Hardiness and Resilience Article Review
Article Reviewed/Citation:
Maddi, S. (2006, July). Hardiness: The courage to grow from stresses. The Journal of Positive Psychology, 1, 160-168.
Brief summary:
This article looks at the link between hardiness and coping with stress. According to the article, hardiness is characterized by as a combination of commitment, control and challenge. Commitment keeps you connected to the important events and people around you, which helps to keep you from becoming isolated and alienated. A high level of control will keep you engaged in trying to have influence on the outcomes of those things going on around you (regardless of difficulty). Challenge reflects how you see stressful events. If you are high in challenge, stress is simply a normal part of life and it affords the opportunity to learn and to grow. Looking toward the future and seeking to use adversity as a learning experience and point of growth requires courage.
Why it’s important to practitioners, managers and leaders?
Stress and adversity are a part of our work lives. If we can help people learn and grow from those events, we are providing them with powerful, life-long fuel.
I found it powerful that hardiness has been defined as three attitudes:
- commitment (remaining involved);
- control (self-efficacy); and
- challenge (framework where stress and challenge are simply normal parts of life).
This gives a very solid foundation from which to work for individuals and practitioners.
What are the three most important implications for the practice of theory of organization development?
Prior studies (as discussed in the article) have shown that employees who are high in hardiness are more effective at performing under stress. Clearly, this is of tremendous importance to any organization or leader. Providing coaching or other interventions to assist in the development of hardiness could be very beneficial. Related to that is the finding that hardiness can be learned. This is exciting for developmental purposes. Finally, since hardiness is also linked to better physical and mental health, this data could be used to persuade an organization to make an investment in their employees (better physical and mental health means lower insurance costs, fewer sick days, increased productivity and performance, and likely lower turnover).
© 2011 Bobbi Kahler. All rights reserved. Developing Leaders, Creating Possibilities: Kahler Leadership Group
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