August 2021 - Coorpacademy

We are pleased to announce that Coorpacademy is officially certified Qualiopi.

We are pleased to announce that Coorpacademy is officially certified Qualiopi.

Made compulsory in France on January 1, 2022 for all providers of actions contributing to the development of skills, this certification attests to the qualitý of the process and services offered by training providers and also allows access to public or mutualized funding.

This certification is an additional guarantee of the seriousness and quality of Coorpacademy’s services, which therefore already meets the requirements of the National Quality Reference published by the Ministry of Labor.

Thank you to our teams for the quality of the work accomplished and to our customers for the trust they place in us!

Qualiopi  is the name of the quality certification mark for training providers. Its objective is to attest the quality of the process implemented by the providers of actions contributing to the development of skills. This certification is a legal obligation to benefit from public or mutualized funds. Law no. 2018-771 of September 5, 2018 for the freedom to choose one's professional future provides in its Article 6 for an obligation of certification, by a third-party organization (CERTIFOPAC), of organizations carrying out actions contributing to the development of skills on the basis of a single national reference system, if they want to benefit from public or mutualized funds (financing by a skills operator, by the commission mentioned in Article L. 6323-17-6, by the State, by the regions, by the Caisse des dépôts et consignations, by Pôle emploi or by Agefiph). 
Please note: the national quality reference framework is organized around 7 criteria linked to 22 indicators that apply to all providers (common core), plus 10 indicators specific to apprenticeship or certification training. 


The "Qualiopi" mark aims to  
- attest to the quality of the process implemented by the providers of actions contributing to the development of skills; 
- make the training offer more readable for companies and users.

https://travail-emploi.gouv.fr/formation-professionnelle/acteurs-cadre-et-qualite-de-la-formation-professionnelle/article/qualiopi-marque-de-certification-qualite-des-prestataires-de-formation

Traveling abroad builds soft skills

August is coming to an end and with it, the taste of vacation. This month, we’ve told you about the formative virtues of travel. In this article, we would like to refer to another type of travel – perhaps one of the most formative – to which we want to refer. Whether you are a student or an employee, it is often advisable to gain international experience. In fact, you may know someone who is preparing for an Erasmus exchange year for one of their children or someone who is moving to a country with a different time zone. But even if it is only for a short period of time, travelling abroad is extremely useful to develop your soft skills!

Interacting better with colleagues

Communicating with people from different cultures can be difficult. In the world of work, corporate culture differs greatly from country to country, and if you want to successfully build relationships, work in different regions, or simply visit a subsidiary or colleague abroad, it is essential to be comfortable with cultural differences!

When you travel abroad, you are confronted with the unknown, both literally and figuratively. You discover the behaviors of a society that is different from the one you know, and you witness the customs that govern it. To interact smoothly with the inhabitants of this country, avoiding misunderstandings, you will identify the attitude, vocabulary and communication approach best suited to your interlocutor. This way, as soon as you return from your trip, you will be ready to interact with people from different cultural backgrounds.

To go further: Cross cultural communication

Training your memory

Going on a trip requires a lot of organization, and we often leave with several things in mind. Train tickets, check; hotel reservations, check; knowing how to say thank you in Italian, check; so much information that puts our memory to work, especially when we find ourselves in front of the waiter and end up stammering a timid “grazie”.

Thus, when we travel, we stimulate a specific part of our brain: the prefrontal lobe and more particularly the hippocampus, this part of the cortex which allows us to pass from a short-term memory to the long-term memory. The hippocampus receives all the information decoded in the different sensory areas of the cortex, and sends it back to where it came from. A sort of sorting center that compares new sensations with those already recorded. The hippocampus reinforces the links between the different characteristics of a thing, and by dint of repeating the links between these new elements, the cortex will have learned to link the different characteristics itself to make what we call a memory.

Thus, when you are traveling abroad, your hippocampus is strongly stimulated, which improves your ability to memorize information in the long term!

To go further: Boost your memory

Improve your English – if you’re not an native English speaker

Well, English is still the most widely spoken international language in the world, with 1.348 billion native and second language speakers. Mastering English is essential for professional success and for interacting in multicultural environments.

