When you try to make changes, you will encounter resistance. Jeremy Thomas and Myron Weber discuss a mental model and practical applications for understanding the sources and solutions to systemic resistance.
- Sources of Resistance
- Knowledge Inertia: see the concept of paradigm shifts as introduced by Thomas Kuhn in The Structure of Scientific Revolutions.
- Structural Stasis: things are the way they are for a reason – you can’t change the structure of a system by fiat
- Political Resistance: organizations don’t make decisions; people in organizations make decisions. Public Choice theory helps us understand the motivations.
- A Physical Analogy of Resistance and How to Overcome It
- Friction: static friction keeps things locked in place; dynamic friction creates heat when change is under way
- Lubricants: getting things unstuck and keeping them moving
- Conceptual Models for Overcoming Resistance
- Strategic Leadership: unfreeze – change – freeze (Kurt Lewin)
- Cultural Leadership: manage your own anxiety to improve the functioning of the system (Murray Bowen)
- Technical Leadership: solving the problem is the most important goal of leadership (Gerald Weinberg)
- Systems Thinking: what do you control; what do you influence; what established structures and functions must be changed?
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