Is Your Organisation Ready For Change?
How can you tell if your organisation is ready for change? This is not a simple question because, before we can answer this question, we must first answer 3 other questions. The first is [...]
The Ocean
In last week’s post, I wrote that change readiness is primarily about the capacity to succeed in the change process. Today, I want to take this idea deeper.I want you to think about the ocean. [...]
Capacity
What ideas come to mind when you think of the term ‘change readiness’? I don’t know what the term means to you but let me suggest some ideas of what it means for some. [...]
Highly Symmetrical Organisations
How many times have you encountered a change that doesn’t make a difference? I have seen many such changes. There’s lots of noise and activity, but, in the end, no difference. In physics, such changes are [...]
Reduce the Cost of Organisational Change
Most organisational changes cost more than expected and incur unnecessary financial losses. According to a recent McKinsey study, 78% of the financial losses occur in the implementation phase. And the reason for these losses comes [...]
Positioned to Learn
We often think of change – especially organisational change – as something to be implemented and managed. Change is what happens in the organisational machinery, and in the context within which the organisation operates.Viewed this [...]
Failure
Failure. It’s not a four-letter word but it’s still a dirty word in many places.From this starting point, we could explore attitudes towards failure and the importance of psychological safety as a key cultural element.But [...]
Is My Organisation Ready to Change?
What is the critical factor indicating the organisation is ready for the change?This is a great question but before we delve into an answer, let’s stop for a moment and think about ‘the change’. The [...]
On the Kubler-Ross Model
On the Kubler-Ross ModelI have written elsewhere about the Kubler-Ross Model (KRM).I have nothing against the model, but I do have a problem with it when it’s used as a model of change. Unfortunately, it [...]
Competitive Advantage
Whether a business survives and thrives depends on how creatively it adapts to future demands, not how well it has performed in the past. Adapting to an unknown and unpredictable future requires agility. Becoming more agile in how [...]
Agile People Agile Business
Agile People Agile Business A Matter of Survival Our survival will come down to how agile our minds are. Humanity has many problems to solve - climate change, social inequality, the threat of war, [...]
Cultural Knowledge
For most of human existence, change happened slowly. For generations people hunted and foraged, or later farmed the land or kept animals. Not much changed. But that’s far from our experience today. We count [...]
Getting to Know Agility
Getting to Know Agility What do we know about the strategic creation of agile organisations?In 2014, Schulling reported on a 25 year-long study into this question. Here are 6 insights from that study.Develop an inquiry [...]
Why Agility Is Important
Why Agility Is Important We all know that business in the 21st century is different from what it was in the 20th century. In the 20th century, competitive advantage was based on economies of scale, [...]
The Meaning of Management
The Meaning of Management What does management mean to you? What did it mean in the past and how has it changed over time? Social Change Before the start of the Industrial Revolution in the [...]
KPIs and Change Fitness
The true value of change fitness becomes apparent when you think of improvements in KPIs. Performance improvements can come from efficiency gains, or they can come from capacity gains. Building change fitness increases performance capacity. [...]
The Change Fitness Story
The change fitness story Everything has a story. Here’s a quick peek at the change fitness story.About 20 years ago, one of The Change Gym’s founders, Dr Steve Barlow, worked in the NSW prison system [...]
Boost Your Performance
How do you boost performance in your organisation? Do you use incentives to inspire people to perform better? Or perhaps you rely on performance reviews to provide feedback, maintain accountability, and set new targets.Sure, all [...]
Create Star Performers
It’s often said that people are your greatest asset. But not all people equally. For instance, Google found that 90% of their teams' performance was produced by just 10% of their people. And we're [...]
4 change readiness questions
An organisation’s change readiness is its readiness to succeed at the change process. It is not about an organisation’s readiness to begin a change project – it is about readiness to succeed at the [...]
What we do
What we do We help leaders deliver organisational change projects that are more successful, easier to achieve, with less risk, and at less cost.We do this by helping them build the change readiness of their [...]
How We Work
How we work Our initial meeting will be an introduction to build a general understanding of your needs and how we might be able to help you. This meeting is free of change.People are often [...]
Leading Successful Change
Leading Successful Change By Dr Steve Barlow Every leader wants to be successful. Many leaders look and act successful on the outside. Many also lay awake at night – worried about those cracks in [...]
