How to Use the HERO Model for INDIVIDUAL changes…

by Doug Gray | Dec 12, 2024 | change, Coaching, family, Financial Professionals, Leadership, Managers, organizational leadership, Sales, strengths, Success, talent, talent assessment

I’m often surprised at what business psychologists know, that ANYONE could benefit from knowing and practicing… 

This content is #1 of 3 articles.

Title: The HERO Model: An approach for Navigating Organizational Changes in Family Enterprises

All leaders and advisors struggle with Organizational Change.  How could our work be anything else?  Family enterprises are infinitely complex.  No one likes to be told to change.  We all bring our biases and adopt heuristics to reduce that complexity.   Attorneys say, “We mitigate risk.”  Wealth advisors say, “We leverage capital assets.”  Next Gens say, “We want to innovate.”

We all use heuristics (patterns for what works) to reinforce the structures that reflect our worldview for each family system.  One common example is the multidisciplinary views of capital, that include financial, social, human, family, legacy, and intellectual views of capital.   Those views of capital are resource-based, and the capital diminishes as we age.  In my final years, for example, I will forget people and information, and my financial assets will be invested into healthcare… just like each of our clients. 

What would happen if more practitioners adopted a more pervasive and universal view of capital? 

Social psychologists (like me) know that Psychological Capital (PsyCap) is a dynamic, validated construct that can be used to describe our clients.  PsyCap is defined as a construct based on 4 inter-related competencies: Hope, Efficacy, Resilience, and Optimism (see the APA link here, or read the book here).

As the primary author, Fred Luthans, recently stated to me, “PsyCap has and continues to take off across the world … I have over 166,000 citations of my research which has been awarded in the top 1% of all researchers in all fields in the world and ranks #1 in organizational behavior textbooks. In other words, I am very happy with how PsyCap research is going, especially in the global economy.”  (direct communication 9.5.24).

 The HERO model is more than a convenient acronym.  The HERO-within model is a critical approach that practitioners can apply at multiple levels- individual, team/ family, and organizational/ societal. 

I have applied the PsyCap model with countless clients for decades.  You can also do so!

And ANYONE can apply this model to themselves.

Practitioners, by definition, need to practice new behaviors and share them widely.  My opinion is that practitioners have a fiduciary responsibility to practice both new ideas (innovation) and celebrate strengths (stability) every day. 

The purpose of these 3 short articles is to introduce the HERO model, like a new vocabulary term, and examples that can be applied by advisors in any discipline.  I invite you to assess how you can apply these practical examples with yourself, your loved ones, and with the clients you serve. 

Imagine that you are building a house with a garden that you hope will support generations of loved ones.  Hope is defined as “the will and the way” to build a better future (read the book here).   Every business founder believes “I can build this product or service.”  Their hopes are often defined in founder’s history books or videos, vision statements, the stories told and re-told at gatherings.  Efficacy is the capacity to build that new house, to get the job done.  We all use blueprints such as values statements, family constitutions, charters, phased strategic plans for new projects.  Resilience is our capacity to respond to adversity by returning to the same or a better level.  Examples include our responses to global disease, market adversity, or loss of our loved ones.  Optimism is our choice to believe in a positive outcome, such as well-being for our children and grandchildren.  All four of these competencies can be measured, taught in under 90 minutes, and developed over time.  The PsyCap impact is more significant when all four competencies are measured (a second-order effect) than when only one or three competencies are measured. 

Here are examples for how we can accelerate PsyCap at three levels:  Individual, Team/ Family and Organizational/ Societal.

Article #1 of 3: The HERO Model applied at the Individual level

We all need to look in the mirror at times.  We all need to exhale.  All good leadership development models start with self-awareness and lead to new actions, so it makes sense to start this list of activities with assessments, then several new behaviors that you can implement immediately.  

   A.  Pre-Meeting or Annual Surveys.   For years I’ve embedded these 4 questions into surveys so that I can provide a summary of PsyCap changes over time.  Directions:  On a scale of 1 (low) to 10 (high) how do you assess each of the following?

                  1.  Hope.  I have “the will and the way” to achieve my goals.

                  2.  Efficacy.  I feel confident that I know what I need to do to achieve my goals.

                  3.  Resiliency.  I can get through difficult times or challenges.

                  4.  Optimism.  I am optimistic about what will happen to me in the future.

When I share the data, I also encourage people to use these four vocabulary words regularly.

   B.  Self-Assessments.  Individuals and teams can clarify values using free tools like https://www.viacharacter.org/ or https://www.lifevaluesinventory.org/

Personality and behavioral data including strengths and derailers can be assessed from https://www.hoganassessments.com/ or https://www.discprofile.com/

   C.  360-Assessments.   The most valid form of assessment is anonymously collected from others and focuses on the behaviors of family and non-family leaders.  See my process at https://assessnextgen.com/

   D.  Reflected Best Self activity.  When I ask 10-15 people to describe my strengths and weaknesses, those details can help me identify how I can be “At My Best.”  Our colleagues and loved ones may never have been asked to provide feedback or advice.  (See details at https://hbr.org/2005/01/how-to-play-to-your-strengths). 

   E.  Three Good Things.  The gold standard in social science, with over 100 years of research, occurs when a random sample population repeatedly has a significant result from an isolated behavior.  Imagine that you practice this new behavior for a week.  When going to bed, write down or state out loud Three Good Things that happened that day.  Simple activity, right?  If we measured your subjective well-being (happiness) daily, it would increase.  Related prosocial measures, like gratitude and kindness, also increase.  If you extend your Three Good Things activity into a journal for months and years, then you can ask your loved ones if they notice any results.  (read the book here).

   F.  Adopt a metaphor, such as building a new house with a garden where your great grandchildren can flourish.  When we “design a future self or future house” then we can adopt that metaphor and practice flourishing.  Ask any founder.  Or ask any parent.  When we hold newborn children, we always whisper our best intentions and hopes.  Why not do the same for yourself and your clients?

Time to pause… what do you think?

Article #2 in this series will focus on the team/ family level.

Article #3 in this series will focus on the organizational/ societal levels of organizational change.

Conclusion

Like every practitioner, I’m regularly reminded of how little I know.  I ask for advice, and read, and on good days I listen well.   Then I try something new.  The PsyCap term may be new to some readers.  However, the words “hope, efficacy, resilience and optimism” are ancient and familiar. 

If we embrace the HERO model for our loved ones and our clients, then we are practicing ancient wisdom, in a new way.  (See my riveting dissertation here).

My experience is that Psychological Capital describes family-centric values over a longer term than any other measure of capital. 

Please add your thoughts if you share that bias or want to continue this conversation!

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