Stepping outside your comfort zone. An old-fashioned idea?

“You’ve got to step outside your comfort zone to improve your skills and adapt to new job market demands”. A comment often heard in today’s business world. But I wonder whether, except on the odd occasion, this approach is rather old-fashioned after years of executive and business disruption and reinvention. 

The comfort zone concept is underpinned by the basic premise that people are happy with their everyday routines and inertia or in other words, that their life is based on an unwavering mindset, a stubborn resistance to change, and risks sliding into a ‘zone of self-complacency’. 

Growth mindset 

Today, I see a different attitude to employment. Most people have already adopted a ‘growth mindset’ and stepped outside their comfort zone. People are already implementing plans to actively further their career, some slowly, others more quickly, some slightly, others radically. 

Once your curiosity has been piqued, try to concentrate on broadening your comfort zone and entering your learning zone, as the Esade professor Andrés Raya says. Key factors for this include bolstering self-knowledge, exploration and training based on a thorough analysis of your purpose, strong points, fields of development, passions and career interests. 

By broadening your comfort zone, you will garner new capabilities that improve your performance and job prospects, without overlooking your traditional skills and addressing certain weaknesses if they are really crucial for your future.  

You must be seriously committed to everyday, on-going personal improvement and your ability to learn, and view life like an eternal apprentice dealing with ups and downs along the road: a philosophy of personal growth exemplified by the marvelous film The King’s Speech. 

The practice of learning 

Entering your learning zone requires bravery, tenacity and humbleness because you will shift from being an expert in classic savoir-faire to being a learner in these new skills. As regards these skills you will be less agile and have doubts, and you’ll worry about the outcome or progress you make. You will be rewarded for this discomfort in the medium term providing you persevere and don’t give up despite your concern for short-term results or possible failures at the outset.  

Training your learning muscle regularly will garner new items for your professional toolbox, and many benefits too: employability, versatility, self-realization, better results, and a young-at-heart spirit that will take you closer to personal and professional fulfilment. 

And then, with time and effort, you’ll move out of your grey comfort zone and into the magical, shining zone of learning and personal change.