By Kaiti Iliopoulou
e are certainly facing one of the most hazardous and discouraging eras of our century. This pandemic has been rapidly grown and it’s spreading like wildfire. Though it is not the first time humanity has worn its armor and tries to overcome such dangerous viruses, it is indeed for most of us, the first time that we undoubtedly feel that this situation is a hurdle which is somehow perpetuated.
Worldwide for almost a year now, entire cities are being in a way restructured by implementing new practices and governmental rules, in order to be fortified against our indirect foe. The latter, has shown us many profiles, as it appears with various costumes. In other words, many have been contaminated without even noticing any symptoms whereas, others have suffered tremendously or even lost their battle to Covid-19.
The current reality integrates a multitude of emotions and reactions which are definitely reflected in the cornerstone of how our societies, our daily routines and even our relationships have radically transformed. It seems to me, that we are indeed, at some level trained or even coached, during these times. We are trained on how to be proactive and protect our immune systems, we are trained on how to become more diligent with our hygiene, on how to sanitize our hands and wear our masks. Simultaneously, we are trained to keep distance from one another, to work remotely and to stay at home. All of the aforementioned, are parameters that are inevitable and one could say urgently necessary, in order to stay safe, beat this virus and reclaim our “freedom” once again in the foreseeable future.
As citizens of this world, we could comprehend this reality as we all work together as one entity, embracing the same goal, which is no other than staying safe and reducing these catastrophic for public health rates of the pandemic. Moreover, we have accepted the change, we are certainly adjusting and transforming our behaviors and we patiently wait for the outcome of our act and its’ evaluation.
This current state reminds me one of the theoretical models I came across during my studies in Human Resources Management; the Kirkpatrick’s “Four Levels of Training Evaluation Model”. In an organization when a change occurs or a reinvention has to be implemented, there is no better way to succeed than integrating new learning techniques and training programs. Based on Professor’s Donald Kirkpatrick and his son James, work of “Evaluating Training Programs”, there are “Four Levels of Training Evaluation”; The level of Reaction, the level of Learning, the level of Behavior and finally the level of Results.
To associate the latter model with the situation we face, we can undoubtedly confirm that we have indeed, traversed throughout all the above stages. The pandemic’s outbreak on December 2019, imposed a worldwide necessity of demonstrating new behaviors. The notorious virus definitely changed our reality when the restrictions came to modify everything. At the beginning, we reacted during the training period in order to digest the severe measures, the rules and the prevention. Then we learned from this learning phase on how to live our daily lives and last but not least, we acted and applied the new practices; the lockdowns and the social distance. Consequently, during the summer days we saw the positive results of the cases’ reduction.
This simulation may seem strange, but we have to remember that we are human beings, who have inherent the essence of adopting, learning and evolving, as this is our way of surviving. The history has taught us that this second lockdown and its’ arising challenges, are once again unavoidable, so as to unanimously fulfill our hope, which is no other than overcome and win as soon as possible COVID-19. After all, we are all in this together…
