Page 29 - CCCA Magazine Fall 2018

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er value system, based on law and order, led her to take on Double-loop learning is a concept developed in the 1970s by
the issue herself. Her initial approach was to make exist- Chris Argyris, a leading business theorist. In contrast to single-
hing rules stronger and create new ones to make staff events loop learning, which involves changing your processes to solve a
even safer (though the accidents were unrelated to the actual problem, double-loop learning means changing your underly-
events). “Clearly, we need rules to enforce!” she had thought. ing assumptions (values, goals, conceptual framework). It does
“I got the President’s buy-in but I neglected to get HR’s not necessarily mean adding new knowledge; it means shifting
because I thought it was my issue,” she explains. “I didn’t get your mental model.
enough stakeholders in the process, and to be honest, I think I Double-loop learning is hard because you have to accept that
stepped on HR’s toes because what we did was crack down on how you view the world may no longer be relevant. However,
everything. I have failed initially to see the synergies … and so the alternative of not learning or growing in this quickly chang-
I had a lot of resistance, not against the policies but against the ing world is worse—you make yourself obsolete.
approach. There was no uptake.” Josephine Yam, previously Senior Legal Counsel at the Gov-
“At that point, I thought I was going to leave the company. I ernment of Alberta and now CEO and Co-Founder of Building
thought it was a values misalignment,” she adds. Breakthrough Boards (B3) Canada, gives the example of artif-
We all fall prey to this trap: “If I work hard at what I do best, I cial intelligence's impressive advances in the legal world: “There
will be successful.” But what if you work hard, implementing better is talk of AI replacing junior lawyers who do routine tasks like
and stronger procedures in this instance, but do not see the desired contract review and legal research. Instead of the lawyers taking
results? Do you continue working harder at it? Do you give up? 20 hours, AI can get those tasks done in 20 minutes. So to stay
There are some challenges that cannot be overcome simply relevant, we need to embrace such changes. We need to rein-
by working harder if you are not seeing the bigger picture and vent ourselves so we can answer, ‘What higher-value work can I
focusing on the right things. Fortunately for Chow, she was able do that AI can't replicate?’ That's exercising independent judg-
to get a different point of view. ment, bringing creativity and innovation to mission-critical
“I talked to my friend who owns an external HR consulting work, creating strategy and exercising empathy. If I, as in-house
company. They gave me the perspective that the values misalign- counsel, rely heavily on performing routine tasks as I always did
ment was really my values problem,” she says. Her friend helped her for the past 10-15 years, then I'm really setting myself up for
see that although both she and the company value human life, her failure and for obsolescence.”
approach of top-down compliance because of her legal background “There's been a change for in-house counsel where you're
and way of working did not align with the family culture of the Keg. not just a lawyer. You're a business person with a legal back-
“So the values change for me was, ‘I have to get out of the le- ground. You're an integral part of the business as a strategic
gal services mindset and into the wider enterprise values.’ Legal partner,” says Fernando Garcia, VP Legal and General Counsel
departments value compliance but our wider company values at Cargojet. “This requires different thinking. This requires a
family more. How could I integrate that in? So I went to people different approach. This requires a different relationship.”
instead of expecting to send out memos…. I looked at how we “There are a lot of things we didn't know when we were in
can do things differently because the value of our company is law school. Because the pace of technology is moving at break-
about taking care of the family. I stopped stepping on toes.” neck speed, we need to learn them if we want to make ourselves
relevant,” Yam advises. “It's only when you stretch yourself to
Double-loop Learning learn new things and you take risks, when you're open to new
ideas and perspectives, that you become a better version of
When you are not getting the results you want, you need to con- yourself. Life begins outside of your comfort zone.”
sider double-loop learning.

Double Loop Learning: Single-Loop Learning

The most common style of learning is problem
solving—improving systems as they exist.
Assumptions Strategies & Techniques Results
Why we do what we do What we do What we get

Double-Loop Learning
This style of learning questions the underlying assumptions,
values and beliefs behind what we do.

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