Going abroad means practicing your English – unless you are a language whiz and have mastered the national language of the country you are going to – and improving your speaking skills. Speaking in a foreign language is not always easy. It can be stressful and impact the way you deliver information, describe a situation or express a feeling. In fact, travel allows you to confront this challenge and get used to speaking a language that you don’t practice often enough.

To go further: Holding a meeting in English

Are companies prepared to deal with short-term environmental disasters?

On Monday, August 9, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) presented the first of three reports expected by 2022 as part of its sixth climate assessment cycle. This new report presents the current state of knowledge on the climate crisis, its origins, causes and impacts, and on possible actions to respond to the environmental emergency. The findings of this report represent a final warning to individuals, but especially to governments and businesses around the world.

“Life on earth can recover from major climate change by evolving into new species and creating new ecosystems. Humanity cannot.” – IPCC report

The urgency is not new, but it has never been so current.

Established in 1988 at the request of the G7, the 7 richest countries, by the World Meteorological Organization and the United Nations Environment Program, the IPCC synthesizes and assesses research conducted in laboratories around the world. Its fifth report, released in 2014, had already concluded that the human influence on climate systems was clear. But the new report, the sixth since 1990, allows the organization to be even more incisive about the direct link between human activity and current global warming.

If these reports provide essential elements to limit the extent of global warming and the severity of its impacts, it is up to governments, businesses and individuals to collectively organize and take concrete action in the face of the facts highlighted.

What is currently happening in the world, such as the megafires all over the planet from California to the Mediterranean basin or Australia, are the direct consequences of climate change. And as the IPCC report concludes, directly linked to human activity. The consequences exposed by scientists for several years are a strong argument for action, yet this sixth report still has the effect of a bomb. Today, humanity does not have time for a seventh report, we already know the conclusions, but we can contribute to write a few lines, if we act now.

The ecological crisis: a risk for companies

In our model of infinite growth and exploitation of (limited) natural resources, only a radical transformation of our modes of production, consumption and lifestyle can limit the catastrophic consequences for which we are responsible.

“Our current mode of development, based on a linear economy, is not sustainable.” – Célestine Julien, Inter-Company Pathway Manager (GR20²°) at MySezame – In what world do we want to live in 30 years?

In business, environmental risk refers to the possibility of an accident occurring in a company, which would have harmful repercussions – direct or indirect – on the environment, people, company employees and the company’s objectives and reputation. Today, not only is this environmental risk unavoidable, but it also impacts the environment in which the company operates, i.e. the external factors that influence the proper functioning of a company, such as political, environmental, societal and economic aspects. The company’s strategy must then identify the climate emergency and evaluate how it impacts and threatens its activity. If the ecological transition is so necessary, it is because companies will not be able to exist in a world that is disappearing, or at least will not be able to survive if they do not accelerate their adaptation to climate change, the consequences of which we are already seeing.

The IPCC report is clear. If global warming is limited to +2.0°C instead of +1.5°C, sea levels will rise by +30cm to +93cm, impacting more than 10 million people and the number of people affected by drought will increase by +410 million. Through these impacts, climate change is already influencing migration worldwide, and the United Nations predicts 200 million climate refugees by 2050. The impact of the migration crisis on the political and economic environment is obvious.

And internal consequences

Our modes of production are not sustainable. If the resources on which we depend are finite, it is not a shortage that we will face, but an impossibility to produce at all. Already following the pandemic, traders and businesses have faced a major shortage of raw materials, as in Canada where accumulated droughts and heavy rains have caused a drop in production and a rise in wheat prices. But in a few years, shortages may prove much more difficult to overcome. Reduced production, higher raw material prices, loss of personnel, the consequences of the ecological crisis on the production cycle is a risk that companies cannot ignore.

Beyond the political, economic and logistical aspects, the ecological crisis also impacts a resource that is essential to business: people. On a personal level, we are all witnesses to this catastrophe, and we can sometimes feel even more helpless in the face of the emergency. Of course, we can each participate in the collective effort, but we are also aware that the emergency requires a radical and global change in our society. Thus, the anxious and cataclysmic environment in which we evolve every day with a feeling of powerlessness, has an impact on our personal well-being – not to say our mental health. In addition, the expectations of employees – and particularly of the new generations – have changed. To flourish, their work must have meaning and their values must be in line with those of the company.

