August 2015 – HCSE Blog

29/08/2015

Retrospectoscopy

There is a wonderful invention called the retrospectoscope which is designed to provide clarity of hindsight.

And there is an art to retrospectoscopy.

The key to the art is to carefully avoid committing to precise purpose at the start – in the prospectus; then after the actual outcome is demonstrated, to claim that it was predicted and using the ambiguity of the prospectus to hide the sleight-of-hand.

The purpose is to gain a reputation to have foresight and to be able to predict the future … because oracles, sages and soothsayers are much valued in society.

Retrospectoscopy has gained a tarnished reputation but it does have an important role … it provides the ability to learn from experience … but to be effective we have to use the retrospectoscope correctly. It is too easy to abuse it and to fall into the trap of self-justification by distorting and deleting what we see.

To avoid the trap we need to do several things:

Write down and share our clear diagnosis, plan and prediction at the start … ‘the prospectus’.
Record and share the information that we will need to test our prediction robustly … ‘the evidence’.
Compare our prospective rhetoric with the retrospective reality and share what we find … ‘the learning’.

It is unlikely that our prediction will be 100% accurate … and any deviation from aim is a valuable source of learning … better than predicted, worse than predicted and not predicted are all opportunities for new insights, deeper understanding, new opportunities, wiser decisions and better outcomes.

If we fail to use the retrospectoscope correctly then we will be caught in a perpetual cycle of self-justifying delusion that is manifest as the name-shame-blame-game. And if we side-step the expected discomfort of learning we will condemn ourselves to endlessly repeating the painful lessons that history can teach us to avoid.

The common theme in the self-justifying-delusion trap-avoiding recipe is share … if we are not prepared to learn in public then we should accept the inevitable consequences with grace.

Both courage and humility and are leadership assets.

22/08/2015

Storytelling

Telling a compelling story of improvement is an essential skill for a facilitator and leader of change.

A compelling story has two essential components: cultural and technical. Otherwise known as emotional and factual.

Many of the stories that we hear are one or the other; and consequently are much less effective.

Some prefer emotive language and use stories of dismay and distress to generate an angry reaction: “That is awful we must DO something about that!”

And while emotion is the necessary fuel for action, an angry mob usually attacks the assumed cause rather than the actual cause and can become ‘mindless’ and destructive.

Those who have observed the dangers of the angry mob opt for a more reflective, evidence-based, scientific, rational, analytical, careful, risk-avoidance approach.

And while facts are the necessary informers of decision, the analytical mind often gets stuck in the ‘paralysis of analysis’ swamp as layer upon layer of increasing complexity is exposed … more questions than answers.

So in a compelling story we need a bit of both.

We need a story that fires our emotions … and … we need a story that engages our intellect.

A bit of something for everyone.

And the key to developing this compelling-story-telling skill this is to start with something small enough to be doable in a reasonable period of time. A short story rather than a lengthy legend.

A story, tale or fable.

Aesop’s Fables and Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales are still remembered for their timeless stories.

And here is a taste of such a story … one that has been published recently for all to read and to enjoy.

A Story of Learning Improvement Science

It is an effective blend of cultural and technical, emotional and factual … and to read the full story just follow the ‘Continue’ link.

01/08/2015

Early Adoption

The early phases of a transformation are where most fall by the wayside.

And the failure rate is horrifying – an estimated 80% of improvement initiatives fail to achieve their goals.

The recent history of the NHS is littered with the rusting wreckage of a series of improvement bandwagons. Many who survived the crashes are too scarred and too scared to try again.

Transformation and improvement imply change which implies innovation … new ways of thinking, new ways of behaving, new techniques, new tools, and new ways of working.

And it has been known for over 50 years that innovation spreads in a very characteristic way. This process was described by Everett Rogers in a book called ‘Diffusion of Innovations‘ and is described visually in the diagram above.

The horizontal axis is a measure of individual receptiveness to the specific innovation … and the labels are behaviours: ‘I exhibit early adopter behaviour‘ (i.e. not ‘I am an early adopter’).

What Roger’s discovered through empirical observation was that in all cases the innovation diffuses from left-to-right; from innovation through early adoption to the ‘silent’ majority.

Complete diffusion is not guaranteed though … there are barriers between the phases.

One barrier is between innovation and early adoption.

There are many innovations that we never hear about and very often the same innovation appears in many places and often around the same time.

This innovation-adoption barrier is caused by two things:
1) most are not even aware of the problem … they are blissfully ignorant;
2) news of the innovation is not shared widely enough.

Innovators are sensitive people. They sense there is a problem long before others do. They feel the fear and the excitement of need for innovation. They challenge their own assumptions and they actively seek solutions. They swim against the tide of ignorance, disinterest, skepticism and often toxic cynicism. So when they do discover a way forward they often feel nervous about sharing it. They have learned (the hard way) that the usual reaction is to be dismissed and discounted. Most people do not like to learn about unknown problems and hazards; and they like it even less to learn that there are solutions that they neither recognise nor understand.

But not everyone.

There is a group called the early adopters who, like the innovators, are aware of the problem. They just do not share the innovator’s passion to find a solution … irrespective of the risks … so they wait … their antennae tuned for news that a solution has been found.

Then they act.

And they act in one of two ways:

1) Talkers … re-transmit the news of the problem and the discovery of a generic solution … which is essential in building awareness.

2) Walkers … try the innovative approach themselves and in so doing learn a lot about their specific problem and the new ways to solving it.

And it is the early adopters that do both of these actions that are the most effective and the most valuable to everyone else. Those that talk-the-new-walk and walk-the-new-talk.

And we can identify who they are because they will be able to tell stories of how they have applied the innovation in their world; and the results that they have achieved; and how they achieved them; and what worked well; and what did not; and what they learned; and how they evolved and applied the innovation to meet their specific needs.

They are the leaders, the coaches and the teachers of improvement and transformation.

They See One, Do Some, and Teach Many.

The early adopters are the bridge across the Innovation and Transformation Chasm.