How often have you heard the phrase “we’ve always done it this way?” I’ve heard it so many times for whatever reason over the years, that it drives me crazy. We seem to get caught up in our comfort zone because of the way we’ve always done things – and change disrupts our routine or behavior, or worse yet – what may be possible.

A couple of examples come to mind. I happen to be a member of the Crested Butte – Mt Crested Butte Rotary Club. Our annual fundraiser is a Rubber Ducky Race held in the summer each year. We sell tickets locally and People buy the tickets (which are numbered) and effectively by a “duck in the race” which has a corresponding number to their ticket. We actually release about 6,000 of these rubber ducks into a local stream and about 20 minutes later the winners have traveled downstream and are identified at the finish line.

Not to get into any of the details are reasons why, I suggested that we expand our geographic reach for ticket sales to a City 30 miles away. Several of the older members of our Rotary Club thought it was a bad idea because we’ve always conducted our sales locally. You would’ve thought that I was suggesting a complete revamping in the way we did things, rather than trying something new. They said “Frank, we don’t want to let anyone else sell our tickets other than in our community because that’s the way we’ve always done it. We don’t want to lose our identity.” Rather than simply expanding our reach and identity, they wanted to continue to keep it close to home.

Another example that comes to mind is the process and method with which employers bid out their health insurance programs, or how they select their brokers and consultants. When I happen to contact an employer about their upcoming renewal, in many cases I get responses similar to “we’re not going to quote our program out this year,” or “contact our broker and they can review your recommendations,” or “here’s the process that always done to review quotes” or “we’ve always used this broker,” or “we’ve always been with XXX insurance company and we don’t think anybody can compete,” or some version thereof.

We tend to get comfortable in the processes that we know and have come to utilize in the past. We tend to get so embedded in the way we’ve done things that sometimes we put blinders on as to if there’s a better way. We block out the possible benefits and opportunities of doing things differently because we don’t want to create change for ourselves and/or others, or we are uncertain about the results that change may bring. Or worse yet, we don’t want to take ownership of change if things don’t turn out the way we expected them to.

As Rear Admiral Grace Murray Hopper said “the most damaging phrase in the language is We’ve always done it the way!’”

Sometimes you need to crack some eggs to make an omelet. New technology is a perfect example of how change can benefit everyone. If we get stuck in old technology we wouldn’t be where we are today.

Be open to change and new ideas. Sometimes you don’t know what you don’t know.