The world as we know it today will no longer exist in a few years. To keep existing, companies will have to reinvent themselves, adapt and train in order to avoid the risks they face. If the ecological crisis has direct impacts on the company’s environment, it also has indirect consequences on its internal functioning. The strategy must therefore be aligned with this new reality, and the entire organization must adapt in order to anticipate certain now inevitable repercussions on their activities and businesses.

Because the problem is complex, the solutions will be in essence innovative. To act now, discover Coorpecology, the first training platform dedicated to the ecological transition. To quickly train all employees and give them the keys to build a viable future. Sustainable transformation can’t wait any longer, click here to learn more.

Organizational change: a collaborative approach

As we witnessed during the pandemic, developing the adaptive capacity of individuals and organizations is crucial to ensure their proper functioning. Because the future is unpredictable and the world is changing as quickly as customer expectations are rising, adaptation is a necessary disposition to meet current and future challenges. Nevertheless, when a company has to adapt, its entire organizational structure has to be rethought and transformed. Therefore, what skills are essential to initiate and sustain this change?

The pillars of change

An organization is first and foremost a human adventure, and to progress, people have to introspect. To remain competitive, improve their productivity or attract new customers, companies must also question themselves, evolve and adapt. The major transformation processes allow for the emergence of more responsible, digital and agile corporate cultures, to adapt to the objectives and constraints that a company encounters within its own ecosystem.

A company is also strongly influenced by its culture, and culture is only the result of who we are. As the heart of the company, employee involvement is key to organizational transformation. It is around the employees that the company’s structure and operating methods are organized. The human factor is essential to initiate organizational changes and the revision of the company’s structure, because it is at the center of the organization.

To engage employees in the transformation, everything possible must be done to support them through the stages of change. It is at this point that the role of the manager is as important as that of the HR function, as both are responsible for implementing the necessary actions to ensure a smooth transition.

The HR function at the heart of the transformation

If employees are the pillars of transformation, the HR function is the foundation. First of all, the HR function, as its name suggests, provides the company with the organizational and human capacities necessary to achieve its strategic objectives. It has a global view, enabling it to understand all the organizational issues and changes required to achieve the objectives. The HR function is responsible for creating the conditions for the company’s strategy to be realized, and this of course includes the field of corporate culture.

Not only because it contributes to the definition of strategy and drives change, but also because it identifies the key skills to be developed to transform the organization, through its training and recruitment strategy. By organizing the expertise of each person, but also by attracting new talent, the HR function is essential for successful organizational transformation.

Management that guides the transition

Evolving in an uncertain context, companies must adapt more and more rapidly. Business strategy must change in response to the changing environment, and with it, organizational and human capabilities. The most agile companies – those that identify strategies quickly and adapt – have a major competitive differentiation asset to ensure their sustainability. When it comes to aligning with the company’s new strategy, organizational and human capabilities must evolve, transform. And it is largely the responsibility of management to involve and engage employees in the transformation. To better help employees overcome the challenges and changes they face, managers must be leaders who inspire and guide their teams. However, any major transformation cannot be achieved without identifying the essential skills that will enable the change to take place.

3 essential skills to transform your organization

Manage your team and encourage collaboration

As the human factor is the driving force of transformation, it is essential to encourage the development of its teams. New technologies, digital giants and start-ups are revolutionizing managerial practices to adapt to the new expectations of employees. To initiate change and foster organizational transformation, adopting a reinvented, collaborative and innovative managerial model is one of the keys to success.

The keys to emancipatory management

The ability to adapt

Strategies evolve, and the organization must adapt to the type of strategy chosen. As the organizational structure depends on the company’s strategy, it is also important for employees to develop their ability to adapt, to evolve with the strategy. Today, the environments in which companies evolve are so changeable and unpredictable that they are referred to as “VUCA” environments: Volatility, uncertainty, complexity and ambiguity (Warren Bennis and Burt Nanus). These contexts require organizations to rely on the agility of their organizational capabilities and to develop their capacity to adopt change.

Operating in a VUCA environment

Shift into leadership mode to engage teams

For a successful transformation, cohesive leadership is essential. Being a leader means being able to embody the change with employees and engage them in turn. Leaders are the masters of organizational transformation, as they influence their teams to engage them in the change.

