Creating Intelligent Change

Fact is 75% of all transformation programs do not reach the intended outcomes.

Change is HARD and all the effort, passion and drive that gets put into it, reaps poor rewards. It's frustrating and leaves people burnt out, change fatigued and disengaged.

Sarcasm rises when yet another change program is announced. Your voice of why it didn't work in the past is quickly silenced, your black hat thinking is not welcome in the face of fresh enthusiasm and renewed drive. After the initial rebuff, you keep quiet with half a foot out of the program, going through the motions.

Sound familiar? Poorly run change leaves a bad taste in our mouths. It could have been so great, but somehow it wasn't. We can finger point at certain roles or individuals to make us feel better in our justification, but not until we realise that we are part of system and address change at the systemic level, we are ignorant to navigating change intentionally and consciously.

Change is the new normal and transformation is the new era. We need to get really good at creating intelligent change, accept that it is constant, inevitable and natural. People adapt to change at different speeds and for different reasons.

Intelligent change understands the underlying dynamics of change and works actively with the system to navigate intentionally.

Change occurs when we cross the edge, from the know to the unknown, from how we know how to be to new behaviours. The edge is at the limit of what we know about ourselves and our system, a new frontier.

Change challenges at the identity level - from "how we have always worked" to "the new ways of working".

Change is deeply personal, emotional and at the edge is usually accompanied by a frustrating push/pull dance between what is known and what is not yet known.

Everyone has a role to play in how the edge is crossed. Some leap over enthusiastically, some hold onto what is known, some build bridges for others to cross.

Intelligent change means being able to work with, address and consciously navigate the signals of how change is received and experienced to create successful lasting transformation into the new world.

Credit: Creating Intelligent Teams - Anne Rod, Marita Fridjhon

Christiane is an experienced facilitator, competent trainer, leadership and individual coach and works with change, builds teams and communities of practice in large and complex environments. As a critical and inductive thinker her focus is to innovate and improve thinking, processes and practices. 

She specialises in building high performing teams by bringing in expertise in human behaviour, group process psychology, deep democracy and rising the teams emotional and group intelligence. She is currently raising her expertise of transformational change by going through the Organisation and Relationship Systems Coaching program with https://www.crrglobal.com/