Lead yourself with an adaptive mindset

- In the face of continuous change, adopting an adaptive mindset will make your career more resilient and it will make you more valuable. This is especially true now as AI and other advanced technologies alter the workplace and affect jobs. An adaptive mindset, though, doesn't wait for permission. An adaptive mindset is proactive, and it depends on self-leadership. Self-leadership is the art of scanning the horizon to imagine possible outcomes and to set a direction that aligns your ambition with action. It makes you responsible for identifying your strengths and acknowledging your deficiencies, and for building a plan to leverage one and strengthen the other. And self-leadership doesn't wait for permission to learn a new skill or explore a new technology. It puts you in charge of you. Now sure, you need to be mindful of the boundaries of your organization, and it's wise to discuss your insights, and ideas, and plans with your manager. Yet by taking the initiative to explore, to learn, and to share your knowledge, you model the adaptive mindset. You position yourself as a leader for an organization in transition. So in the face of change, ask yourself, "What will my future look like if I resist or reject this change?" And remember, there are valid reasons that an organizational shift might not work for you, and sometimes moving away from change can be the right thing to do. What will my future look like if I embrace this change? How will I need to change and what skills will I need to hone to be successful in a future state? How might this change advance my career? Take a few minutes with your notebook to answer these questions. Think specifically about what you might do to cultivate these skills that you will need in the future. The answer to these questions create a blueprint for your future, and design an action plan to build it. And pro tip, in the next chapter, we'll explore some exercises that you can use to design that future just for you.