Managing Change and Free Will
When you’re managing change it’s obviously best if stakeholders want to follow you of their own free will, rather than being dragged into change against their will. The question is, how do you get [...]
Changing Organisational Culture
We often think of the culture of an organisation as ‘the way we do things around here’ or ‘the way things are’. Culture seems to convey some sort of reality – the reality of how [...]
How to Secure Your Future As a Change Manger
The future is bright for change managers provided they can bring together tow big areas of knowledge. This article explores what these are and gives you tips for the future.
4 Tips for New Coaches
4 Tips for New Coaches It was my first day on the job. I stood by the window, waiting for my first coaching client to arrive. I felt nervous, quite unsure of what to [...]
Succeed at Every Step
MANAGING CHANGE PAID SERIES In this short video we ask what is meant by the change process and what is required for success. Succeed at Every Step https://vimeo.com/416772534/fc56919511
About The Change Gym
Hi, I’m Steve Barlow, a Director of The Change Gym.I want to help you understand what we do as a company and how we may be able to help you. So, let me tell you [...]
Are You an Essential Worker?
This sign has appeared outside London Tube stations and speaks to the realities of life during a pandemic. A few people get the green light to travel and everyone else goes home.But life has never [...]
Marketing and Sales: The Secret of Stuck
Marketing and Sales: The Secret of Stuck This is the third article in a 3-part series on marketing and sales. In the first article, we considered marketing and sales as engaging in the first two [...]
Marketing & Sales: The Secret of the Stories
Marketing & Sales: The Secret of the Stories This is the second article in a 3-part series on marketing and sales, taken from the perspective of change and change readiness. In the first article, we [...]
Marketing & Sales: The Secret of the Steps
Marketing & Sales: The Secret of the Steps This is the first article in a 3-part series on marketing and sales form a change perspective. If you’re in the early stages of building a business, [...]
Change Management Toolkit Benefits
BENEFITS Based on best-practice change management processes Leverages the natural structure and flow of the change process Guides you through each step of the change process Helps you ask the right questions at each [...]
You Are the Magic
You Are the Magic Have you ever felt like you’re not very important? I think most of us feel like that from time to time. I know I have – many times.It’s easy to feel [...]
Why a Business Analyst’s Change Readiness Assessment is Crucial
One of The Change Gym's Directors, Dr Steve Barlow, was recently featured in an article about organisational change readiness. You can read the article below, and then follow the link to the original article written [...]
How to Predict the Future
How useful would it be if you could predict with pinpoint accuracy what will happen in the future? Imagine you could accurately predict the performance of a coaching client over a given time period. [...]
About The Change Gym
We are a team of change specialists helping organisations and individuals build more capacity to succeed at the change process. For your organisation to become more agile and successful at change, you should develop your [...]
Change: The Learning Zone
In a previous article, I made the claim that humans are hard-wired for change. My argument there was that, since we have managed to survive and thrive in virtually every ecological niche on the planet [...]
Debunking a Popular Myth: the Kubler-Ross Model of Change
The Kubler-Ross Model (of Change)Many people are familiar with the Kubler-Ross model. This model is often cited as a description of how change works – a model of change, if you will. It is commonly [...]
Live Training
LIVE TRAINING RESISTANCE TO READINESS This live 1-day training is delivered online or onsite. Discover why resistance to change occurs and how you can turn resistance into readiness. Build engagement and succeed at change. LEARN [...]
Have You Gone Viral Yet?
I remember the first time I heard the concept of going viral. An associate told me that you create a piece of content, put it on a social media platform, and wait for it to [...]
You Need a Strategy
Swiss adventurer, psychiatrist, and author, Bertrand Piccard, makes a very interesting observation about how most people approach life. He says, “To construct our life, we’re going to need to learn some strategies, but in reality, [...]
What We Do
Growing Success We help organisations and individuals become more successful at change. We do this by developing their capacity to succeed at the change process, helping them get ready for change, and by providing actionable [...]
Is the Change Process Real?
Is the change process real?Is there such a thing as the change process? That might sound a strange question because there are hundreds of models of the change process and people have been studying it [...]
The Hardware and Software of Change
The Hardware and Software of ChangeHuman beings have always needed to adapt to change. The fact that we have survived so far, have managed to occupy almost every ecological niche on the planet, and have [...]
