Lessons from the River

What Change Agents Can Learn from Fly Fishing

As we near the end of a brutally hot summer, I look forward to taking a few days to go fly fishing in Montana! I couldn’t help but notice that success in change adoption overlaps with this sport in a few key ways:

It Helps to Use a Guide: You'll vastly improve your chances of success if you seek help from a professional who has fished the river many times, understands the mind of your intended target, and brings a solid overall process as well as a few subtle techniques you might not have learned yet.

You Can Make Your Own Luck: They say luck is the marriage of preparation and opportunity. That's true on the river and that's true when guiding change adoption. Do the hard work of preparing and practice the skills needed to recognize when adoption opportunities present themselves, so you can take action.

You'll Need a Map & Equipment: Good equipment is necessary, but not sufficient. Knowing where you are doesn't mean the fish will be there too. So even a perfect process, (like one of the dozens of great change management methods out there), will not deliver results if you don’t commit to the work, adapt to conditions, and diligently follow through.

You Should Plan to Catch and Release: When you do land that big fish (or deliver that big change), don't keep it to yourself. Take a few selfies, then plan to catch the best things you've learned and release them to your team so everyone can apply what they've experienced to the next challenge.

The entire river (and your organization) will be better off.

Thanks for taking a few minutes to read this! Reach out if you or your team could use a hand from some expert guides to navigate your next big change.

-Steve

Questions for Chatter:

1.  In your experience, what are the 2-3 most important things that need to be in place to achieve lasting change adoption?

2.  Describe a time when the perfect process and plenty of resources were still not enough to get a big change over the finish line - or produced disappointing long-term results.