Episode 120 - Try a 5 Week Experiment – Part 2

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On the last show I suggested introducing team change as a five-week experiment because experiments make change easier to accept. Plus, you establish a perfect opportunity for soliciting true feedback during the first five weeks.

But why five weeks? Psychologists say it usually takes a 1 month to get comfortable with a new routine. Years ago in my real estate office, when I changed the systems, it generally took 4 weeks for the noise to settle down and each change to take root. So why make it five weeks instead of four? During that last week the griping, moaning and complaining generally dissolves and you can do a candid assessment whether your new idea is worthwhile or not.

And here’s something else, if you impose a change and it turns out to be lousy, you have to change back. Your reputation as a professional might suffer as the grumblers will grumble, “I told you she didn’t know what she’s talking about.” But if you set up an experiment and at the end of the 5 weeks you choose to dump it and go back to the older, more effective way, all you do is simply announce that the experiment confirmed the original way was better. Be sure to thank you everyone for trying. The nice thing here is your professional reputation doesn’t take a punch in the nose. You didn’t fail. Actually, you are to be commended for taking a risk and conducting an experiment to improve things. Doesn’t that sound smart?

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This entry was posted on Tuesday, May 8th, 2007 at 5:30 am and is filed under Podcast. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

Episode 120 - Try a 5 Week Experiment – Part 2

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