Resilience training has value, but it cannot solve every workplace problem.
Explore why organisations need to consider both individual capability and working conditions.
By Ify Bamigboye, BACP Integrative Psychotherapist & Certified Executive Coach
Resilience matters.
People benefit from learning how to manage pressure, regulate emotions, adapt to setbacks and navigate uncertainty. These are valuable capabilities. MindPath teaches them.
But resilience becomes problematic when organisations start using it as the answer to every form of pressure.
Because sometimes the question isn’t “How can employees become more resilient?” It is: “What exactly are we asking them to be resilient to?”
Employees report sustained pressure. Managers are overwhelmed. Teams are navigating continual change. The organisation responds with resilience training.
The programme is excellent. People learn practical tools. They leave with useful strategies. Then Monday happens.
The workload remains the same. Priorities are still competing. Role boundaries remain unclear. Managers still have insufficient capacity. The transformation continues.
People begin using their new resilience tools within exactly the conditions that generated the concern. Nothing is inherently wrong with the intervention. The problem is the diagnosis.
This is where workplace conversations can become unnecessarily polarised. One argument says individuals need greater resilience. Another says organisations need to change. Both can be true.
A useful organisational response considers the interaction between the individual and the environment. Research into work-related stress repeatedly points towards aspects of work design including demands, control, support, relationships, role clarity and organisational change. Likewise, Job Demands–Resources research distinguishes between what a job requires and the resources employees have available to meet those requirements.
That changes the resilience conversation.
Is this a difficult but temporary peak? A significant transformation? A genuinely demanding commercial period? A challenging role with adequate support and autonomy?
In those circumstances, psychological tools for managing pressure may be extremely valuable.
Or are employees repeatedly compensating for unclear responsibilities, permanent understaffing, conflicting priorities, poor decision-making processes, unnecessary bureaucracy, persistent dysfunctional relationships or insufficient management capacity? Those require a different response.
Counselling. Wellbeing apps. Resilience programmes. Mindfulness. Employee assistance. Mental-health resources.
All can provide value.
But there is an important distinction between supporting people who experience pressure and understanding why that pressure is being produced. Strong organisations should be capable of doing both.
The most revealing questions may therefore be: “What support are we giving people?” and “What is happening in the organisation that makes this level of support necessary?”
This distinction matters to us because MindPath delivers workshops. We aren’t arguing against them. We’re arguing against using workshops before understanding the problem.
There will be situations where the right answer genuinely is to equip employees with practical psychological tools. There will be others where managers need support, team relationships need attention, or a change programme needs to be examined through a human-performance lens. Often several factors interact.
The point is not “Don’t run resilience training.” The point is: know what you expect resilience training to solve.
Because a strong intervention can still fail when it is applied to the wrong problem.
MindPath Perspective
Build resilient people. And build working environments in which employees do not require extraordinary levels of resilience simply to manage ordinary work.
Support the person. Examine the system.
Further Reading & Research
