Why Pink Floyd, Dopamine, and Gen Z All teach us about Resilience ?

 

Building Resilience in a BANI World – A CHRO’s Lens

One of the privileges of being a CHRO is that you get to talk to people across generations — from seasoned leaders who’ve spent decades building organizations to fresh graduates who walk in with wide eyes, bright ideas, and the courage to question everything. These conversations are often my biggest source of learning.

The other, more personal source? My own kids.

My son is Gen Z, just stepping into the workforce. My daughter belongs to the generation after that — Gen Alpha. (Yes, they’ve already run out of letters and restarted from the beginning!) The two of them often remind me that resilience isn’t a “leadership trait” you only talk about at work; it’s a life skill, shaped every day at home, at school, and yes, on Spotify playlists.

The other day, my daughter rolled her eyes and declared, “Dad, you listen to boring music — Pink Floyd is NOT my generation.” She quickly added, “But you’re fun, so that’s a relief.” I took that as a win. In this course I have picked some good music of new age like her latest favourite is Katseye and we now have a common favourite Rihanna with her latest hit - Breaking the Dishes !

From VUCA to BANI

When I started my career, the acronym we all used was VUCA — Volatile, Uncertain, Complex, Ambiguous. It sounded impressive in presentations but felt distant in real life.

Today, the reality is sharper. The world we live and work in is BANI — Brittle, Anxious, Non-linear, Integrated. A brittle supply chain can halt a global business. Anxiety spreads faster than facts on social media. Careers move in non-linear zig-zags (you can be a content creator today, a product manager tomorrow). And everything is integrated — one country’s policy or one person’s tweet can ripple across the world.

The pandemic only accelerated this shift.

Conversations with the Next Gen

I often sit with younger colleagues — some just a year into their jobs — and their clarity amazes me. They ask questions we never dared to ask at their age: “Why do we do it this way?” “Does this process add value or just bureaucracy?”

They come with a privileged upbringing compared to Gen X (my generation). They’ve grown up in a Blinkit world where groceries arrive in 10 minutes, dopamine is one scroll away, and information is abundant. Failures can be swiped away like a bad app screen.

And yet, when things don’t go as planned, I notice how hard it can hit. A missed promotion, a project collapse, or even a piece of tough feedback can feel overwhelming.

This is where resilience becomes critical.

Resilience: The Bounce-Back Muscle

Resilience is not about never failing. It’s about building the muscle to bounce back. I often tell young managers: if you’re not failing at something, you’re probably not stretching yourself enough.

Simon Sinek once said in a podcast that dopamine has wired us for instant gratification, but true growth happens in the slow burn of persistence. That’s resilience — the patience to keep going when results don’t come instantly.

At work, I’ve seen failures become the best teachers:

1. A young manager was devastated when her first big project didn’t land. She thought she had “failed the company.” Her mentor told her, “Congratulations, you’ve earned your first scar. Wear it proudly.” That shifted her mindset.
2. During the pandemic, I saw kids — including my own — lose their “plans.” Exams canceled, classes online, routines broken. Some crumbled, but some found new pathways: learning coding, starting small businesses, even exploring new art forms. Adversity became the accidental teacher.

How We Can Build It

From what I’ve observed, resilience grows stronger when we:

1. Normalize failure – At home and at work. Call it feedback, not a flaw.
2. Slow down the dopamine – Celebrate progress, not just the end result.
3. Provide perspective – Remind ourselves (and our kids, and our teams) that a single setback is just a chapter, not the whole story.
4. Lean on each other – Resilience isn’t a solo act. Mentors, colleagues, and even family become shock absorbers.
5. Practice courage in small doses – Speaking up, trying new things, accepting mistakes — all are training grounds for resilience.

Closing Thought

As a CHRO, I often tell my teams: in this BANI world, skills will change, jobs will change, but resilience will remain the most transferable competency of all.

And as a parent, I remind myself that my kids — Gen Z and Gen Alpha — will grow up in a world far more integrated and non-linear than mine. They may laugh at my music choices, but they also teach me that resilience isn’t about becoming like them or them becoming like me. It’s about learning together, failing together, and rising stronger, every time.

After all, resilience is the glue that holds us steady in a world that can crack easily. And sometimes, the best way to teach it is simply to live it.