The Fundamentals of Leadership

In conclusion, organizational transformation is intrinsically linked to the company’s strategy. When the company’s strategy evolves, the other strategy follows and the entire organization must adapt in order to provide itself with the means to succeed.

Future of training: a review of the round table between Coorpacademy, OpenClassrooms, Simbel and Brighteye Ventures

The training sector has learned some important lessons from the pandemic. Closed training rooms, bans on meetings, lockdowns, remote working that breaks the link between employees and employee motivation, the challenges created by this crisis were numerous for HR functions. How have they met the challenge? What future for the training sector? A look back at the round table discussion between the co-founders and investors of the leading EdTech companies in France: Coorpacademy, OpenClassrooms, Simbel and Brighteye Ventures.

Training to meet the challenges of COVID19

The LearnEverywhere webinar “The Need for Training in Times of Crisis” sheds light on how some organizations have had to adapt in a very short time. At the beginning of 2020, face-to-face training experienced a real upheaval. The sudden crisis forced companies to react very quickly to manage the cancellation of planned classroom sessions. One of the first challenges was to manage the immediate emergency by cancelling and communicating about these unprecedented changes. As a result, 97% of public sector training was affected by the crisis, as well as 80% of French presential training. (1)

The second phase of crisis response is adaptation. Once the emergency has been managed in the short term, and the future of the crisis is a little better defined, organizations revisit the training plan and make choices between what to cancel for good, what to postpone and what to convert to distance learning, through digital learning. This stage requires a lot of work to redesign course materials and to support trainers in mastering the technological tools. Thus, the crisis marks a real revolution in training, which is becoming digitalized at an exponential rate. In fact, 85.2% of European training managers believe that the crisis has accelerated the digitalization of training. (1)

Paradoxically, in times of crisis, training becomes even more essential. Especially when the crisis forces us to organize ourselves differently, to use new tools and when it disrupts our lifestyles. It is then necessary to accompany the employees so that they appropriate the new tools and understand their functioning, their usefulness, and what is at stake. Thus, to ensure team training, some companies have opted for virtual classrooms (73%), for the company’s LMS platforms (54%) and for third-party digital platforms for off-the-shelf content (28%). Among the topics to be covered are: getting to grips with the tools thanks to digital acculturation, training on how to work remotely, but also how to manage remotely, and finally, training more focused on the well-being of employees, which is essential in these difficult times.

Unsurprisingly, the pandemic has caused an unprecedented disruption in the entire professional training sector, shaking up our habits and giving us the opportunity to rebuild everything.

The future of learning

But while the word recovery is talked about everywhere, what future do we want to shape for training, which is crucial to the smooth running of businesses?

The crisis has had several positive impacts on the EdTech sector. By forcing companies to operate remotely, they were forced to invest in digital learning and finally adopt it. As a result of the crisis, online training was able to prove itself, and training managers were able to test and discover the tool, which they might not have done before. Due to the cancellation of face-to-face sessions, the budget that was previously earmarked for this purpose was redistributed to finance the digital transformation. So the future of training is indeed digital, or at least hybrid, to keep face-to-face sessions when the subject matter lends itself to it, or to diversify the formats. Thus, after the crisis, 73.8% of companies will increase the share of online training in their training offerings. (1)

Another conclusion from this crisis is the need to diversify formats. To engage learners in their learning, it is crucial to innovate and develop different ways of learning, through various media. For example, at Coorpacademy, we attach great importance to pedagogical innovation. Therefore, we have developed many formats such as Escape Game, audiolearning or other formats inspired by games like Trivial Pursuit. Diversifying formats is a key to making training a pillar of your company, because it allows you to engage but above all, to encourage information retention. That’s why, after the crisis, 58.5% of companies are willing to innovate in training formats. (1)

Finally, what will define the future of the training sector is also the evolution of the job market, which will require an evolution in skills. The World Economic Forum has already stated that by 2025, the job market will have undergone two major upheavals: job losses related to increased automation and the economic repercussions of the COVID19 pandemic.

These two disruptions combined could displace an estimated 85 million jobs. Thus, the World Economic Forum lists the 10 key skills to be acquired to face this profound disruption. These skills, mostly soft skills, are the future of employment, but also the future of training. Among these skills, we find resilience, agility, leadership, creativity, etc. It is therefore crucial for digital learning players, but also for HR functions in charge of training, to do everything possible to help employees develop the skills of tomorrow’s world.

