Making Room for What's Coming

Photo by Åaker

You know things need to change. You understand the direction. Yet the old pattern keeps returning.

There's a plan. Maybe even a good one. The analysis checks out, the need is widely shared. But somewhere between knowing and doing, it stalls.

Where does that come from?

The Familiar Approach

Change often follows a familiar pattern. A vision emerges, a project plan, a communication campaign. It feels familiar. Manageable.

But what if the situation calls for something other than control?

The world moves faster than plans can keep up with. What worked yesterday doesn't automatically fit tomorrow. Yet the reflex is to reach for what we know — especially when things get tense.

Structure and Movement

John Kotter describes what happens when you approach change not as a project, but as a network. Something that moves, learns, adapts.

That calls for a different balance:

• Management & Leadership. Structure and stability matter. So do direction, imagination, and agility. Both at once.

• Head & Heart. Understanding why something matters. And feeling that it does.

• Have to & Want to. People only truly change when they feel connected and choose to contribute.

• Select few & Diverse many. Leadership sets the course, but change only happens when more people join in.

Not a choice between one or the other. Both at once.

What if the way you approach change follows the same logic you're trying to change?

Change that lasts takes more than a new plan. It takes the willingness to examine your own patterns. To let go of what feels familiar.