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Fast forward to the beginning of April - suddenly it felt like the bottom was falling out and we were going to lose everything we had built. All we were hearing was bad news – friends and acquaintances falling sick and a few passing away, thousands of businesses shutting down, and millions of people losing their jobs in a free-falling economy. We closed the office and started working from home. Everything seemed chaotic - figuring out how to work remotely, how to take care of our clients who were also working from their homes, and most importantly figuring out what was next for us. The entire month of April was at standstill with nobody responding to anything. All new deals and renewals were on hold and our clients had no clue what to say or do…
Every time I talked to my leadership team and watched my team’s behavior, I was reminded how lucky I was to be surrounded by this amazing group of people who were willing to do whatever it took to fight it out. Every time I heard how our clients were using our technology, it reminded me how we were supporting these places of innovation to invent the next big thing… hopefully including a new vaccine!
I decided deep in my heart - no salary cuts and no fear of failure! We would only march ahead with relentless positive energy and passion. We should control what we could and ignore what we could not control. And we marched on with sheer Grit and Grace with no fear of failure.
So, what is Grit?
Instead of worrying about the problems around us and trying to sell next license to the customer, our client services team members started focusing on helping clients and users get most out of our technology. They started going above and beyond their fears, concerns and constraints to focus all their energies on making sure that our users were able to use our technology in new ways in this pandemic world. Our product team members quickly learned and implemented the refinements needed by users to use our technology in this new norm. Grit played a very critical role during this phase by allowing us to transform our mindset towards realizing that we are all together in this crisis and now is the time to become much better at what we do.
- Grit is about effort — any effort you make ultimately counts toward your goal. Putting in the effort is perhaps more important than raw talent.
- Grit can be learned, regardless of IQ — Most or all of us can improve our grittiness if we want to.
- Grit is always related to a “growth mindset” — A “growth mindset” is the belief that the ability to learn is not fixed and can change with your effort. A growth mindset leads to optimistic ways of dealing with adversity and leads to perseverance and seeking new challenges that ultimately make you even stronger.
- Mindset really matters — People tend to develop theories about themselves and the world, and those theories make up their mindset, and that mindset affects what they do. “Grit” is a mindset.
Looking back, I now believe that the entire team already had Grit as a mindset. During the pandemic, I realized the importance of it by simply observing my team in action. Balancing Grit as a mindset, both top-down and bottom-up, demonstrated a well-functioning team!
What is Grace?
There are a lot of different definitions for grace. Grace as defined in the dictionary: Simple elegance or refinement; a pleasing appearance or effect; seemingly effortless beauty or charm of movement, form, or proportion; ease and suppleness.
During the pandemic I realized Grace stems from two principles that I live by: “Treating others as I want to be treated” and as “Showing up in the world as someone who makes a meaningful difference for others.”
Grace was visible at every step of the way with each team member. And it is in large part what has gotten us, as a team, to this point in this amazing journey of transformation, of reaching our greatest potential and becoming the very best version of us. Of course, still going, still growing… still becoming!
This pandemic has taught us that anything done with Grit and Grace is the only way to survive and thrive through a crisis of any magnitude. However, I now believe that it is the only way to lead and live life… both personally and professionally!