In conclusion, the future of training will be digital and varied. Between the hybridization of training, offering face-to-face sessions combined with a digital training platform, and the need to diversify formats, training is at the dawn of its metamorphosis. It is up to us, EdTech players, training managers and employees, to accompany these changes, to integrate them and to define the best possible strategy to move forward serenely together, learning continuously to guarantee the employability of all!

Sources

(1) Talentsoft Study – The impact of COVID-19 on the Training Departments

Learn Everywhere #6 : The need for training in times of crisis
SNCF x Coorpacademy: The rise of digital learning

Coorpacademy’s blog – The 10 key skills to be developed by 2025

The Coorpacademy course recipe: interview with Solène Rascle, educational engineer at Coorpacademy

Engaging learners in their learning is one of the main missions of Coorpacademy. The objective is to enable employees to continuously learn, in order to guarantee their employability in an uncertain world and a changing job market. But how to create innovative, qualitative and engaging content? What methodology should be applied? These are some of the questions we wanted to ask Solène Rascle, educational engineer in our content team and who co-constructs the courses in the premium content catalog with partner publishers.

Not everyone is familiar with the job of educational engineer. Straddling the line between engineering and teaching, the job title can sometimes lead to confusion. Nevertheless, training engineering is evolving rapidly as it becomes more digital and as learners show an interest in diverse and innovative formats.

In this interview, discover the job of educational engineer and go behind the scenes of Coorpacademy!

To begin this interview, introduce yourself in a few sentences…

I am Solène, educational engineer at Coorpacademy! To give you an idea of my background, I have always been quite knowledgeable about education and training. I started in teaching, I have notably taught French in London or organized cultural and academic programs for international and American students in France / Paris. I have always loved learning, discovering, sharing, and as I like to invest myself in various activities, I thought I could blossom in the field of e-learning.

The job of educational engineer is not yet very well known, it is a term that I discovered myself with Coorpacademy. Could you describe the main missions of this position?

So to begin with, you can imagine that I also discovered this job by applying to Coorpacademy! In fact, an educational engineer is in charge of designing a learning path, designing courses, learning experiences, all of this to train a given public on various subjects. Hence the name of engineer, which concerns the design, creation and implementation of training devices adapted to a public of learners, and to which is added the whole pedagogical part, so that the training devices meet the fixed pedagogical objectives.

How does the educational engineer create a course? Is there a methodology specific to Coorpacademy?

First of all, several factors can influence the way a course is created. First, it depends on the educational engineer in question, but also and above all on the target audience, the subject of the course, the objectives and the company or the partner publisher! At Coorpacademy, we have our own method for building courses. Our unique pedagogy is based on several pillars. We start by asking questions to the learner, who can then play the short course video whenever they wants. This is the principle of inverted pedagogy: the learner is involved from the beginning of the course and everyone can progress at their own pace! So at Coorpacademy, when we work on a course, we must first keep this format in mind. Then, we must also think about the fun aspect of our courses, with quizzes, battles between learners, and stars and lives to accumulate. The gamification of training invites the instructional engineer to think of these courses in an entertaining format, which makes the course and the learning experience more fun and engaging, as opposed to the classic course format, which we already know by heart.

To build a course, you must first master the subject matter, and for that, we work with partner course publishers, or experts. We have the pedagogical expertise, but not the expertise on all the subjects we will cover in the premium content catalog, which already includes more than 1,700 courses! So, when we have to think about creating a course, we talk to those who have the expertise on the subject, our role being to take ownership of it, to understand what is at stake, to define the pedagogical objectives and the skills that the learners will have developed as a result of the course.

Could you give us a recipe for creating a course at Coorpacademy?

Of course! First of all, you will need essential ingredients: curiosity, desire to learn, a zest of humour and a good dose of rigour. As far as the recipe is concerned, I invite you to follow the following steps:

Step 1

For a successful Coorpacademy course, start by getting to grips with the subject. Once you have a good grasp of the subject on which the course will be focused, you can define the pedagogical objectives with the client or partner. These elements are crucial to building a course architecture. With this detailed plan, we will be able to think about and define which essential ideas we want to convey, in which order we want to organize the ideas, in how many chapters and, above all, in how many levels.

