Day 22 · Act IV — Lead the Organisation
Leading Change
Kotter · ADKAR · Resistance and adoption
~35 minutes
People do not resist change; they resist being changed.
The Core Idea
Most change programmes fail not on design but on adoption. Leaders underestimate how much people need to understand, feel and practise before behaviour shifts.
Kotter's eight steps address the organisational journey; Prosci's ADKAR addresses the individual one. Use both.
The Mental Model
ADKAR
Awareness, Desire, Knowledge, Ability, Reinforcement — Prosci's individual change model.
At work: Training (Knowledge) fails when staff never saw why the change matters (Awareness) or wanted it (Desire).
The Case Study
Kotter's urgency principle
DocumentedJohn Kotter's 1995 HBR article 'Leading Change: Why Transformation Efforts Fail' identified failing to establish urgency as the first common error.
Interpretation: complacency, not opposition, is often the larger obstacle.
Cinema & Story
Invictus (2009)
Symbolic acts can shift a nation's emotional readiness for change.
The Reading Room
Leading Change
John P. Kotter
The classic eight-stage process for organisational transformation.
Further reading: Switch — Chip Heath & Dan Heath
The Journal · Portfolio output: Change leadership plan
The Field Experiment · within 24 hours
Interview one sceptic about the change. Ask what would make it work for them.
The Evening Review
Lead the heart, and the process will follow.