecturer at Auckland University says: "It's really hard to think of a profession or industry that doesn't change much these days and it's even harder to think of someone doing the same thing through a whole career."

In his book Future Shock from the 1970s, Alvin Toffler described the extreme stress that would occur for people dealing with too much change in too short a time.

Now in the 21st century, change is the constant and as Cooper Thomas says: "Don't get complacent. You will continually need to adapt. Don't wait to be told."

Not only has the software and equipment changed and keeps on changing, so has the way we run our careers.

"Years ago you wouldn't have negotiated your salary. The company would have decided a career path for you.

"Now the challenge is how to keep up to date and how to convince an organisation to keep you up to date."

She says to cope you need to be self-reliant and make your own decisions.

"You have to take responsibility, not wait for a company to make decisions for you and control your career path," she says.

The employer, of course, should help employees deal with change.

"Recruitment is expensive," Cooper Thomas says. "It's best to hire people who want to continually develop with a company. This is much more effective than recruiting all the time."

She explains that a way to get more out of staff, to get them to put the organisation first, is to help staff feel they're wanted and are being developed.

"You still do want loyal employees who will think of the organisation as a valuable resource.

"If a company does invest in an employee, the employee is likely to be more loyal. It's a psychological contract."

Also, an employee who is given more training can help colleagues.

However, as Cooper Thomas emphasises, if your company is not investing in your training, it does not mean that it's okay for you to lag behind.

"If you consider how much investment we make for our original training - our plumbing certificate or university degree - without expecting a company to finance it, why waste that original outlay by lagging behind?"

Cooper Thomas suggests that employees who feel that they need extra training should go to the employer and say: "'This is what I need.' If the request is ignored, then the employee has to take responsibility for keeping up to date.

"An option would be to move to another organisation in order to keep up."

This is frequently done in the IT industry. If a company is lagging with an aging computer language and employees feel they need to keep current, they move on to somewhere else that does.

"Basically, sometimes employees need to put themselves through training courses. An employer could go out of business if it's lagging too much behind - an employee doesn't want to find himself unemployable in the market place."

But what of other changes in the workplace? New colleagues can also be threatening, and companies frequently outsource and make employees redundant.

It's not only difficult to deal with redundancies if you're one of those made redundant - the workplace is forever changed and how you react to those changes can affect your career.

David Doyle, principal, executive recruitment firm Chamberlin, Doyle and Associates says in his experience there are two ways in which people react to organisational change. Firstly, there are the people who show resistance.

"This marks them as being resistant and obstinate - and unfortunately, even if they come round eventually to what the organisation is doing, the impression that they've given is never lost. They're seen as being obstructionist."

The other type of people, however badly they feel about the changes, say, 'Bring it on. I'll deal with whatever happens'.

"They're more accepting. They're the kind of people the organisation has a level of comfort with," Doyle says.

"These are the people the organisation is more likely to go to for help with implementation of new things, even if it's just on the colour to paint the office. It's more likely that they are going to be given more control to shape what they do."

Doyle says that with change the option is whether to opt in or to opt out, each has consequences.

"You can say you're opting in, even if you're eyeing opportunities outside the company," says Doyle.

As far as an organisation is concerned, Doyle says change must be considered carefully. There are people who say change this or that and nothing happens - they lose credibility.

"You need to have a vision - to know where the company is going. It's preferable to know that such changes have worked before."

Doyle says the company should not only suggest or copy change, but demonstrate to the employees the value of that change.

"Selling something does not require the loudest or most strident voice. It's in showing the value of it."

In short, change in the workplace is inevitable. The success of that change depends on how the employer and employee deal with it.