Small change: go back to the start

Rinse, repeat. Rinse, repeat. Look at any organisation and you will see the same patterns — the same problems — recurring over and over. Rinse, repeat. Rinse, repeat.

For proof, ask any new Exec to take note of the issues and dynamics they observe in their first few months. If you revisit them later — even years down the line — they are likely to hold true. Or ask a team to predict why change will fail before the project begins. The answer will be on the money.

This might sound glum, but it contains a liberating truth: the answers are always under your nose at the beginning. If you’re stuck, struggling or lost, go back to the start. Look at what you were hoping to achieve — and all the ways you thought you might get in your own way. Addressing those issues is the work that now needs to be done.

Something to consider: what have we always known to be true about how we cause ourselves problems?

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