Anecdote: Lessons from Lewis & Clark—a new white paper is coming

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15/05/08 |

Lessons from Lewis & Clark—a new white paper is coming

By Shawn. Filed in Change management, Complexity, Narrative.

David Drake and I have written a new white paper describing a narrative approach to successful organisational change. We've built on our three journeys metaphor, which you might remember was inspired by the epic exploration of the the US West by Meriwether Lewis and William Clark. Apart from describing the three journeys we've drawn a set of lessons from the Corps of Discovery (the nickname for the expedition) for each of our three journeys. Here are the lessons from our first journey:

It is important to be clear on sharing the rewards before there are any.
Travelling requires both authority and freedom/permission.
Change requires an organisation to venture into unknown territory; it is as much about discovery as it is about design.
Every change process has its “St. Louis”—a jumping off point into the unknown, a hub for action, and a platform to which one can return.
Often the landscape changes merely as a result of setting out on the journey.

If you'd like to early notification and the ability to get this paper before we publish it more widely, please sign up for our monthly newsletter. In the next few days I will share the lessons for the second and third journey.

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