Change the system, not the people

One of the areas I really see Scrum Masters struggle is in Change Management. It’s not something that is typically taught with Scrum or Agile practices. However, if you are trying to coach a team to adopt something new, that is Change Management. Traditional Organizational Change Management teaches us that organizations don’t change, people do. And yet, Management 3.0 teaches us to not try to change people, but to change the system. This seems like quite the conflict of ideas...

According to scientific research, humans may be the most adaptive species on our planet. We have adapted to overcome extreme environments that our ancestors would never have been able to. Sometimes these environmental changes are on purpose, and sometimes, like in the case of COVID-19, they are thrown upon us. One thing is for certain, changing a person’s environment is the surest way to invoke change in that individual. Therefore, inducing change into the system, systematically introduces change in individuals.

However, there’s no manual that will tell you how to get the change you desire every, single time. As my colleague likes to say, “there are no best practices, only good practices.” Therefore, what we are really doing is troubleshooting our organization. If I introduce this change, what is the output? OK, now what happens if I introduce this one? Another word for that is experimentation. We are effectively running experiments to see if we are moving toward or away from the desired results, in, perhaps, one of the most complicated games of hot or cold.

Ultimately, if we can teach our organization to experiment, there is nothing that it can not accomplish. Through enough experimentation your organization will become a Learning Organization, capable of adapting to any environment. This is essential in mastering the infinite game, which according to Simon Sinek, “in infinite games, like business or politics or life itself, the players come and go, the rules are changeable, and there is no defined endpoint.” As companies like Sears, Blockbuster, Nokia, and many others will tell you, no one will announce when the game is changing. Experimentation is the one sense an organization has to perceive the world around them and respond to that sensory stimuli.