Understanding the Demands of Change
When the change process is difficult it is difficult for a reason. The reason is that it makes demands on us. We might look at those demands in a future article (let me know if [...]
Are We Leading Change with the Wrong Framework?
Think of the term ‘change management’. What framework is implicitly related to that term? Obviously, it’s the management framework. Accordingly, change management is one type of management. ‘Management’ is the broad framework and ‘change [...]
How to Create Successful Change
In 2010, McKinsey reported the findings of a huge study involving more than 315,000 respondents. They found that 75% of organisations were experiencing change and that 70% of change initiatives were regarded as unsuccessful.Hundreds of [...]
Move Beyond Your Comfort Zone
Flames pushed at the cold and dark as they eagerly devoured the campfire. In a ring around the fire, I sat with a group of friends. Behind us, the blackness stretched into the unknown. But [...]
A Difficult Change
I want to tell you about one of the hardest things I have ever done in my life.I created a website. That might not sound like much but hang in there – there’s an important message [...]
Where does change fitness coaching fit in?
We base a lot of what we do and teach on the model shown below. You get coaching clients because they have a change project. This is the problem they want to [...]
The Challenge of Organisational Change
Some years ago, a yachtsman competing in the BOC challenge pulled into Sydney harbour. He and his fellow competitors were sailing solo around the world. They were competing against each other, but also [...]
How should we understand change fitness coaching?
We know there are different types of coaches: business coaches, life coaches, executive coaches, career coaches, etc. So, what’s a change fitness coach? Is it a new type of coaching, or is it [...]
What is a change readiness assessment?
You might not know why you would even need a change readiness assessment if you don’t understand what it is. In this article, I want to give you a general understanding of what [...]
How much change is ‘too much’?
In this article we examine the perceptions people have of how much change occurs in a workplace, and how those perceptions affect behaviours. In a 2017 article in the British Journal of Management*, [...]
Change fatigue – the hidden killer
Managers are often aware when employees resist change. Resistance is usually a visible thing – people complain, tell negative stories, or get annoyed. But change fatigue is hidden and managers often fail to [...]
Recognising The Demands of the Change Process
This article examines why people find change difficult and how managers and leaders can help employees find success. We all know change is, at times, demanding. It takes us outside our comfort zone [...]
Change Fitness and Change Readiness – How are they similar and different?
How are change readiness and change fitness similar, and how are they different? They are similar in that they both relate to the change process. One is about being fit for the change [...]
Is Change Readiness about Getting Ready to Begin?
Getting ready to begin a change is certainly important. Many people think change readiness is mainly about getting ready to begin – organising things in preparation and ticking off the checklist. Sure, this [...]
HOW DO YOU ASSESS CHANGE READINESS?
This article will help you understand how to assess change readiness in an organisation. This is important information if you manage organisational change. Change readiness has been on my horizon for almost 20 [...]
THE 3 ‘A’S OF ORGANISATIONAL CHANGE
We need to start thinking more systemically about organisational change. I mean, we need to move beyond the first A (acceptance) and start thinking about the other two (acceptance and adaptability). Approach Lewin, [...]
THE HOW AND WHAT OF CHANGE FITNESS COACHING
To a greater or lesser extent, many coaches do their work in the applied psychology space. In other words, they are interested in what goes on in the mind of their clients. So, [...]
HOW CHANGE FITNESS COACHING WILL HELP YOU
This article will help you understand the value of working with a change fitness coach. HIGH VALUE OUTCOMES Success. Have you ever watched a master at work? A master makes it look easy. [...]
What’s So Special About Change Fitness Coaching?
What's So Special About Change Fitness Coaching? What's so special about change fitness coaching and why could it interest you? Coaching is an exciting industry and there is scope to specialise and [...]
What’s the Problem with Organisational Change?
What’s the Problem with Organisational Change? If you lived one hundred years ago and you asked, “What’s the problem with organisational change?”, a good answer would have been, “We have no scientific understanding [...]
How to Manage Client Accountability in Coaching
Accountability We are all accountable for what we say and do because we are part of a system. Our behaviours affect others, and their behaviours affect us. This accountability takes many structures – [...]
How to Manage Expectations in Coaching
We all have expectations. Coaches should make those expectations explicit at the outset of the coaching relationship, and they should insist on them throughout the relationship. It is important to be very clear [...]
