Teams: Experimenting at work (why, what & how)
It stands to reason that innovation requires breaking new ground, but often at work the climate and time to try new things is—shall we say?—lacking. Enter, the experimentation mindset.
Why experiment? Ok. So you’ve heard the elevator pitch above that without experimentation there can be no innovation, but let’s take it a step further. For one thing experimentation can be exciting. It galvanizes a team around a hypothesis and lets them engage together and be creative. It also allows for people to focus on learning— the classic in a growth mindset. Plus, it’s a formula for outsized performance—some of the most successful companies embrace experimentation.
THE WHAT AND HOW OF EXPERIMENTATION AT WORK.
Start with psychological safety. First, you have to either have the right conditions or set a working agreement. By that I mean you and the team can start by removing judgement and assumptions about what is and what is not (I am channeling my inner Yoda here). If your company is a place where people spend cycles perfecting something to an extreme, or if you find feedback is back-channeled, chances are you have some work to do to build trust.
Pick a goal or problem. You want to focus your work on a real thing. Are your clients asking for a feature you don’t know how to build? Does your team want to reduce waste? Think about something real and meaningful.
Language matters. Then put on your scientist hat and start talking like an inventor. Start with a hypothesis. It could be the cause of the problem. Or a solution you’d like to try. For example, if you want to reduce waste as a team, start with a hypothesis that people will take some extra steps to recycle, as long as you provide clear instructions. Do you know this for a fact? It’s a hypothesis which you will test and learn as you execute.
Start by starting. The beauty of experimentation is you don’t need to be perfect— you can build a prototype or a quick outline to try out the theory.
Pick the right scope and scale. Maybe don’t experiment on the foundation of your house. But totally fine to experiment with paint samples. Starting small and then working quickly gives you a chance to create a virtuous cycle of innovating and improving.
Be real about the data. It’s important to observe, collect data, and be clear about what you see. If your hypothesis was that people would take extra steps to recycle because the team wants to reduce waste, and after a week people aren’t recycling as much as you thought, does it mean you should dump the whole thing? (See what I did there? Garbage humor!) Well, what did you observe? What data did you collect? Chances are there are insights you can gain, which can feed a new hypothesis to test out.
Take time to learn and adjust. I cannot stress this enough— build in checkpoints to retrospect on what you learned and observed. If something didn’t meet the expected results of the hypothesis, what insights did you gain? What adjustments can you make? What will you do differently?
Celebrate the experiment. This is not just about innovation, this is about creating a culture of learning and continuous improvement. Make time to showcase the wins, as well as the learnings. Say thank you to people for taking the risk, and have fun with the unexpected results you may encounter!
Can’t wait to hear about all the experiments large and small you pursue!
