Does Change Require Crisis?
I have heard the phrase, “Never waste a good crisis,” from quite a few smart people but the one I remember most sharing that bit of insight is Ken McGee, a Distinguished Analyst at Gartner, and dang good counsel. I have been thinking about this recently, but not in the terms Ken and I used to discuss with various senior executives, about their, companies, but in terms of individuals.
In a recent video blog post, I did with my friend Rusty Zaspel, we discussed what it takes to make real change, in yourself. It seems that often I am talking to people who came to, or through, a crisis or traumatic event which spurred them on to a change. I started wondering, “does it always take a crisis or hitting some sort of ‘rock-bottom’ to spark real change in us humans?” That would kind of suck, IMHO.
But our conversation took at turn when Rusty said, “Transformation is an always happening thing.” That really hit me. For those of you who have read my book The Heart of Transformation; Building the Human Capabilities that Change Organizations for Good you will know that I believe change is not an act, it is not isolated, it is not just something you do episodically then go back to “normal”. Nope, not in the world we live in. We all agree that the pace of change has increased, whether driven by technology or something else, the change around us has increased logarithmically.
Given this, my own belief is that change is a capability. And it is something that can become an organizational capability, but it cannot start as one. It starts individually. Then it grows in pairs or groups. It takes hold in pockets and corners. Eventually, if nurtured, it can grow into something organizational. And lasting. A capability, a competitive advantage, a company strength.
So, what are the implications of this?
It takes time.
If you have made all your decisions, crafted your strategy, envisioned your goals, and are now ready to address change…well…you’re too late. This is one of the key reasons that organizational change efforts usually range from falling flat to utter disaster (despite what that pricey consulting firm will tell you and sell you and, mea culpa, I am guilty of selling that beautiful lie in the past as well. Because I believed it too).
It requires different tools.
Dialogue-based, interpersonal, and very human tools. The best ones I know of are what appear to mere conversation-starters; good questions that cause us to think. But good questions operationalize curiosity—one of our most powerful tools in building relationship, seeking clarity, and gaining true alignment. It takes good questions, and real answers, to expose and then examine our assumptions. Until we can actually see them, and express them, we cannot do anything other than follow them blindly. And the blind following of a belief system, even one that once served us well and was, maybe, “right” at that time, will come to cause us pain and misdirection.
It’s your job, not somebody else’s.
This has meaningful implications for everyone in the organization but more so even for that organization’s leaders. My experience, with literally thousands of C-suite leaders across the globe, is that they are the ones who are, in the end, actually the most resistant to change when it comes to their own change. Chris Argyris’s “Teaching Smart People How to Learn” (Harvard Business Review, 1991) argues that the very qualities that make people successful — intelligence, competence, achievement — often make them poor learners when it comes to reflecting on their own behavior. He illustrates something he calls The Competence—Fragility Paradox
The more people define their identity around being "smart" or "capable," the less tolerance they have for being wrong or appearing ignorant.
They equate learning (which involves admitting gaps) with failure.
So, they avoid situations that might expose their weaknesses - especially interpersonal or behavioral ones.
In effect: their intelligence fuels their inability to learn from failure.
So, no, I don’t think a good crisis is required to change, although it can be a great catalyst or moment, no doubt about that. But wouldn’t it be nicer if we were engaged in an “always happening” of change consciously? If our ability to change, adapt, evolve was a capability we held as people, and leaders, in our organizations? Let’s take the shock out of change, let’s just accept that it’s coming. And coming. And then get to work accordingly.