Linda’s Story
Linda came to me after a successful career in the corporate world. She was facing a period of change in her life and she was a little nervous about it. She needed some [...]
PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT TRAINING FOR COACHES
We provide International Coach Federation accredited professional development training for coaches in change fitness, change leadership, and change readiness. Our training will equip you to better understand your clients' change journey and how [...]
Barriers Coaching Clients Face – and How You Can Address Them
Common questions about coaching If the coaching-specific literature and the 2016 #ICF survey of coaches are anything to go by, a lot of people are interested in the impact and benefits of coaching. [...]
How Change Fitness Affects Performance
Change fitness supports performance Change fitness doesn’t only help you change – change fitness also helps you perform. In the modern world, our ability to perform is increasingly dependent on our ability to [...]
How to Leverage Individual Differences During Change
SWOT When seeking to manage organisational change, it is important to identify and leverage your strengths. A useful methodology to use is a SWOT analysis (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, Threats). In this article, I [...]
What Is Organisational Change Readiness – and how can you get more of it?
There is some confusion around the concept of change readiness and I want to help you understand what it means. In this article, I am focusing on change readiness in organisations, [...]
Overcoming Negative Attitudes to Change in Coaching
This article is written for coaches and people involved in managing change. We have all adapted to change Humans are oddly ambiguous creatures. On the one hand, we are among the most adaptable [...]
How to Assess Client Progress in Coaching
This article explores how to assess client progress in coaching and is mainly written for people who are new to coaching (as well as old hands). I will be considering how to assess [...]
How to Coach and Build a Business
In this article I want to address the issue of how to coach and at the same time how to build a coaching business. I recently posted on LinkedIn an article called “Should [...]
How to Reduce Anxiety in Coaching
Anxiety Have you ever thought of how clients feel before that first coaching session they have with you? Some might be excited and really looking forward to it, but others might be slightly [...]
Is Coaching a Form of Education?
The backlash A few months ago, while talking with an experienced coach, I made the comment that coaching is a form of education. That statement encountered an immediate backlash. According to this person, [...]
Build the Capacity to Change
I believe change is possible for everyone, but that doesn’t mean everyone has the capacity to change. What does that mean? What do we mean by 'change'? We need to go back to [...]
What Is a Change Fitness Coach?
Steve, what is a change fitness coach? I have been asked this question many times, so I thought I would write down my answer. I will make my answer simple but bear in [...]
Becoming Adaptable, Remaining Stable
When I was a kid we had a game called Fiddle Sticks, also called Pick Up Sticks. You had a container of sticks which you’d empty onto the table, creating a random structure. [...]
Are We Free or Programmed?
How much freedom do we have to change? This is an important question because our beliefs affect the structure of our thinking, how we approach the world, and what we think is possible. [...]
Managing Change, Change Fitness, and Power
Much of the language around change management has to do with power. In this article I want to challenge you to rethink the nature of this power and to consider the role of [...]
The Change Quadrant™
The idea of change fitness didn’t just come out of nowhere. It has been shaped by the ideas of great thought leaders, including Lewin, Sternberg, McAdams, Maruna, Koltko-Rivera, Prochaska & DiClemente, Seligman, Gergan, [...]
Why Coaching Fails
I have been coaching for over 16 years and I wish I could say that all my clients made fantastic progress. Some did, but others were disappointed with the coaching outcomes and some [...]
Should I Become a Coach?
Coaching as a Career Choice As the title suggests, this article is written for people who are considering moving into coaching as a career. Many others have already made that transition – some [...]
On ICF Accreditation
What are accredited programs? Our flagship program, the Personal Change Fitness Program (PCFP), is accredited by the International Coach Federation (ICF). That may mean something to some of our readers, but in this [...]
Personal Change Fitness Program
What’s the Background? The PCFP was developed in 2015 by The Change Gym’s founders, Steve and Stephanie Barlow. To be agile and ready to succeed at change, people [...]
Beyond the Me Project
The mystery of things I recently purchased a book about famed Australian artist, Margaret Olley. In that book I read these words, penned by Lou Klepac; “if we stopped judging objects by their [...]
THE CHANGE GYM – WHAT’S OUR STORY?
The Change Gym began under a different name in February 2010. If you’re interested to hear our story thus far, here it is. Let’s go back before 2010. In the first decade of [...]
