“There is only one thing more painful than learning from experience and that is not learning from experience.” – Archibald MacLeish

Change leads to all kinds of things.  Excitement, frustration, success, roadblocks, progress and setbacks.  And probably a bunch more.  Change is a permanent part of the human condition and so are all the things that go with it.

While a lot of those things are unavoidable parts of change, there are some things we can control.  Namely, we control whether we make the most of what comes out of those changes.  Good or bad, rewarding or soul-crushing, exciting or depressing, we choose what comes next.

Think about yourself as a leader.  When you make change – or it’s made on you – how do you respond?  If it goes well, do you build on it?  So many leaders make successful change and then think that means they don’t ever have to make change again.  I literally had a leader tell me a couple of weeks ago that they successfully changed a certain thing back in 2013 so “we don’t ever have to do that again”.

False.  Successful change is something to celebrate and enjoy, not something to rest on.  It’s merely a plateau.  You take a deep breath, then you start the next climb.

What about when it goes poorly?  There are just as many leaders who struggle with change and either give up or keep trying the same thing over and over again.  Quitting isn’t the answer, but neither is beating your head against a wall.

When you struggle with change, do you just keep trying the same thing?  Or do you step back, reassess, and try to find a better way?  Change is difficult and there will be a lot of times it doesn’t go the way you want it to.  How do you respond?

Change is really about learning.  Learning what we really want in our lives and careers and organizations, and then learning how to make that happen. 

Don’t stop learning.  Don’t get complacent, don’t quit, and don’t just keep trying the same old things.  Your brain is made to learn and it can be very good at learning – if you allow it to be.  Let it do it’s job and you might be amazed at the results.