Change makers: we got to feed the beaver, he?

#NimbleVlog Season 05 Episode 04 — ORCHANGO’s president & co-founder Edmond Mellina uses a beaver analogy to highlight an important call to action for change-makers…

Transcript

Reading time: about 2 minutes

When teaching Nimble Change Leadership™ [or Change Agility for Staff Members], I often use a beaver analogy. Of course, it works very well with Canadians. After all, the beaver is our national animal.

But it resonates as well in other countries. For example, last month I spoke with an audience of senior leaders from Central & Western Africa, and the analogy worked as well with them.

Imagine I’m a researcher in beaver behaviours; and I’m conducting an experiment with a family of beavers: mom, dad, and a couple of kiddies. I take them to a provincial park; I drop them in a forested area where there is a little creek. A few months later, I come back to the exact same spot.

The little creek is gone! Instead, there is a lake…

Why? Because beavers are control-freaks. They didn’t like at all the little creek. They feel way more in control when there is a dam. So, they built one…

If you live in a city, or a town, or a village, look outside through a window. It used to be a forest… Not anymore…

Leave a human family somewhere; come back a few months later; and they will have changed everything around them drastically.

Why? Because we humans are like beavers: control freaks!

This is critical to keep in mind when leading people through change. Control and anxiety are like opposite sides of a seesaw. If control is high, anxiety is low. When going through change, the beaver in us kicks in. We feel a loss of control. Anxiety goes up, which leads to worst-case thinking and resistance.

The takeaway? As change-makers, we need to give control back to the people impacted by change. We call it: “Feeding the beaver”.

How do we do that? Through involvement and co-creation. As the saying goes: “Nothing about them without them”.

Stay tuned for the next episode of the #NimbleVlog…

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