I often get strange looks from people when I tell them that I like seeing my staff struggling to balance themselves at work, as if they were at the edge of a cliff all the time.

But I mean it.

Have you noticed how you felt when your boss assigned you to a new job, something you'd never done before in your entire life? Excited, nervous and stressed, right?

But at the same time, you would push yourself harder to learn more, work more and think more.

Although we will definitely make some mistakes all along the process, having a chance to try something new lets us know our real potential.

Working on the same job for a long time means long experience and high trust from people around you. But it can also kill your creativity. Moreover, it will make you feel so secure and comfortable with your surroundings that you tend to build up your own "comfort zone" at the end.

That's why I like moving people around in the company. Finance guys are moved to marketing, engineers to sales, investor-relations people to human development. I moved them around because I wanted to drag them out of their comfort zone and make them stay fit all the time.

But it's not just picking anyone from the tray. You have to know these people well enough, seeing their potential in other areas of the company's business. More importantly, you must choose people with the "right attitude" and the "fighter mindset". Someone who is tough enough to stay put, not jumping from the cliff or running back home after getting the new assignment!

To change people's attitudes is not easy. If they resist change, moving them out of their comfort zone will be very difficult.

But if they have positive thinking about change, they will grasp the opportunity to learn new things. This type of person is an asset - one we need to retain and develop further.

For those still stuck with the same old thinking, we need to gradually adjust them to the new culture. I believe that our constant cultural renewal will one day make them slowly adapt themselves to changes.

What we are doing now is trying to show them that change is not scary. It's just something that has to happen in life. That's it.

I think more than 90 per cent of rotation cases are quite successful. Since these people didn't have a strong background in or knowledge about their new assigned area, they were like a blank sheet of paper: ready to absorb new things all the time. Besides, they had the desire to input new, fresh ideas to their teams. They had also learned to rely more on teamwork than in the past, knowing that they couldn't work without team support.

The other thing that I have noticed is that previous barriers that used to separate each department from another have been removed. This is because people have been moving around so often that they come to know more about each other through regular contact and cooperation. The strong attachment to their old teams or old titles has also gone.

People ask me how to deal with those who are not successful in their new jobs.

I simply have to move them to a new area. Now, we have many new projects coming up so they will not be entirely cut off from their previous job. What they need to do is delegate more work to others so that they can have more time to work on their assigned project.

After completing one project, these people will be eager to work on another new one even though it means having to stand at the edge of the cliff again.

Why? Because life is far more exciting and interesting this way compared to having to work on the same old job all the time. Don't you think so?

Please e-mail me your comments anytime at sigve@dtac.co.th.

Sigve Brekke

Special to The Nation