Leading Learning
“What keeps you up at night?”
Leading From Aspiration, Not Desperation
Leading Learning
In the past few months almost every strategic planning conversation I have been a part of has posed this question as a way to stimulate consideration of new possibilities. The problem for me is that most nights I sleep quite well. And I can't imagine I'm the only one in this industry who does.
I get the effect folks are hoping for: Let's identify people's anxieties and then figure out how we might help with what causes them concern. It makes sense at the most simplistic level; if I feel things are going along fine, then what incentive would I have for making a change (that might backfire)? It's the old "better safe than sorry" mindset. While this approach indeed can be somewhat effective, the greatest possibilities for leading learning don't emerge from a negative, pain-avoidance mindset.
The "pain before gain" approach suggests that systems and people need to be sufficiently disturbed to break them out of their patterns or complacency and to engage in innovation and change. Such an approach then begs for incidents or individuals that will unearth sufficient fear or uneasiness to motivate a change in people's behavior. The bottom line? It can turn leaders into agents of pain or storytellers who focus on the extreme negatives so people view them as a possible threat to avoid.
These two downsides of the "pain before gain" mindset become rather significant over time. If you believe people need to feel the pain in order to change, you spend your days unearthing others' anguish. They, in turn, begin to associate you with little more than pain and misery, the one who constantly bums them out.
Using negative visions to inspire fear in colleagues - while often successful - loses its effectiveness over time as people must be in a constant state of fear or pain. As Peter Senge and his colleagues wrote about in The Fifth Discipline Fieldbook, negative visions only motivate behavior change so long as people see the threat as real and imminent. The example I often use for this phenomenon is driving the speed limit. Even the fastest drivers usually slow down and toe the line when a squad car is sitting at the side of the road in plain sight. But once they pass the police (and the threat is no longer imminent and real) they go right back to driving as fast as they want.
The "pain before gain" mindset has little to do with inspiration or possibility. Yes, it is effective, but I believe it should be used sparingly, in moderation, and certainly not as our default approach for getting others to think differently about our meetings.
Leadership should not be about inflicting pain as a means to stimulate action. Leadership should always include truth telling and transparency about the very real challenges and the potential consequences individuals and organizations might face if certain actions aren't considered.
However, we do ourselves, our organizations, and others a disservice when we too quickly promulgate some perceived conventional wisdom about what it takes to make things happen in organizations. Gain can and does come without pain. We need to trumpet that reality more regularly and lead learning not from desperation, but from aspiration.
Leading Learning Take Away
Ditch the "pain before gain" mindset. Instead:
1. Offer a compelling picture of the potential benefits of the desired change, to engage stakeholders in a discussion about what it means for them and how they might refine it.
2. Pick some low-hanging fruit that gets things moving toward the desired ends.
3. Institutionalize ongoing improvement and innovation so it becomes the cultural norm in the organization - "the way we do things around here" - instead of something done only when the pain threshold has been crossed.
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