Change Readiness Assessment
What Does Our Change Readiness Assessment Check? The Change Gym provides comprehensive change readiness assessments for organisational change. We check 3 key areas of an organisation's change readiness. These are the: Stakeholder engagement [...]
What’s Next?
We need to be willing to change. Change is the essence of life. Those words aren’t mine: they come from American psychiatrist Dr. Gordon Livingston. After listening to people telling him their woes, [...]
How Should Coaches Understand their Clients?
How should coaches understand their clients? There is a way of understanding literature that could be called a ‘through the window’ approach. The idea is that reading a novel is like standing in [...]
3 Lessons My New Friend Taught Me
My new friend has been teaching me. Wicket is a 12-year-old, one-eyed rescue dog who joined our family about 15 weeks ago. It was love at first sight – a perfect match. He [...]
Will Change Fitness Become a Key Employability Factor?
There are some good reasons why change fitness may become an important employability factor in the future. When you stop and think about the context of the modern world, at least in the [...]
Three Signs a Client is Ready for Coaching
You can’t assume a client must be ready for coaching just because they turned up. Some people think the coach’s job is to get rid of their problems and make them successful. Others [...]
Change Readiness Assessments
We provide change readiness assessments for businesses and organisations facing change. Change readiness assessments fall into four broad categories. We can assess your: stakeholder readiness to engage in a specific change (their readiness [...]
Change Readiness Training
The Change Gym provides change readiness training and coaching for organisational leaders wanting to better understand this important issue. There is a large body of literature on the nature of the change process [...]
How to Build Change Readiness
The Change Gym has something important to offer ordinary people who want more out of life, coaches who want to better outcomes, and organisations wanting to become more successful. This offer is not [...]
Why Change Readiness Matters
Why does change readiness matter, and why should it matter to you? Here are 4 reasons. The question is not whether you will change - the question is how likely are you to [...]
What Makes Coaching Work?
In this article, I want to examine what makes coaching work. A friend of mine recently went to a business networking meeting. The speaker was a business coach. After the presentation, three separate [...]
BENEFITS OF BEING A CHANGE FITNESS COACH
There are real benefits in Change Fitness Coaching, and it is worth considering this opportunity. Here are 10 advantages to consider. Need – the need for change fitness is a real thing. [...]
Bob’s Story
Meeting Bob When I first met Bob he seemed like a savvy business consultant with all the right answers. He was a guy in his early 4os, well-presented, well-spoken, and he appeared confident. [...]
Brian’s Story
I first met Brian through LinkedIn. He lives in Australia, loves learning, and is a medical professional. He was interested in change fitness because he encounters many clients who say they want [...]
Julie’s Story
Julie is a self-employed coach living in Australia. She comes from a professional background, and, although she considers herself a capable and skilled coach, she found it difficult to know how to [...]
A More Comprehensive Approach to Organisational Change
The aim of The Change Gym is to change how organisations approach change. Arguably, the current dominant approach reflects Kotter’s 8-step change model. Whilst we acknowledge the contribution that Kotter has made to [...]
How to Be Free When Nothing’s Free
Written by Dr Steve Barlow Freedom’s an interesting concept, and it’s not always what you’d expect or easy to define. I spent some years delivering anger management coaching to maximum security prisoners. Contact [...]
Two Problems, One Solution
Written by Steve Barlow Let me ask you a question. Why do your coaching clients come to you? There could be a myriad of reasons, but they probably all boil down to one [...]
How Coachable is Your Perfect Client?
Written by Dr Steve Barlow How coachable is your perfect client? Most people would probably say, “Very coachable”. Right? Well, maybe. We all like clients who are intrinsically motivated, honest and open, self-aware [...]
About Change Fitness Coaching
Written by Dr Steve Barlow You might be wondering what's different about change fitness coaching. Is it what you're already doing, or is it something different? Let's explore this idea. Tradition Innovation is [...]
5 Signs of Low Change Fitness
5 Signs of Low Change Fitness What are the 5 signs of low change fitness? If you hear comments like these from a client, it is likely a symptom of a change [...]
How to Become a Better Coach
How to Become a Better Coach How can you become a better coach? You might be just starting out as a coach, or you might have been in the business for years. [...]
