Our world today is constantly changing and evolving. Innovations in technology come rapidly, and the whole world is becoming connected more and more. It can be hard to keep up with the pace of these rapid changes, and it’s easy to fall into the trap of thinking that what you currently know will be enough.
Especially in our world today, where many things have suddenly changed, everyone needs to keep up to be able to do their job properly. Things like remote work used to be an impossibility, but is now a necessity. Flexible working hours were something that many companies forbade, but is now a common option. Even the tools being used in the workplace are constantly evolving and improving. Everything seems to change, even upgrade but have you ever thought of upgrading yourself?
The Upgrade-Ready Mentality
As citizens of the 21st century, we’re used to perpetually shifting trends in both culture and technology. It can be hard to keep up, and taking a quick breather often means returning to something entirely foreign to you. However, if we want to increase our income, understand how business works, or even improve our career, adapting to change is necessary. We need to not just upgrade our tools, but ourselves as well. But how can you achieve a mindset that’s ready for upgrades? Here are a few tips.
Be Flexible but Don’t Be a Pushover
First things first, let’s define what being flexible and being a pushover means. A flexible person can adapt to the situation or task and tackle it effectively, a pushover lets someone else dumps their job on them and is forced to deal with it.
Be flexible but don’t be a pushover. By being flexible, it means that your skills aren’t one dimensional. You have multiple skills and abilities, that when combined, give you a very wide range of expertise. Flexibility can also mean adapting and learning quickly by looking at what fundamental skill is needed in that situation. Once you know what fundamental skill is required, you can either adjust to that or if you lack that skill, defer to someone else who’s better equipped.
However, this doesn’t mean you will constantly accept tasks. Assess whether you have enough time, energy, or even skill to tackle a job. Be sensible enough to say no if accepting more means a detriment for you. Once you have become flexible, you will constantly see yourself ‘upgrading’ as you take in every new discovery and learning.
Creativity Leads to Innovation
Whenever you’re faced with new challenges, your instinct should always be to ask “what can I do to solve this?” Once you’ve geared yourself up to address a challenge, now comes the hard part: actually solving it.
To solve a problem, and to get better at solving problems, you need to have a creative mind. Learn to think outside the box, and innovation will follow. How do you think outside the box? For one, it helps to know the contents of the box. Brush up on your fundamental skills and then approach it differently. Having the basic skills means you have the capacity to solve it, and approaching it differently means you’ll find new ways to utilize your skill.
Mix flexibility with creativity, and you’ll inevitably end up with something innovative. A mixture of old ideas with fresh ones will result in something new- something that can be considered an ‘upgrade’.
Don’t Be Afraid to Ask for Help
When the air conditioner is broken, you ask for air conditioning service. When your computer is slowing down, you go to the computer repair shop. There is nothing wrong with asking for help, in all aspects of life. Be it a career, business, even personal life- knowing when you don’t have the skill set necessary to address a problem means everything.
Don’t worry about carrying the world on your shoulders or feeling like others have high expectations of you. This will ultimately spell bad things, as you will either succumb to the pressure or succeed but at a great cost. Knowing when to ask for help means you won’t be subjecting yourself to unnecessary pain while learning something valuable at the same time.
And once you’ve asked for help, and have learned from receiving that help, then you’ll constantly improve. You’ll be helping yourself, and helping others as well.
These three tips to having an ‘upgrade mentality’ is not an end-be-all tip. Of course, there’s a lot we didn’t cover. But being flexible, being creative, and being ready to ask for help will not only help you hone your skills or improve your career but also get ahead in life.
