When it comes to change, there are a few reactions that help us understand how important stability and predictability are to an individual.

Most of us will have heard the statement “it’s how we’ve always done it.” A similar statement is “it will not work.”

Both build on existing experience, and both assume that existing experience can be used to predict the future.

What they also do is reject the possibility that circumstances or the situation changed. Or that they can be changed. In essence, it is the assumption that nothing can be learned from the existing experience one is referring to.

Whenever leaders use those statements, they can also be sure that it reduces the amount of energy available for action. The team finds itself limited in its creativity and imagination, and it either will give in and accept that nothing can be done, or it will engage in conversations meant to remove the limitation.

In a way, “it will not work” is a safe statement. It’s a result that can always be achieved. There is very little risk that it will work.

“We’ve always done it like this” is also a safe statement. If things continue to work as in the past, one has made the right choice. And if things don’t work out as expected, the responsibility can easily be attributed to those who chose that solution in the past.

While it is very useful to assess what may and may not work, using past experiences as a measure also has a price. Choosing to know and predict an outcome prevents being wrong by avoiding learning from past experiences. Considering the outcome to be one’s learning is forgetting that the outcome is the consequence of a variety of circumstances and actions impacting one another.