Change LP

Learning projects require accountability and the ability to drive positive change. In group settings, participants are encouraged to share examples of specific actions they took to further change. This helps create continuity and expectation for future meetings. An example is given of a financial services firm undergoing significant technology changes. By having employees share observations of the positive impact of the changes, it helps drive the desired change within the organization. Now, when I think about learning projects, I think about accountability. And change has got a lot of moving parts to it. Yet, I also think about having, especially in a group setting, and you can certainly do it with an individual, is every week I want you to come in with an example or two things that you specifically did to continue to drive change positively. Two things that you did that were on your list that you successfully completed. Come in prepared to share, and if it's with you as an individual, or share in front of the group. That learning project ties your sessions together. It creates continuity. See, often when we have conversations, especially around a thing called change, don't let the conversation just exist in the session. You want to plant a seed that they have an expectation for the next meeting. We're going to share it as a group. One of the things that we did with a company, a financial services firm, who was going through dramatic change, dramatic systems change, legacy systems were being ripped out, new technology being put in. This was, for lack of a better description, somewhat of an old, staunchy financial services firm, wildly successful, very, very profitable. Everyone said, why do we need to do this? We're making money. That's the tough thing with change. So when you're successful, people will fight change more. And when people aren't as successful, or the company's struggling, people will come up with ideas, why are we doing this? You know, we have these other problems over here. And so what we ended up doing is we had everyone come in every single week, throughout departments and leaders, sharing one or two things that they observed as a result of the change being implemented. Now, one of the things that they had were transactions with customers. And they used to have to go through multiple, multiple systems. And I'll never forget, I sat in this meeting, and this one woman stood up and goes, and shared with the group, I have to tell you, I was nervous about this, I hate technology. She said, what I have found is my transactions are shorter, they're crisper, and clients are even mentioning it. And I'm like, wow, that was fast. Did you guys upgrade? She said, that was the moment. Now why do I share that quick story? When you get your people internally talking about incidents of positive change and of benefit, and you get that in a structured way through the learning project, always sharing, it drives the change that you're seeking.