In the last three decades of increasing change and uncertainty, leaders in organizations have been chasing the manifesto “We must manage change or be washed away!” This manifesto has resulted in a myriad of change efforts, some of which have only marginally succeeded, and most of which have failed outright. The unfortunate result of these change efforts is a wasteland of demoralized, exhausted, and jaded employees and leaders.

The reason that most change efforts fail has less to do with what the organization and its people are doing, or are not doing, and more to do with the dynamic of its corporate culture. Like countries, organizations are cultures — corporate cultures — consisting of visible artifacts such as language, structures, history, and ways of working and getting things done. But an important aspect of a corporate culture is not visible — its ability and capacity to learn. Like an ocean, a corporate culture has strong flows and dynamics that shift and move people, decisions, learning, and actions in certain ways. Many people simply go with the flow, learning by following what others are doing. Others try to initiate change efforts, often going against the flow, challenging and questioning the way things are done around here.

Many change efforts meet a tidal wave of resistance, marking out the boundaries of learning capacity. This is often blamed on something called resistance to change, which can occur at any level of an organization. But resistance to change is a complex concept. More often than not, it is a lack of understanding and an unconscious reaction to uncertainty — an attempt to stabilize in a hurricane of change. Strategic practice helps us to understand and work with the dynamics of corporate culture, so that we can create the conditions in which people and their organizations thrive

This Strategic Practice Quick Reference Guide is a companion guide to Corporate Culture and Organizational Change: Strategic Practice Guide. This Strategic Practice Quick Reference Guide contains information and tools that you can use in real time to analyze cultural system dynamics – people’s ideologies, and the power and politics dynamic that arises when ideologies clash causing change efforts to fail. It focuses on identifying the cultural stances that are occurring, understanding which cultural patterns cultures have in common as points of effective intervention, making a strategic choice, and taking action on that strategic choice.

Who Should Buy This Guide? This Guide is designed for people who want to learn to solve complex problems and have an understanding of the strategic practice approach described in Corporate Culture and Organizational Change: Strategic Practice Guide.