We have a bias for our own ideas. We put work into developing our ideas, we test them in our heads, and we fall in love with them. When leading change, we need to subordinate this bias.

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The research is chock full of proof that we love our own ideas…our own stuff. A favorite of mine is something called “the IKEA effect,” which comes from research done at Harvard, Tulane and Duke. People were willing to pay 63 percent more for an IKEA product they assembled than a pre-assembled item. “Even constructing a standardized bureau, an arduous, solitary task, can lead people to overvalue their (often poorly constructed) creations,” the researchers say.

They cite how 1950s housewives originally weren’t excited about cake mixes, so the manufacturers added some housewife-required input (an egg was added to the recipe), and packages flew off the shelves. Build-a-Bear is another creation people value for their own contribution.

“This needs to be mine,” we seem to say, or “I need to contribute,” even if it’s only subconscious.

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We can’t let our subconsciouses win when we’re inspiring change. Because, you see, our people also love their own ideas—their own stuff. Like anyone else, they value their own contributions more than others’.

So we set ourselves up for failure (and two-thirds of change efforts do fail) when we fall in love with our ideas and think everyone else also will when—to our people—it wasn’t their idea.

Best to set aside our brilliance and ask our people first. This is for two reasons: Our people will feel that they contributed to the plan to reach the (now) shared goal; things move faster, with less resistance (visible or not). And our people are closer to the day-to-day, to the customer, to what’s going on, so we’re likely to learn a lot from what they have to say…and thus we settle on ideas that are less naïve…and more likely to take hold.

I personally LOVE my own ideas…they excite me, give me energy…so the IKEA effect was a huge learning opportunity for me.

And you?