What We Got Wrong First
A new book from IID Bangladesh collects 13 honest stories of institutional learning — from inclusion policies to policy influence — and shows what it really takes to adapt and improve.
What We Got Wrong First
What We Got Wrong First published by IID Bangladesh
2026 Download it here
“Most organisations are expected to share what worked. At the Institute for Informed Development (IID), Bangladesh, we also wanted to share the quieter part of our journey: the plans that did not work as expected, the assumptions that needed correction, and the lessons we had mostly kept within the team,” says Syeed Ahamed, CEO, IID Bangladesh.
IID is a civil society organisation working to promote an informed, inclusive, and democratic society through social accountability — and with support from Education Out Loud, they have been doing evidence-based advocacy and civic engagement for quality and equity in education in Bangladesh.
“Over time, including through Education Out Loud’s learning exchanges, we felt these stories could be useful only if told honestly. Therefore, we put it in a book. It is not a book about failure, but about the discipline to pause, listen and adapt,” adds Syeed Ahamed.
The book brings together 13 stories across 13 years of trial and error.
One story came from IID’s Gender Audit, carried out as part of the Gender and Social Inclusion effort supported by Education Out Loud. It showed that finance, procurement, HR and inclusion policies were individually strong, but not always connected in daily workflows. The lesson: inclusion is not a document. It is a culture built into everyday decisions.
Another story will resonate with civil society organisations doing advocacy work. For years, IID treated attendance at policy events as a measure of success. But paying closer attention to what happened after the room emptied told a different story. The shift came when IID stopped making events bigger and started making conversations longer, more protected, and more candid.
A third story showed how learning stayed in the notes. IID had a solid system for documenting lessons after events and projects. Notes were taken, checklists updated, debriefs held. And yet the same kinds of problems kept returning. Lessons lived in notes but never fully entered the organisation’s working systems. The shift came when IID stopped treating documentation as the end point and started asking: if this lesson matters, where will it live tomorrow?
“Going through the reflections on organisational practices and having the courage not only to learn from them, but to actually adapt is an inspiration to all organisations. Education Out Loud has, through its support to collaborative and experiential learning, been promoting adaptive practices. It is great to see civil society organisations mature partly due to this investment,” says Dorte Jørgensen, Senior Programme Coordinator, Education Out Loud.
👉 Read the full book here
👉 How Education Out Loud works with adaptive practices, see Adaptive Management in Education Out Loud