In December 2019, I wrote about attending the Lean Higher Education International Conference at the University of Michigan. I was new in my role as Change and Opportunity Lead with the Office of the Vice-Provost, Students at Ryerson University. The conference brought back the excitement I had felt in 2013 at my first OneStop conference. I ended that post with a question: how long would it be before I moved from learner to leader in Lean?
The answer is (apparently) seven years. In October 2026, I chaired the organizing committee for Lean into the Challenge, the Lean HE 2026 virtual global conference. The 2019 question assumed that learning gives way to leadership. Chairing the conference required as much learning as my first Lean HE conference did, and in less comfortable ways.
The 24-hour format, a volunteer team spread across continents and AI tools for planning and scheduling were all new to me. Lean asks practitioners to run small experiments, learn from the results and adjust. Teaching that principle is easier than applying it to my own leadership. Experience did not remove the discomfort of trying something new. It made the discomfort more visible, because a team takes its cue from how its leader responds to uncertainty.
The conference succeeded because others also stepped into an untested format. Session hosts gave up early mornings and late evenings. Presenters shared unfinished work and lessons from failure. Participants joined from around the world and built community in a virtual space.
In 2019, I challenged you to think about the last time you were a learner. This time, I challenge you to name the last time you led through something new.