5 Tips to Build a Successful Coaching Practice
5 Tips to Build a Successful Coaching Practice By Dr Steve Barlow There’s an issue many coaches face: the struggle to get enough clients. Many have paid thousands of dollars in training to [...]
Introduction to Change Fitness Coaching
Written by Dr Steve Barlow I want to give you an introduction to change fitness coaching. Most coach training/PD programs aim to make someone a better coach. Sounds obvious, but why is it [...]
Slaying Dragons, Changing Lives
Slaying Dragons, Changing Lives by Dr Steve Barlow You may not have realised it, but there are connections between coaching and dragons. I’m referring to those dangerous and fearsome dragons of European mythology; [...]
Give Change What It Deserves
We all know that human behaviour is complex - get people involved with change and you'll soon discover that. Some embrace change and see it as a challenge and adventure, but, unfortunately, many [...]
6 Reasons Why Coaches Need Change Fitness
Here are six reasons why coaches need change fitness. Change fitness is about your change capacity and that of your coaching clients. It's great to have plans and goals for the future, but if [...]
Letter to Coaches
“We don’t see things as they are: we see them as we are.” Anais Nin. Our perspectives dominate us. Social learning theorists claim that much of what we know we learn from the [...]
Overcoming Limits to Growth
In the year 1972 a new book entitled “Limits to Growth” appeared in the bookstores. At the time, this book aroused a great deal of interest. It focused on what happens when exponential [...]
The Link Between Uncertainty and Success
The Link Between Uncertainty and Success A light breeze blew across the Tweed River one warm December evening in 2006. People stood at tables drinking, laughing and telling tales of the year that [...]
The 7 Habits of Highly Ineffective Entréepreneurs
I want to introduce you to the entréepreneurs. The name entréepreneurs explains how some people respond to change. They are often curious about change, and even embrace it with eagerness. They love the beginnings of change; the excitement [...]
What Really Makes Change Fail
In this article we examine what makes change fail and why people resist change. Digging in Peter Senge quite famously said that people don’t resist change; they resist being changed. Most of us [...]
Change Readiness and Structural Change
This article considers change readiness and structural change. Risky business Structural change can be risky business. That's why change readiness is so important. Kevin Voigt of CNN estimates the failure rate of changes like [...]
Patterns in Behaviour
The world is full of patterns. Sometimes they are irregular, like the edges of coastlines. They can mirror Mr Miyagi's famous saying, "same, but different" - like snowflakes are the same, but each [...]
Does Resilience Help You Change?
I am sometimes asked whether change fitness is a similar concept to resilience. Resilience is defined as “the capacity of a system to absorb disturbance, re-organise, and keep functioning in much the same [...]
Why Is Change Hard?
Every year organisations large and small spend lots of time and money dealing with change. Not because they particularly want to, but because they have to to stay ahead of the game and [...]
Recruitment Intel
This article examines the importance of assessing change fitness as part of the recruitment process. Are you a recruitment professional? If so, I'm sure you pride yourself in selecting the very best talent [...]
Make Resistance Your Friend
Resistance to change is very common and it frustrates most managers. But here’s a secret: resistance doesn’t have to be a problem. In fact, it could become the manager’s best friend. Change how [...]
Change in the Technology Age
It’s not front page news yet we all know it: technological change is speeding up. Some folks embrace new technology, as my 88 year old friend did when he got his first iPad [...]
6 Mistakes Managers Should Avoid
When it comes to change in organisations, Kotter warns us of 6 attitudes that will lead to complacency and probable failure. It would be great if these harmful attitudes were uncommon, but unfortunately [...]
Training for Change
I recently participated in a LinkedIn discussion on the topic of whether soft skills training has any lasting effect. Other contributors made some very interesting and valuable points. Some commented that the positive [...]
Defining the Personal or Business Problem
Before you can work on fixing a problem you have to first work out exactly what the problem is. Teasing out the exact nature of a problem can be taxing and challenging work. [...]
Why Change Readiness Saves You Money
In this article we examine why change readiness saves you money. Think of this question: why are some changes easy and others difficult? In reality, change is only easy when you are ready [...]
Change Readiness or Resistance?
Are the people in your team ready for change, or do they typically resist change? People who resist People who resist generally don’t handle change well and tend to see it as a [...]
Change Fitness: Why You Should Care
Change fitness is all about having the personal or organisational resources that enable you to handle change really well. Having change fitness gives you a competitive advantage over others who struggle to cope [...]
