The Wrong Question!

Change has been the topic of conversation within the business community for decades. In May 2005, the Harvard Business Review cited the need for a radical departure from traditional thinking.

According to the article, “Your Company’s Secret Change Agent,” while isolated success strategies can be brought into the mainstream, doing so requires a departure from the notions of bench-marking and best practices that we are all too familiar with. The key is to engage the members of the community you want to change in the process of discovery and make them evangelists of their own conversion experience.

The ideas for creating change are pretty sound. Involving the people you want to change in process of leading change is brilliant. However, we collectively still lament the willingness to change what exists within our worlds.

So what gives?

Maybe we’re just asking the wrong questions. For example, instead of asking “How do I get this done?” or “How can I validate my work?” we should ask, “What is holding us back from opportunity?”

No matter what the solution is for change, the thing that ultimately holds us back is belief or lack thereof. In other words, maybe there is a feeling that once change is implemented we will be destroyed in some way. Belief can go a long way as long as it’s true.

We must all have faith that sticking our collective necks out is a good thing. We must believe that when we choose to do the unconventional, we will end up stronger and more educated. And we must feel confident that we can become the kind of people who not only make change, but change things for the better.