Step 2

Once the course architecture is ready, let it rest, the better to make the dough rise! In non-cooking terms, this means leave yourself some time to analyze the course progression: is it coherent? Is there a gradation in terms of difficulty of the questions? What format would be most appropriate to best address the topic? All these questions are essential to ensure that the pedagogical objectives are achieved.

At Coorpacademy, it is on this basis that we will then produce all the course content, making it engaging with short and entertaining videos! To remain in the analogy of the recipe, it is a bit like the cherry on the cake.

Step 3

You’re almost there, but there’s still a lot of preparation to do: this is the production of the videos, which are our main course materials. To begin, write a script. This writing step may require working with an editor (external or partner). Once the script is finalized in your hands, it’s time to taste the dish: proofreading! And if it’s not to your liking, the ideas are not clearly stated or the tone is not appropriate, make the necessary changes. Finally, it’s time to cook! The videos are produced, and naturally, this step will also require you to pay attention to the final production, even if it means cooking a little longer.

Step 4

The oven is ringing! The course materials are ready and it is time to assemble them. On the basis of the courses, therefore the scripts, you will be able to write the inevitable quizzes, the Coorpacademy trademark. To make sure that the dish will be delicious, you have to put yourself in the shoes of those who will taste it! So, we put ourselves in the place of the learner, we try to vary the question formats (True or false, multiple choice, situation, illustrated questions, etc.) and to vary the situations. In fact, the hardest part is often finding the wrong answers! They should not be too obvious, nor too complicated.

Step 5

It’s time for service and tasting. Everything is ready. Put it on the plates, or rather, on the Coorpacademy client platforms! Then, after the final proofreading and uploading, it’s time to play the course of our colleagues, and to get some good practices and feedback from them.

What about custom courses, i.e. courses tailored to our clients’ topics?

For custom courses, the same production process and methodology is used. The steps of the recipe remain the same. The only difference will be in the subjects. Often, with custom courses, we will deal with subjects that are more specific to a sector, an industry, a customer need – and for a more precise target: learners from the same team, from a specific profession, or who already have a certain level of knowledge on the subject. The first step, which consists of taking ownership of the subject and defining the client’s training objectives, will also be defined by the theme that the client wishes to address. Then, it is the CSM team that takes over the cooking, by the way, discover the CSM job in this article!

What do you like most about your job today?

Beyond the fact that I really like Coorpacademy and my colleagues with whom I get along very well, what I like most in the work of an educational engineer is the multitude of subjects that I have to deal with. I learn every day and interact with a variety of people, so I never get bored! I also like the challenges that it can sometimes represent and the intellectual stimulation that it provides to think together about well thought-out course paths for learners.

Do you have any courses that you prefer to work on?

Overall, all subjects are interesting to work on, but if I have to name one, I would choose sustainable transformation because it is a current topic and because it is urgent to act! But in itself, all topics interest me. What will matter most to me are the courses that require different formats. It’s kind of fun to work on innovative formats, and then I like the reflection that it requires to build the course. Innovating, thinking, putting yourself in the shoes of the end user/learner to make the learning experience as pleasant as possible, always with the pedagogical objective in mind. Finally, I think that what stimulates me is to create, to do new things and especially when we invest in subjects that seem classic but are nevertheless unavoidable.

Could you describe a typical day for you?

I don’t have a typical day in the sense that, as we manage several projects or several partners at the same time, I am constantly developing my agility! Switching from one subject to another, from partner X to partner B, managing emergencies: my typical day is ultimately a mosaic. On the other hand, there are tasks that are constant and cannot be ignored: reading sources, books, proofreading and writing scripts and quizzes, and finally, a lot of spelling and typography work. It’s a job that requires both work and dedication upstream of the publication of the course, but also downstream because it also means following the feedback (from learners, customers, partners) to improve ourselves, perfecting our content so that it is as qualitative in content as in form!

Do you have any advice for those who are interested in becoming an educational engineer?

Among the ingredients of the recipe, you can’t do without the two main ones: stay curious and keep learning! Curiosity is one of the primary qualities of an educational engineer. You have to be willing to learn about all subjects, even those that don’t necessarily speak to you at first. From a more pragmatic point of view, there are more and more training courses for educational engineers, and I think that this can be a good way to discover this profession! But any experience in education, training, writing, or publishing are interesting experiences to have in this position. Finally, and not surprisingly, I would advise sleeping with a Bescherelle on your bedside table, because you need to have impeccable grammar.

