In any given situation, you don’t know what you don’t know…you know?
You try, hustle, slay away, ‘wing it’. Until new data, information, conversations or some kind of opportunity comes your way to bridge the gap between what you currently knew and what you know now. As the late Maya Angelou once stated: “When you know better, do better.”
Prosilience is the ‘bounce’ that ultimately bridges the gap between how you perceive challenges and how you can intentionally prepare yourself to deal with them.
‘Prosiliently’ speaking, when you know a better way to build resilience in the constant of change, you can better deal with whatever life throws your way. Organisationally, prosilience can assist employees in dealing with high levels of turbulence while maintaining high levels of productivity, without placing their own health and well-being at extreme risk… (i.e. the ever-challenging work-life balance and all the other balls that just won’t stay in the air).
We’re all just trying to survive, right? Right.
And at present, the risks are too great and wide-ranging to throw a blind eye for the sake of just ‘powering-through’. In a world where mindfulness and mental wellbeing matters more than ever, we may just be doing ourselves a favour by minding our ‘bounce’ business for the better.
‘Stayin’ alive’ – why bother with the ‘bounce’?
In the case of prosilience, ‘stayin’ alive’ is more than the soundtrack that might’ve just popped up in your mind (if it hasn’t yet, it will now).
According to Dr. Marli Jooste, insourced Wellness & People Developer at RAiN Chartered Accountants, prioritising mental health and wellness is no longer a luxury but a necessity. As part of her recent research/study*[1] she asserts that: “Long term exposure to such a taxing environment, without always having the necessary resources to meet ever increasing job demands, may have a negative impact on the health and wellbeing of these individuals. One such potential impact is burnout.”
Workers across industries now need to explore how they can develop their skills, re-skill and adapt to the rapidly changing job environment. Coping becomes a dangerous survival game when the pressures drive you to a complete empty tank of exhaustion and disengagement in your work environment. Burnout is but a blink away and more than a buzz word making its rounds.
And it’s happening at a terrifying pace.
When measuring employees’ mental wellbeing in terms of resilience, burnout rate, motivation and key risk areas through the MHQ score; findings of a recent study also indicates severe cause for concern. Dr. Jooste adds: “We view ourselves as South-African leaders in a very necessary movement as our country has hit rock bottom on a[1] global list where more than 11 887 respondents took part and South-Africa had the lowest MHQ score of 46%.” (For more information, refer to: Mental wellbeing: SA hits rock bottom on global list – Health-e News)
According to a study conducted by Dr. Jooste, Psychological wellbeing and emotional intelligence are two critical role players in an individual’s outline and ability to develop prosilience. The constructs listed below describe some attributes*:
This looks good in theory and most of us feel comfortable and familiar with some of these attributes while we know we should invest in self-development to improve our ability in some others. We get it – no one said shifting from ‘stayin’ alive’ to flourishing would be a paved brick road all the way.
Fortunately, prosilience enables each individual to choose better in order to do better. Little by little and day by day. Minding the gap. Showing up in a more productive way to bounce into the changes of our turbulent world.
(Source: https://www.facebook.com/Prosilience)
Here at RAiN, merely ‘stayin alive’ isn’t an option. With inevitable downpours, get curious about how to become more prosilient. Whether it’s incremental, by just jumping over a puddle or two, or how to build a better umbrella to weather it out before you’re worn out.
Let the bounce-building begin…
References:
- Hoops, L. Prosilience: Building Your Resilience for a Turbulent World, 2017.
- Jooste, M 2020, The Role of Emotion, Psychophysiological Markers of Burnout and Their Relevance within the Leadership Pipeline, PhD Thesis, University of Pretoria, Pretoria, Available at: yymmdd <http://hdl.handle.net/2263/78176>
- Jooste, M & Coetzee, N. 2022. The role of emotional intelligence in the experience of burinout among South African leaders working in financial roles. International Journal of Work Organisation and Emotion, 13 (1): 83-101.
