Experiment:
- To try something with the intent of learning something new or testing out a hypothesis.
- A playful approach to change in which there is no right or wrong, just more information.
Working in financial services on the West Coast was like living in a sleep deprived bubble. I woke up at 3.15 am. An hour later, I was on the desk. Those were the haziest 18 months of my life. I never got enough sleep. And I was bored…so bored.
I wanted to live a different life than the one I was living. I had returned to California so I could spend weekends hiking in the redwoods, mountain biking in Marin and walking along Land’s End. Instead, I was sleepwalking through my days dreaming of something different.
I had always romanticized wine country and even played with the idea of doing more formal study. One day, fed up with what was missing in my life, I decided to test out my wine country dream. I got in the car and drove up to Napa. There was no grand plan except to pick a random tasting room and talk to the person behind the bar.
The whole thing felt absurd, awkward and, more than once, I thought about a detour to the outlet mall instead. What was I even doing? What did I expect would come of this? I didn’t have an answer. I also didn’t have a good enough reason to turn around, so I kept driving until I pulled into the parking lot of a random winery in Carneros.
Forty-five minutes later, as I walked back to my car, I felt like a different person than the one who had nervously walked into the tasting room. I had the name of a winery that was hiring. A month later, I was spending my weekends giving tours and tastings.
I was no longer stuck. I had something to try – my first real experiment.
The Case for Experimentation
I have always been awed (and slightly envious) by people who were born seemingly knowing what they were meant to do with their lives.
As you can probably guess by now, I am not one of those people.
It took me years of trying different companies, different roles, and different industries to find the path I have now been on for the past 18 years. I used to regret the winding road of my career, wondering how much further along I might have been if I had taken a more direct route. For most of my life, I’ve viewed this as a flaw – an inability to commit, focus or be satisfied.
Now I see it differently. In executive coaching, experimentation is a powerful tool.
Herminia Ibarra, Professor of Organizational Behavioral at London Business School and author of Working Identities, emphasizes that you cannot think yourself into a new way of being. You have to experiment, evaluate and iterate.
Think about that for a second. How many times have you tried to “figure things out” before you made a move? What could be different if you flipped that and moved into action without having all the information?
How to Create your Own Experiments
- Simply state the problem, decision or behavior that you want to focus on. For example: I don’t know where I want to move. I don’t understand why I am not considered for this role. There is a lack of engagement in my team meetings.
- Design the experiment. Looking at the example of wanting more interesting meetings, you might decide to shake things up. You might tell the team, “Our meetings are feeling stale lately, let’s try something different today and brainstorm agenda items, prioritize in real-time and allocate times to each item together.”
- Think like a scientist. Rather than evaluating whether it was a success or failure, look for information. Ask yourself, “What did I notice? What worked? What didn’t work? What did this make me more aware of? How was my experience different? Do I want to repeat the experiment? What else do I want to try?”
- Embrace the awkward. Trying something new and not knowing how it will turn out is not easy. The counter-intuitive goal is “that was a little uncomfortable.” Leadership development is a practice, one that will inevitably stretch you.
Maybe the biggest benefit of experimenting is feeling more alive. I walked into that tasting room bored, dulled and stuck. In less than an hour, I felt like I had woken up from my sleepwalking. I was excited, nervous, and hopeful that, no matter how this turned out, something would change.
That alone is worth the price of admission.
Continue to enhance your leadership development through experimentation and subscribe to my newsletter on LinkedIn.
Starla Sireno is an NYC Executive Coach. She partners with leaders to more effectively navigate the complexities of their roles, increase their influence at all levels, and hone their interpersonal communication skills in order to become more impactful both internally and in client-facing roles. Inquire how you can work with Starla or her team.