And finally, a little quiz: If you had to choose between these 3 new courses in the catalog, which one would you choose and why?

The new Trivial Pursuit courses
The “Making Better Decisions with Game Theory” course
The “Preventing Discrimination and Encouraging Diversity” course co-published with Wolters Kluwer

I would say Trivial Pursuit because it is a perfect course for summer and vacations! Trivial Pursuit is 30 questions to learn while having fun, while developing one’s general culture and knowledge of certain subjects. Moreover, at Coorpacademy, we provide you with an explanation of the right answer and a “Did you know?” as a bonus, unlike the classic general knowledge game. Frankly, a course played on the phone at the beach with your friends or your family, it is still the best way to learn in a fun way and with others!

Trivial Pursuit – Planet and Environment

Are we tired of resilience?

It’s perfect timing. In the wake of the crisis, the concept of resilience is talked about everywhere, especially in corporate culture. Introduced by Boris Cyrulnik, the concept of resilience states that it is possible to overcome a traumatic event, to draw strength from one’s misfortunes, and to “navigate through the torrents” (Boris C). To suffer and to heal one’s wounds, in order to heal more quickly. This could be an appropriate analogy for resilience, which also reminds us of the current recovery context, compromised by a labour shortage.

In a previous article, we described the labor shortage as an opportunity. An opportunity to focus on training, to overcome this issue that companies are facing. To draw strength from one’s misfortunes, to see the glass half full, there are a thousand and one ways to describe resilience. This term, which is basically about personal growth, is sometimes debated. Isn’t it too good to be true? Can we really ignore the difficulties, the trauma, to move forward? Is it an innate disposition or can resilience be initiated within a group? In this article, we decipher this phenomenon to finally answer the question: Are we tired of resilience?

A debatable term

Turning hardship into strength sounds like an admirable notion. It is true that, on paper, we would all like to be capable of resilience, both in our personal and professional lives. Realistic, yet optimistic, resilience is the prospect of a better future, without denying the reality and harshness of life’s hazards. However, some criticize this notion, which they consider unfounded, even futile. In “Carnet de Philo“, Géraldine Mosna-Savoye, producer of the French philosophical show and lecturer, deciphers the phenomenon and states “Everybody hates resilience” (i.e. Title of the episode of 25/02/2021). According to Mosna-Savoye, the critics are formed on the following: resilience is a poisoned but well-wrapped gift that tells us “get by, show resilience, rely on your ability to bounce back on your own and you’ll see, everything will be fine, you’ll manage to overcome all the trials of the world”. Said like that, it can seem too easy. Resilience is a fashionable notion, which “is enough to give oneself a moral, empathetic and supportive content, and so much the worse if the facts, the political or ethical acts, do not follow” according to Mosna-Savoye. So, the speaker opts for hope, which would be “joy, even inconsistent”, as opposed to “the naïve and bland certainty of always getting through”, which would be resilience. But is the dilemma between these two notions so simplistic?

The joy of knowing you will always get through

If hope and resilience do not go hand in hand, then obviously the notion of resilience cannot be applied in practice. To oppose these two notions is to deny the purpose of the resilience phenomenon: to strive for a better situation. Of course, when we talk about resilience, we tend to focus on the reaction to the crisis, because this is where everything is at stake. But over time, resilience allows us to work towards a better future, a goal towards which we can move, and to grow. Hope, on the other hand, is based on the expectation of a better situation than the existing one. Waiting is not acting. And this is where hope and resilience are ultimately inseparable. Resilience, which encourages action, can only be effective if we cultivate hope, which gives individuals the necessary passion to believe in a better future, and to do everything to achieve it.

Learn to live with uncertainty, or simply to anticipate

Being resilient, showing resistance, tenacity, being able to absorb shocks, bounce back, etc. The lexical field of resilience focuses mainly on the acceptance of trauma and endurance, rather than on the fulfillment that is supposed to come from it. What resilience tells us is that in order to deal with adversity and overcome crises, accepting the situation is the first step towards action. It means “rolling up your sleeves”; “never giving up”; “pushing yourself”. From then on, accepting uncertainty, living with the unexpected, allows one to minimize the consequences, so as not to end up paralyzed, unable to make a decision.

