Reflections
Thriving Through Change: The Roughest Seas Make The Best Sailors
By Fawzia Ali-Kimanthi
Five years into her journey at the manufacturing firm, Rose Mwende( my fictional coachee), had built her reputation the intentional way; early mornings on the shop floor, long afternoons with distributors, and a relentless focus on understanding what moves the product. Her numbers had been climbing steadily, her territory had expanded and her name was quietly circulating in leadership conversations. A promotion was not just likely, it felt earned.
Then everything changed. The email came through on a Monday morning; the company had been acquired. Overnight, certainty gave way to ambiguity. New leadership. New priorities. A rumor mill that moved faster than any official communication. The role she had been working towards suddenly felt fragile. Would her track record still matter? Would the new leadership see her potential, or should she be starting from scratch?
For a few weeks, she did what most people do- she worried about everything she could not control. The decisions being made in a board room, the organization charts she had not seen, the unknown expectations of the leaders who would join.
But after a few weeks of having very authentic coaching conversations, something shifted. Rose went back to what had gotten her here in the first place. Her work ethic and performance. She doubled down on her customers. She sharpened her pipeline. She reached out proactively to understand the new business direction. She made her impact visible; she anchored herself in execution. The reason is because she realized in that moment of uncertainty, her promotion may no longer be guaranteed, but her performance, her mindset and her response to the change still were in her control. And this is where the real story of managing change and controlling the controllables begins.
We often use the line,‘ Change is the only constant’. We use it so much, that we forget that, actually it is true. We use it whenchange impacts other people. We use it to help them make meaning of change. But when the change impacts us, uproots us,
”
Navigating change is less about reacting to external forces and more about mastering internal discipline towards clarity of direction. A leader who effectively communicates a clear purpose- what matters now, what success looks like, what will not change- creates stability even in turbulence. Clarity becomes a competitive advantage.
changes our life, then it becomes real. And that statement is not so easy to accept, as wise as it sounds.
I recall one of the many organizational changes that I have encountered, where my role fell through; it was no longer on the organization structure. My initial instinct was to look for someone to blame. The economy, the leadership, my boss. I have learned over the years that we need to give ourselves grace. This is a natural reaction. Dealing and accepting change requires us to go through various stages.
The first step is denial. At first, change feels unreal and unnecessary and often we go back to holding onto the familiar.
The second stage is anger or resistance. As reality starts to set in, emotions surface- frustration, anxiety, even anger. You start to question your abilities and whether your contribution made any impact. You start to question your value. Your start to question the change.
As time passes, the third stage, exploration, starts to kick in. I remember being part of the change team and I understood the need for the change. If we did not change, we were going to lose our connection with our customers and our market leadership position. It is just that I was impacted; it had a sting. However, I started to embrace the change, after several coaching sessions, I began to ask myself, how I could make this work; what I could I learn, what other roles were available. But I must be very honest, it was not easy at all.
They say the roughest seas make the best sailors. My greatest leadership lessons have been picked in times of great change. At the time, the greatest opportunities were to lead a team of leaders in a general management role. I had no experience in the sales craft, so I leaned on my leadership craft to lead and guide. Over the next three years, I honed my craft in sales, customer experience, being
24 MAL71 / 26 ISSUE