London Olympics–lessons on Change

From the procession of the torch round the country where 8,000 people each carried it for 8,000 miles, and most people were within 5 miles of it at some point  (I personally have had it cross my path 3 times) to the opening ceremony, the organisers have tried to engage the population in a feeling that this is their Olympics.  Interestingly, the reach of the games has gone considerably beyond London, right down to Weymouth.  They have made sure that the road races and swimming  have used venues that the general public can access like Box Hill and the London parks and the public have rewarded them by turning out in huge numbers. The net dividend of all this is the country is truly engaged in and excited by the event. 

I have heard it argued that the National Lottery funding has helped build venues and support sport in a way that the Exchequer never could and the success this has lead to (48 medals so far and third place in the league table) has also done much to engage and excite people.  I have found myself watching all manner of minority sports on the 24 dedicated channels, which also increase people’s access.

So we have and emotionally resonant opening ceremony together with good access and success on the field and the net result is engagement and ownership.  If you are contemplating initiating Change in your business, then you need take a leaf from this Olympics in how you construct your program and prepare your ground.

Tags: Change, olympics

This entry was posted on Thursday, August 9th, 2012 at 13:50 and is filed under Business Change, Hints, Tips & Techniques. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.