Chief Learning Officer - March 2008 - (Page 4)

editor’s letter It’s Better to Convince Than Persuade This issue of Chief Learning Officer magazine is focused on the changing role of the CLO. Keeping with the theme, I set out to write about pervasive transformation in 21st-century organizations and the part CLOs have played in organizational change. In doing my research on the subject, I found inspiration from a very unexpected source — an address delivered at Boston University in late fall of 1928 by Mary Parker Follett. Follett was farsighted on interpersonal relations and organizational management. As a management consultant, her theories about the notions of community, experience and the influence of human relations within the group were groundbreaking for her time, and they eventually found an enthusiastic and admiring audience in the world of business. While her calls for a “more ‘human’ approach to administration” seem less than revolutionary now, back then this “soft” orientation was well outside the mainstream. Her writings were rediscovered decades later by management thinkers and practitioners such as Peter Drucker, who is said to have referred to her as “a prophet of management.” Gradually, with growing interest in developing learning organizations, she has been recognized as the originator — at least in the 20th century — of ideas that now are considered “cutting edge” in organizational theory. Follett’s 1928 speech at Boston University was assumed lost until it was discovered in a small box of surviving manuscripts years later. She had been asked to speak at BU about “the teacher-student relation as an aspect of leadership.” By substituting “learning leaderlearner” for her “teacher-student” terminology, I saw many relevant points in her remarks for CLOs charged with managing change in modern organizations. She clearly believed that one of the duties of the teacher was to indicate to members of the next generation “the tasks which are about to devolve upon them.” But she also held that leadership was more important than rote instruction or propaganda in accomplishing the teacher’s mission, as these excerpts reveal: “A difficulty in thinking about the teacher’s ‘influence’ on his students is one we find in talking of leadership generally. There is a conception of leadership gaining ground today very different from our old notion With that conception, you had to be either a March 2008 leader or a learner . . . In the best organized groups, which have the best leadership, the members do not follow the leader as the sheep the bellwether.” “[Now] we think it better to convince than to persuade. A man may be persuaded against his reason, against his better judgment. But if you convince him, it is a different matter. Persuasion crushes out one of two opposing attitudes, and the attitude crushed out tends to reassert itself when the pressure is removed. By the process of convincing, on the other hand, two opposing attitudes are united. “If leadership does not mean coercion in any form, if it does not mean controlling, protecting or exploiting, what does it mean? It means, I think, freeing. The greatest service the teacher can render the student is to increase his freedom — his free range of activity and thought and his power of control.” I think Mary unwittingly penned a manifesto for modern change management. She knew that people are the sine qua non of any organization — especially one undergoing growth or evolution. She also knew that imposed change does not work. It eliminates the current culture or behavior but does not transform it. Significant organizational change, although it may appear to be about changing jobs, processes or products, is really about changing people’s minds and hearts. Coercing a change in behavior is merely compliance. Influencing a new attitude is just powerful persuasion. But truly convincing people to adopt a new belief in something and act accordingly really is what education is all about. Transformation without that conviction is doomed to ineffectiveness or failure. As a chief learning officer, how do you help manage all this change within your organization? You don’t. You lead it — by honest conviction, convincing leadership and example. It’s what Mary would have called the perfect reciprocal “teacher-student” relationship. I www.clomedia.com I Chief Learning Officer 4 Norm Kamikow Editor in Chief norm@clomedia.com http://www.clomedia.com

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Chief Learning Officer - March 2008

Chief Learning Officer - March 2008 Editor's Letter Table of Contents Imperatives Selling Up, Selling Down Strategies Take Five Learning Solutions The Treasury Board of Saskatchewan: Training the Trainers With Experiential Learning Clo Profile Environment Xerox: Creating a Learning Masterpiece Tactics Capturing the Knowledge of the Workforce Productivity Succession Planning Tips from the U.S. GAO Human Capital Influencing Competency Management Case Study Case Study Business Intelligence Advertisers' Index Editorial Resources In Conclusion

Chief Learning Officer - March 2008

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