How do we help ourselves change?
Future Here Now.
We usually struggle with change, even when we want to do it. The beginning of a new year drives that point home, whether the change we seek is eating fewer cookies or redesigning how our organizations work in the face of new realities. We can do both of those, but they’re not easy for the same reasons — we evolved to stick to habits that worked in the past. We don’t change — ourselves or our organizations or communities — unless we’re intentional, determined and consistent.
Here’s a few recent articles that helped me plan for my own change:
If you’re ready to thrive in a changing world, my Change Maker’s Workbook for Getting Future Ready will help you think through the Mega Trends impacting our lives and examine your own responses to them. Available at this link in easy to use PDF.
The Ecology of Work: Growing Resilient, Growing Wilder
This piece argues that organizations need to move away from hierarchical, top-down command structures toward heterarchical models inspired by resilient natural ecosystems. The key insight is that deep resilience requires loose ties and weak connections between units rather than tight centralized control, allowing organizations to adapt continuously to changing circumstances rather than simply optimize for stability.
Loose ties are not what our decades of org charts and reporting chains have taught us. We have to intentionally learn to work in a loose ties network. And we often don’t have a mental model for that kind of flexibility yet. And because of that we often lean toward fear and worst case scenarios, which block us from the opportunities we could be experiencing.
Homework for Change Makers
This article presents five underlying evolutions occurring during the transition from the Industrial Age to the next era, designed to help organizations and communities get unstuck when they’re struggling with change. It addresses how unexamined assumptions and practices become anchors that prevent effective change, offering a framework to understand what’s actually evolving beneath surface-level problems.
Yes, this is my article from a few months ago. Sometimes I need to get unstuck, too. I actually use these evolutions and this framework in my own work — and in my life.
Constructive Uncertainty
The author explores the tension between the impulse to make quick decisions and the need to sit with uncertainty in a complex world, arguing that “negative capability” — the ability to remain in uncertainty without reaching for quick answers — is essential for effective adaptation. The article introduces “negative planning” as a tool for adapting to unpredictable change.
God, we HATE uncertainty. I know I do. But Stowe Boyd is one of the most insightful people I encounter. I have to try this negative planning idea.