Motivation and error culture: The success combination for change

The participants of the workshop with Claudia Luca already knew that change is something natural. You meet us all the time - both in your professional and private life. In the course of the evening, however, our alumni were also made aware of something that they might not have been aware of before in this form: That the change from a passive to an active role in change has an amazing potential.

Confidence instead of compulsion: How change is easier for us
 

In this context it was essential to realize that the willingness to make changes is strongly dependent on whether they are initiated by oneself or imposed from outside. While people with intrinsic motivation are capable of initiating and driving even large changes at higher risk, even the smallest adjustments can be a difficult task if they are not made. This can sometimes be explained by the different areas of the brain that are activated in one case or another.

If the desire for change emanates from ourselves, the function of the neocortex, in which our consciousness is located, prevails. However, if a change is forced upon us, we resist it without having an explanation. In this case, the limbic system dominates our behavior, the oldest part of our brain, where our fears and emotions are located. Instead of consciously embracing change and looking for solutions, our subconscious prevents us from taking a constructive approach to the issue. The consequence is that overcoming our reservation against change costs us more energy than making the change itself.

Interactions in change processes
 

However, the workshop did not only discuss the possible reasons for the attitude of support or rejection towards change: It was also vividly demonstrated that change essentially takes place on two levels: on the personal and on the organisational level. In concrete terms this means that not only the perception, behaviour and emotions of the people involved change, but also the existing systems and structures.

These two levels cannot be considered separately or in isolation during change processes. They condition and influence each other mutually on the way from an outdated actual state to a target state - often not clearly defined in advance. In short: The final shape of new structures and systems can rarely be predicted precisely. It depends heavily on the behaviour and feelings of the people involved in the shaping process. To a similar extent, the introduction and establishment of new structures and systems also changes the views and actions of the people moving within them.

Predominant error (in)culture as a stumbling block
 

The fact that changes in Austria are often made more slowly and cautiously may also be due to the prevailing culture of error. As the results of the World Café held by the participants showed, this seems to inhibit rather than encourage change. In the professional context, the general tenor was that making or committing mistakes would often result in blame and stigmatization. There was general agreement that this urgently needed to change. There was also a lack of role models, especially at management level, who were courageous in their approach. However, this is precisely what is needed to take away other people's fear of change or its foreseeable consequences.

An important characteristic of a constructive error culture is, in addition to a greater willingness to try out something according to the "trail-and-error" principle more often, the ability to stand by errors and learn from them. However, this - and there was a great deal of agreement on this - requires a certain degree of critical faculties and self-reflection on an individual level. That is why trying out something new and learning from it is also very important in our next workshop go: This will take place on June 14, will be led by two change management experts from the management consultancy Avanade and will deal with the topic "Design Thinking".