For resilience to be constant and not just a response to each trauma encountered, anticipation is key. Some cities, such as London, have initiated preventive resilience programs. With its London Resilience Partnership website, the Anglo-Saxon capital is disseminating advice on how to visit the city in complete safety. For example, it offers a section that “identifies potential risks to the capital and the impact that these emergencies may have on Londoners”.

Positive attitude

Developing resilience may simply mean changing our perspective, opening up our interpretations, and changing our outlook on a situation. As an individual, or as an organization, we can choose to be more or less positive about a given situation. We have the choice, when faced with a traumatic event, a crisis, to interpret it as an insurmountable disaster or as an opportunity for improvement, like a difficult level that we will repeat over and over again in a video game, until we reach the next level. Positive thinking is a pillar of resilience, being able to think positively about a past crisis helps us to face a current crisis, while putting its catastrophic nature into perspective. Being resilient means seizing the opportunity to learn from every situation, the good ones, but especially the bad ones. This notion is ultimately a state of mind that can be cultivated, learned and passed on.

The pitfalls of resilience

The risk of resilience would be to think that any failure is synonymous with trauma. In France, we often tend to fear failure, equating it with the person who fails. Our perception of this notion is particularly negative, and we wrongly consider that failure is synonymous with incapacity. In her LinkedIn article “The Culture of Failure is Just a Matter of Perception” Clara Kindt describes failure as “a deep disappointment in the face of unmet expectations” and suggests changing our perception of this phenomenon. “When we don’t know, we learn and only then we know. In the end, only people who don’t try don’t fail.” she summarizes. By developing resilience, one also learns to fail and to develop a “culture of failure”, inspired by the Anglo-Saxon, Scandinavian or Latin American mentalities, for example, which advocate assuming mistakes and imperfections. The challenge is not to value failure, but to put it into perspective, in order to draw the right conclusions that will guide our future actions.

Another criticism often made to resilience is that it values the suffering of others, as a kind of competition to see who can bounce back the highest, the fastest or the most skillfully. Yet we all face obstacles and difficulties, both personally and professionally. The goal of resilience is not to determine who suffers the most, nor who will be the most resistant. It is first and foremost a philosophy that translates into a corporate culture that promotes the right to make mistakes, the ability to deal with adversity and that stimulates employees’ hope.

But are we all capable of bouncing?

Let’s take the example of two balls: one bounces, the other does not. One is bouncy, the other is made of a material that does not allow it to bounce. Finally, it is a bit the same for individuals. Some people are born with it, others have a harder time absorbing shocks. Nevertheless, and this is what differentiates us from the two balls mentioned above, it is possible to work on one’s ability to bounce back, because resilience can be learned and maintained. Many factors can help or hinder the development of this notion. For example, the environment that surrounds us can strengthen or diminish our resilience. The people around us play a crucial role in the way we perceive a given situation. In business, the same is true. The environment in which the teams evolve as well as the interactions between collaborators are determining factors in developing the collective resilience of the teams, which will allow the company to move forward through the difficulties. The recipe for corporate resilience is therefore composed of one main ingredient: soft skills. Listening, leaving room for emotions, putting oneself in the place of others, working autonomously, etc. The manager plays a central role in fostering the resilience of his teams.

In conclusion, individual resilience is an incredible strength. Without being a miracle skill, being resilient allows you to move towards a better situation, or at least, it allows you to improve enough to move forward serenely, and to find pleasure in your work. However, this soft skill is above all a state of mind, unlike a tool that can be used on an ad hoc basis, resilience is nourished by our experiences and by the way we interpret the situations we face. In “Autobiography of a Scarecrow“, Boris Cyrulnik writes: “those who take a long time to recover from trauma or never recover from it are those who have been abandoned by the group”. Resilience is also contagious. A resilient group is not just made up of individuals who are prepared for anything and are ultra-resistant. On the other hand, following a crisis, group cohesion reinforces resilience, because as trite as it may sound, there is strength in numbers.

Individual resilience is a tool for employee development, but organizational resilience is one of the essential conditions for moving forward collectively in an uncertain world.

To move from individual resilience to organizational resilience, discover the eponymous course co-published with Management Magazine.

Month: August 2021