Boost Your Mental Toughness

Is your team finding it difficult to cope with change?

Are they struggling to persevere through adversity?

Nothing worthwhile is easy. In every role in every part of an organisation setbacks happen frequently – whether they come through external shocks, cyclical down- turns or through our own unintended, unexpected screw-ups.

This presentation is about making your team more resilient to setbacks. It will provide them with tools to enable them to better persevere through difficult times and cope better with change.

The Japanese have a wonderful saying ‘Fall down six times, get up seven.’ To keep going when the going gets tough is an essential skill. In many areas of life the single most important factor predicting success is mental toughness or ‘resilience’ – the ability to bounce back after shocks and setbacks and not dwell in unproductive emotions.

For many people this is easier said than done. There is a tendency to internalise the reasons for a failure, generalise the failure to other areas and to believe that things won’t improve.

While a minority of people are lucky enough to have a natural predisposition towards resilience, the good news for the rest of us is that there are skills and techniques that, if learned, can dramatically improve our mental toughness.

PURPOSE OF THIS PRESENTATION

To significantly increase your staff’s ability to:

• Manage the impact of setbacks
• Maintain performance during high stress and pressure situations
• Spend less time experiencing unproductive emotions

PROCESSS

FORMAT: Either an engaging and informing 60 minute overview, or a punchy, entertaining and interactive 2 hour workshop.

CONTENT: Recovering from a setback is an emotional process. To influence that process we need to shift our understanding about how emotions work.

We examine how the emotions you experience after a setback are a result of how you explain the setback. These explanations are always of 3 types – the 3 ‘P’s. Attendees become experts at recognising the 3 Ps in their own post setback thinking. Finally delegates are introduced to a series of questions that challenge unhelpful interpretations.

Points are emphasised with anecdotes from The X- factor, The Matrix and high performance sport as well as my own experiences facing setbacks while preparing and taking part in the trans- Atlantic rowing race and trekking to the South Pole.

The workshop concludes with a graduation test. Three examples of people responding positively to high stakes setbacks are given. Participants find that using their new skills they are able to perfectly predict how they react!

OUTCOMES

• How emotions ‘work’ and the emotional journey after experiencing a setback.
• The three ‘P’s technique to diagnose the explanations that cause emotions.
• How to dispute their patterns of thinking to minimise the impact of a setback and spend less time experiencing unproductive emotions.

Delegates using these insights will be:

• Calmer and more stoic in the face of change
• Be more productive under pressure
• Better able to weather adversity and keep persevering toward their goals

FEEDBACK

“I’d like to thank Kevin on behalf of the team at ALGIM for delivering a memorable experience for our delegates. Kevin was a pleasure to work with, and we look forward to dealing with him again in the future.

Here is some feedback from our delegates [regarding his Mental Toughness keynote]:

Fantastic! Everyone needs to hear this Brilliant presentation, interesting and thoughtful – Eye-opener – Great tips – Will use this moving forward – Wickedly awesome! – Best motivational speaker I have heard – Exceptional – Very inspirational and motivational.”

– Gee Mason, Events Coordinator, Association of Local Government Information Management