Most people view organizational change the same way they view a clown standing down the street from them.

It may be a positive experience, but we’d rather it be someone else’s positive experience.

Despite our best efforts, the world continues to change and grow. In order to remain competitive, organizations need change alongside their environment. Changing certain parts of an organization are easy, but changing people is hard.

Most people try to avoid the clown.

For over fifty years, organizations have looked for help in leading people through change. They relied on thought leaders and researchers for help making sense of the mental processes people use to understand and cope with their changing roles. These models can help people become more willing and able to embrace change. At any level in the organization, leaders will be involved in leading change.

So leaders must meet the clown.

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In Sacred Cows, Robert Kriegel and David Brandt explore change. Specifically, they explore why people hold on to outmoded beliefs, process and practices despite evidence the are ineffective. The authors use numerous real-life examples to explain how to identify the sacred cows in an organization that are no longer effective and how to put them to pasture (their words, not mine). They cover how to overcome resistance and prepare an environment for change.

When reading the book, my mind kept going back to Senge’s concept of mental models. Specifically, mental models and sacred cows are a way of life…they make operations easier. However, when those sacred cows no longer serve you but actually hinder you from productivity, it is time to get rid of then. Senge also recommended shifting mental models, however he doesn’t go into enough depth about just HOW to do that. For that, you’ll have to read Sacred Cows Make the Best Burgers.

1. Create a sense of urgency. Identify potential threats and start honest discussions about the need for change.
2. Form a powerful coalition. Identify true leaders and ask for emotional commitment.
3. Create a vision for change. Develop a short vision with the coalition and practice communicating it.
4. Communicate the vision. Talk openly about the change vision and apply it to all aspects of operation.
5. Remove obstacles. Take action to identify change leaders and remove their barriers.
6. Create short-term wins. Look for sure-fire projects and highlight their success.
7. Build on the change. Set goals to continue building on the momentum created.
8. Anchor the changes in culture. Talk about the progress at every opportunity and ensure that people tie future success to the change effort.

Kotter’s work is heavily relied on because of its prescriptive nature. Some have even theorized that Kotter’s eight-stages build upon the three-stages developed by Lewin by providing instructions for leaders to follow while unfreezing, changing and refreezing.

Lewin would be flattered.

• Awareness of the need for change.
• Desire to support and participate in the change.
• Knowledge of how to change.
• Ability to implement the change.
• Reinforcement to sustain change.

Besides leveraging the power of acronyms, this model has made an impact in change management because of its softer, individual focus. There is nothing new in the ADKAR model, except how its unique perspective allows for unique application. Not unlike the five stages of grief, its easy for individuals and leaders in a changing organization to understand and diagnosis their own stage and develop a plan of action accordingly.

Argyris first defined intervention. To intervene is to enter into ongoing system or come between people, groups or objects to provide assistance. An intervener helps the system become better at problem solving, decision-making and implementation so that the system can continue to be effective. With a definition in place, Argyris moved on to outline three basic requirements, or primary tasks, for intervention. First, intervention must generate useful and accurate information to describe the factors that lead to the organization’s ineffectiveness. Second, the intervener must allow the system or organization to make an informed, free choice to become more effective. Third, the organization must gain internal commitment to implement the changes required to become more effective.

Argyris’ theory is not a model, but a series of vital recommendations for leading change. Argyris built on classic organizational behavior theories such as Theory X and Theory Y to create a series of recommendation and requirements that create a sort of oath of office for organizational consultants.

Most people view organizational change the same way they view a clown standing down the street from them.

It may be a positive experience, but we’d rather it be someone else’s positive experience.

Despite our best efforts, the world continues to change and grow. In order to remain competitive, organizations need change alongside their environment. Changing certain parts of an organization are easy, but changing people is hard.

Most people try to avoid the clown.

For over fifty years, organizations have looked for help in leading people through change. They relied on thought leaders and researchers for help making sense of the mental processes people use to understand and cope with their changing roles. These models can help people become more willing and able to embrace change. At any level in the organization, leaders will be involved in leading change.

So leaders must meet the clown.

In the series, we’ll get up close and personal with change and discusses the various models for leading your organization through changing, starting with the godfather of organizational change, Kurt Lewin.

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To begin, the authors debunk a common myth of personal change – that it only requires willpower. Instead, they outline the hidden forces that often drive our behavior. This acknowledgement that environment influence behavior brings the book out of the mire of books like As a Man Thinketh or The Secret and into the realm of actual, researched science. The authors review several studies that add evidence to their claims about the six sources of influence.

It’s an interesting read, and the authors do a great job summarizing several interesting studies. However, I’m unconvinced there is much to this book for leaders. If you’re trying to lose 20 pounds or stop adding to your credit card debt, then this book is a useful resource. If you’re an organization leader, looking to outline a large-scale change initiative, then perhaps books such as Leading Change or the newer Switch would be more appropriate. You’ll have to decide whether Change Anything is right for you.

Eleven years later, it failed.

Most people forget that the Constitution currently used by the world’s only remaining superpower is actually a second draft. In fact, most people forget that a significant portion of the ideas, movements and companies that changed the world were essentially reboots.

If you want to change the world, lead the second movement.

Consider the Internet. Yahoo established early position as the dominant search engine, but it was Google’s refined algorithm and revised, simplified home page that truly changed how humans interacted with each other. Or in music, Shawn Fanning may have revolutionized the way a generation of music lovers acquired tracks, but iTunes’ revised concept eventually solidified itself as the leader using a fully legal, equally accessible model.

If you want to change the world, watch what revolutionaries are doing right and, more importantly, what they’re doing wrong. Make the appropriate revisions and launch. Don’t try to be “the next Amazon.com” try to be “Amazon.com BUT…”

This is particularly disconcerting idea if you’re currently leading a revolution’s first movement. What can these leaders do to remain in the lead? Accept failure. Brace for impact. And revise your model. Change, at its boiled down reduction, is a process of failure and revision.

Leading change is too.

Too often leaders are unsure of just how to unfreeze an organization and create change ready followers. Many leaders start by casting a grand vision of what the new organization looks like. However, followers, still frozen in their ways, do not receive this new vision because they have yet to see why change is necessary. John Kotter’s (1996) book leading change presents an eight-step model for facilitating change that closely follows Lewin’s (1951) three phases model. If we overlay these two models, we see the first three stages of Kotter’s model providing insight on how to unfreeze an organization. These steps are as follows:

1. Create urgency. Leaders to help the organization see that it can not continue down the same old road.
2. Form a powerful coalition. In order to lead change, leaders at the top must form a team of change champions who hold status from a variety of sources.
3. Create a vision for change. Once the organization has a sense of urgency, the coalition can begin to propose a solution to the organization that will inspire them to work toward change.

Notice that step three is create a vision, step four is to communicate that vision. How often do we hear of a new CEO who enters intensely sharing a vision and who is fired just as intensely. If we want successful change, we must make followers change ready by creating this sense of urgency, getting a powerful team of champions together and writing that vision as a team.

Kotter, J. P. (1996) Leading change. Cambridge, MA: Harvard Business School Press.

Lewin, K. (1951). Field Theory in Social Science. New York, NY: Harper & Row.

When leading change in organizations, the primary role for leadership is to unbalance the force. Leaders need to influence followers to see the reasons to change, strengthen the helping forces in the process. If leaders fail to unbalance the force, the change effort simply will not occur.

Lewin, K. (1951). Field Theory in Social Science. New York, NY: Harper & Row.