Distinguishing between change and transformation
Transformation is not just another word for change. It is profoundly different.
Any organization is a system. As the leading proponent of Appreciative Inquiry, David Cooperrider, says:
The task of organizational leadership is to create an alignment of strengths in ways that make a system's weaknesses irrelevant.
The characteristics of change are better, faster, and cheaper. The issue is defined. The outputs are known. Change works inside the system. Transformation works on the system. Change always has unintended consequences; if you change one part of the system, it has impacts over the horizon. By contrast, transformation releases energy and invokes surprise.
The first quality of transformation is its emotional color. It always results in surprise. If you are not surprised, then what you are experiencing is not a transformation but just a change. Change has the power to surprise, but only once. Next time you will be bored. Therefore, keep in...
