The National Learning & Development Conference 2023 –  reLEARNING for reINVENTION  

The L&DI describe themselves as enabling people to reimagine what their organisation looks like, supporting the creation of a climate where people are prepared to fail taking the learnings rather than dwelling on them. The 2023 national conference lived up to this description.  

Here are some summaries of the excellent speakers on the day. 

Amy Edmonson – Keynote Speaker 

Harvard Business School Professor and leading researcher into the science of psychological safety, Amy talked about how organisations with a culture where you can fail and learn from mistakes are most successful. In her new book Right Kind of Wrong: Why Learning to Fail Can Teach Us to Thrive, she provides a framework for failing well and strategies to help us learn from them. Some insights and lessons discussed: 

• Success in an uncertain VUCA world depends on high quality conversations 
• Psychological safety allows high quality conversations where: people are engaged, contributing, and listening; advocacy and inquiry are valued; progress and learning are happening in teams 
• Creating candour and a commitment to excellence in teams is key – consent is not consensus 
• Innovation is the goal and requires failure – intelligent failure  
• As leaders we build psychological safety by:  Reframing the work, inviting participation, and responding productively (de-stigmatize failure)   

Last week Amy’s new book won the Financial Times and Schroders Business Book of the Year 2023. 

David McRedmond – “Repositioning in the New Context” 

Chief Executive of An Post since 2016, David shared how we need to rethink and unlearn, and how to build adaptability into our systems so we can deal with whatever disrupts us next.  

• Know what is going on in the outside world 
• Focus on the big moves 
• Everything must change mindset  
• Think big  
• Focus on the high value and low uncertainty areas such as: strategy, purpose, growth, and innovation talent etc.  
• Create a learning environment, trust people, and let them get on with it  

Sacha Dekker – “Relearning When Life Doesn’t Give You a Choice” 

An inspirational talk from Sasha Dekker, detailing her relearning following dramatic life changing events that left her paralysed and being told on several occasions she would never walk again. Her 3 principles for success helped her achieve what people said was impossible, walking on the Great Wall of China and completing 110km of the Camino de Santiago. 

• Set yourself a purposeful goal, one that has real meaning for you.  
• Choose better not bitter. While things may go against you, you can choose to look back with bitterness or look forward with a “how can I do it better?” attitude.  
• A positive mindset there is always a way! The power of positivity and creativity will help you find or create the solutions.  

Life lessons for us all.  

Some photos below from the conference.