Revisiting Kotter's Change Model, With a Twist
In his book Leading Change, John Kotter describes an eight-step framework to create organizational change. We examine this framework along with a case study in our Certified Agile Leadership training.
Create urgency
Form a powerful guiding coalition
Create a vision
Communicate the vision
Remove obstacles
Create short-term wins
Build on the change
Anchor change in the culture
It’s a seductively simple framework, and one that is very useful, with the caveat from George Box: All models are wrong; some are useful. It’s wrong to think that something as complex as large-scale organizational change can follow a neat, eight-step sequence. Instead, one should treat these as eight important elements of an iterative process toward change. None of these eight elements can be treated as ‘one and done’ — they demand repeated and ongoing engagement from leadership - from the powerful coalition in element #2, which itself may need to evolve and adapt over time.
Join us in one of our Agile Leadership workshops to learn more about Kotter’s model and many other powerful frameworks for driving organizational change.
