You are the first step in organizational transformation

Organizations are collections of people — people with world-views, values, emotions, and needs. People whose lives and livelihoods are tied up in this thing we call an organization. It is a thing created by humans and to be continuously improved and changed by humans — not a static entity that we can’t intervene in.

I’ve worked on many organizational change projects and have seen firsthand the interplay between personal change and systems change. It’s an important relationship to understand because we need both kinds of change to truly shift an organization.

When I begin a new project, I look for what personal change is possible, what my clients are hungry to change within themselves, and how they have changed so far. It’s tempting to walk into an organization and tell folks how they should change, but that’s not how we humans like to receive consultants. So part of my personal practice is to avoid this mindset. Instead, I look for what matters to people, including the leaders with the most power. And I ask them to identify what might need to change within them to enable the systemic or cultural change to happen.

What does this typically look like? Sometimes it’s letting go of authority so that others can take it. Sometimes it’s changing how one approaches relationships in order to cultivate psychological safety or rebuild broken trust. Sometimes it’s learning about new ways of working and having the courage to try out the ones that are most uncomfortable. Each client is different, but all the change stretches people a bit outside of what feels safe and known — because this is where we learn and grow.

When leaders commit to personal change, it shows. When their commitment is sincere, those around them can sense it. It can be a catalyst for encouraging other employees to pursue personal change. The most successful leaders are those who also open up about the personal change they are going through, reminding us that we are all imperfect humans. This is the beginning of organizational transformation.

Sometimes this is a hard truth to swallow. There are endless attempts to push organizational transformation without accounting for personal change. A abundance of analysis, spreadsheets, presentations, recommendations, expert advice, and policy tweaks will not usher in change without human beings doing the “inner work” to break down personal barriers that are getting in the way.

So what does it look like to honor and support the personal change necessary for organizational change? For starters, we approach relationships with compassion and acknowledge that the work of changing mindsets or habits might be slower than we want it to be. It’s also about asking powerful questions, and here are a few that I keep in my back pocket:

• Why does this change matter to you?
• What do others need of you to make this change successful?
• How might this change challenge what you’re used to doing?
• What actions could you take to get in the way of this change?
• What actions could you take to move this change along?
• How do you feel about this change?
• What might you have to let go of to make this change successful?
• What might you have to embrace to make this change successful?

These kinds of questions remind us that as individuals we have incredible influence over what happens in an organization, even if we don’t fully understand that influence in any given moment. And returning to questions like this throughout a change process helps us keep paying attention to the personal while we do the work of changing sytems and culture. So throughout a change process, it’s important to keep checking in about what’s changing inside of us, what we’re learning, and how we want to show up with others. Change is not linear — our reactions and insights can easily change over time.

Personal change, of course, is not the only element in large-scale organizational transformation. There is much more to shifting complex systems, and I’ll write more about those other elements in the future! But I wanted to start at the beginning, which is the personal.