Change Agents, Trust and Briefing to OPM
September 29, 2006
On Wednesday morning of this week, I had the pleasure to be a "guest faculty" at the Office of Personnel Management's Contemporary Leadership Issues Seminar at the Eastern Management Development Center in Shepherdstown, West Virginia. The audience was senior leaders (GS14's and 15s) from a wide range of government agencies but more DoD than civilian.
Based on feedback from some previous briefs at Brookings, I changed the flow of the presentation. I began the dialogue early with a question to the group of what is a change agent? As I had met several of the participants at a reception the night before, it seemed easier to establish rapport in starting the conversation. The flow worked much better and I am thankful to my friends at Brookings for giving me the feedback.
I fielded many questions throughout the presentation and had many comments but three things jump out at me from the day:
1) One of the best questions of the session (and since I wrote the paper) asked me to comment on where in the scale of humility to hubris, the change agents fit. Off the top of my head, my reaction was that humility seemed more prominent to me as a character trait than arrogance. I was quick to point out however, that being humble for a change agent does not mean you will shrink from "breaking china" as Charlie Allen said. It is a fine line. It was a great question.
2) A participant, who identified themselves as a Dogged Conceptualizer, asked how they get their high level leadership listen to them. How do they get heard and how can they get their concepts up to the top of the leadership chain; even if it means passing over their current managers. Another great question and one that I did not have a great answer to. Several in the crowd suggested getting the top leader to commit to join up in less formal settings. One even suggested that the golf course can be a place to establish such rapport. I have thought more about the question and I am now determined to ask other Dogged Conceptualizers what they would recommend. Stay tuned.
3) Finally, the theme that emerged through our discussion of the change agent DNA, is the idea that unless the change agent engenders trust in the people who work with them and for them, that they will fail in their role. Trustworthiness was a trait that several of the change agents shared as important. I have now heard this echoed too many times in settings such as this to omit it as an element in the DNA diagram. Thus, I will evolve that part of my presentation based, yet again, on "the wisdom of the crowd."
I look forward to working with OPM again and offer my thanks to David Ost, Kathy Hanson and Kim Kinley at OPM for the kind invitation to speak. For more information about the fine programs that OPM offers please click here.
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