“As 2020 hurtles towards its end and we as employers and employees do our best to move forward with hope and determination to learn, to retain the learning from the experiences we’ve had and shared, there is a small risk that soon all that we’ve gone through will be lost. It is within our gift to ensure this never happens”, says Yetunde Hofmann, Chartered FCIPD. She is our guest blogger and in this article she explains why we should all learn from 2020.
I cannot imagine that any one of us stood at the beginning of 2020 and said “yup”! This is a year that I’m going to lose my job, I’m going to challenge my personal integrity and that of my friends, family and colleagues; I’m going to march in frustration and anger at the murder of an innocent human being because of the colour of his skin; I’m going to switch on my phone or my TV and see nations across the world rise to their feet to march alongside me, tears streaming down eyes; oh, and by the way, I’m also going to spend all my time on the computer, locked up in my home, unable to hug my family and friends and conduct all of my business at an imposed distance …”
On one side of the fence, through these times, some have triumphed, profits soaring, jobs being created, expansion plans emerging and investors laughing all the way to the bank. You know who you are.
On the other side of the fence still through these times, others have lost, profits plummeting, restructuring plans resurfacing, investors hanging their heads and employees gearing themselves up for the difficult conversations about their livelihoods. This is because there are always winners and losers in every situation. Life can be so unequal.
The one glimmer of hope, the light that could shine is the unity and the coming together of communities, neighbourhoods and people all around the world locally and globally. That proof that through adversity and despair can at times emerge some good. A demonstration that in spite of how selfish, dehumanising and materialistic our world can be, there lies still within us as human beings, a care and a compassion that if nurtured can grow.
The lesson being learned is that what matters is you and me – our humanity, our society and the value of community.
As the world starts to take tentative steps towards what is being termed the “new normal” my one small fear is the risk of the return of the short-term memory amid the melee of activity and busyness that returns to our day to day lives. Because with this return comes the possibility of forgetting and losing the good that has come out of the sadness and the tragedy of events this year and that the death of one innocent man and the deprivation of our freedom will have been in vain.
The risk that all we have experienced in 2020 becomes a moment; the risk that it becomes a moment of history as opposed to a significant learning experience that shapes our outlook and perspective in life in such a way that creates lasting positive change.
We can however choose to say a big ‘no’ to that. We can instead choose to move forward in another more definitive and meaningful way. We can choose instead, to move forward with courage; with willingness and a decidedness to act, think, work, and walk from a place of Love.
We can choose to move forward with Love at the centre of all that we do and choose to be, taking one step at a time – in our work places, our communities, in the way we do government, show up as neighbours, friends and in the way we treat our own selves.
If we choose to do this, then maybe, just maybe, the risk of 2020 becoming a moment will be averted and we can walk toward having our world be the kind of place our children and their children would love to live in.
About Yetunde Hofmann
Yetunde Hofmann is a British based change and leadership consultant, speaker and author. In her latest book Beyond Engagement, Yetunde writes about the experience of more than thirty senior business leaders and offers solutions to the challenge of how to drive employee engagement beyond the transactional.
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