What Makes A Good Change Manager?
What's the best way of managing change? In the past, leaders decided what to change and they developed a strategy and plan to get the job done. They established a game plan. Today, [...]
The Problem With Organisational Change
Do you know that?… it’s much easier to fail at change than it is to succeed most people and organisations are not good at change the failure rate for organisations has been around [...]
Why Strategy Matters
Change management strategies stand at the pivotal point between successful change and failure. Let’s look at this more closely by considering a few things about pivotal points. A see-saw has a pivotal point [...]
Change Fitness: Type or Condition?
I want to address in this short article a question some of you might be asking about change fitness. Does change fitness relate to a certain type of person (i.e., is the change-fit [...]
Develop Change Fitness
The Change Gym is a place where you develop fitness – not physical fitness but change fitness. This is where you learn how to get good at making change. We know exactly what you [...]
Why Test for Change Fitness When Recruiting?
According to a recent article, the true cost of recruiting a new staff member can exceed $100,000. Such expensive investments deserve a rigorous and well-informed decision-making process. Recruitment agencies and some employers often [...]
Change Fitness and IRVEY®
This article focuses on The Change Gym's change fitness assessment tool, IRVEY. In business as in life, you have to change just to keep up. Some of the companies whose names are commonplace [...]
How to Train for Change Fitness
Many years ago I heard a strange little story about a wicker basket. An old woman had a wicker basket that became very dirty through much use. She gave the basket to a [...]
Change Fitness Put Simply
Personal change fitness is a person’s ability to be the primary agent of change in their own life. This means within them they have the psychological resources and capacities needed to successfully navigate [...]
Change is the Journey, Not the Destination?
Have you ever heard that change is the journey, not the destination? What people mean by this is that change is a means to an end, not the end itself. In other words, [...]
Taking Responsibility For What?
I spent 7 years delivering training to maximum security inmates in the prison system. The training was mostly on anger management and conflict resolution. I loved it. I also learnt a lot. The [...]
Change: You’re Allowed Not to Like It
I want to address the real reasons behind successful change. The first reason people change is that they really want to change and they are prepared to do whatever it takes. Now lots [...]
3 Tips for Better Decision Making
Our success in business, as in life, depends upon our ability to make the right decisions. That might sound simple enough, but there’s more to it. What Influences Our Decision Making Ability? Obviously, [...]
Was Frank Wrong?
The year was 1969. The singer was Frank Sinatra. The song epitomised Sinatra’s spirit – I Did It My Way. There are millions of people who want to do it their way. And [...]
Just Do It Now
I am a little impulsive at times and that has sometimes led me into trouble. But whilst impulsivity has its risks, so does procrastination. Ever since I was young I have recognised the [...]
Potent For Change
The root of the word potential is the word potent, meaning power. Our potential is our intrinsic power to make certain things happen. Our potential for success is a measure of our power [...]
Hard’s Not a Dirty Word
I can’t be sure my observation is valid, but I noticed a change occurring during the 1990s. This change was focused on the word ‘easy’. All of a sudden activities like gardening or [...]
Change Fitness Assessment: Your First Step to Success
The change fitness of an individual or an organisation is the best predictor of successful change outcomes. Given that change is an unavoidable element of growth (and even just survival) it is common [...]
The Power of Optimism
People change because they are optimistic about the future: their future. They see things they can look forward to, things they want to be part of, things they want to share. This optimism [...]
Why Change?
There are over 7 billion people on the planet and every one of them changes. Not once, but hundreds or thousands of times. Each person has their own reasons, so the reasons for [...]
All Change is Personal
In the end all change is personal. And its impact on you depends on your personal change fitness. It is personal because it affects how people function, what they are expected to do, [...]
Change Fitness
‘Change fitness’ is a term we have coined to describe the psychological capacities that enable people to be successful at change. It is easy to understand if you compare it with physical fitness, [...]
Do We Measure The Right Things?
Management loves measurement. As managers, we set our targets and measure our progress relative to our success criteria. We always hope the numbers look good. There is a relatively high degree of predictability [...]
Reflections on Kotter’s Eight Step Model
Kotter’s eight step model has become an industry standard in the change management world since its release in the 1996 book “Leading Change”. His model received an update in 2014, more closely reflecting [...]