Five places to intervene if you want to shift culture, norms and habits

Want to make a change to norms in your organisation? I’m going to show you five ways to think about this (and how to implement them in practice).

 

OK, so you are the kind of person who wants to make things better. You have a vision, you can see how things could be faster, simpler, more thoughtful, better connected. What you want is for people's behaviour to change - for what is 'normal' to become different and better.

The problem is, organisations are open systems.

There is no ‘right’ or ‘wrong’ way to think about organisations but I do want to highlight two dominant philosophies that fundamentally influence the kind of intervention we might make and give you a steer on how to think about organisational change.

 

Philosophy 1: Organisations are goal-focused, rational, closed, centrally coordinated

This philosophy expects that if you make a change, there will be a predictable cause and effect.

It says, you tell the system how to behave and if you plan well enough, your intervention will work.

The approach is therefore to plan carefully in advance and then launch at scale, from the top down when the intervention is ready.

 

Philosophy 2: Organisations are messy, networked, interconnected, unpredictable, power is distributed

This philosophy expects that making changes creates unpredictable outcomes and that cause and effect can only really be known in retrospect.

It says, you can’t ‘make’ an organisation change and instead you can only create the conditions for change to unfold.

The approach is therefore to try small things first, evaluate the outcomes, scale up as you learn more and follow what succeeds organically.

 

So which is it?

Clearly there is no right or wrong philosophy. But the dominant thinking in management disciplines has shifted across the spectrum from Philosophy 1 to Philosophy 2 over the last 100 years (massive over simplification, but let's go with that for now!).

The point for you in your organisation about any of this is that if you want to 'change' your organisation, you'll need to incorporate some Philosophy 2 thinking in there. And that means rethinking 'change'. Kotter's 8 Steps for Leading Change which is so well-used, is not wrong exactly, but it's does largely consider organisations to be rationale, goal-seeking machines. And for as long as we consider that to be true, we will apply change methods that are a mismatch.

 

Another way - Donnella Meadows

Donella Meadows was a pioneering environmental scientist and systems thinker known for her influential work on understanding complex systems and leverage points for change. You may know her as a contributor to the famous Club of Rome paper on Limits to Growth from Geography GSCE!

Her approach emphasises the interconnectedness of systems and identifies key leverage points that can lead to significant, systemic improvements - and fundamental shifts rather than superficial fixes, Her work is highly relevant for tackling organisational change.

In the context of how we meet and collaborate, Meadows' approach is particularly because it advocates for systemic change and proposes tangible ways to do this.

I'm going to show you her work on leverage points - or places to intervene in a system - and what that might look like for shifting collaboration norms and habits.

 

She created 12 and I'm going to unpack the following 5 leverage points:

 

1. Mindset or paradigm underpins that the system

2. Goal of the system

3. Rules of the system

4. Structure of information flow

5. Power to add, change, evolve, or self-organize system structure

 

1. Mindset or paradigm that underpins the system

First, an overly simple story :-)

Imagine a community where everyone believes that wealth equals happiness. But the problem is - no one is happy. A visitor arrives and starts demonstrating acts of kindness, teaching the value of relationships, self care and personal growth. Slowly, people begin to see happiness in a new light.

 

👉 Paradigms are the underlying beliefs that shape how a system operates. Shifting these can fundamentally change the system.

 

Practical ways to make it happen in shifting collaboration norms

Soften the ground: Use comms, a bit like a social media influencer, to provoke thought. Many people will never have even considered that there is another paradigm. Show don't tell.

Mavericks and role models: Find, support and draw attention to individuals who embody the new paradigm. Get behind the people who already get it.

Storytelling: Share powerful stories and examples of the new paradigm. Again, show don't tell. You can never push someone into a new paradigm. It is ALWAYS pull.

 

2. Goals

Let's try another overly simple story :-)

A company has always aimed to maximise profits, leading to employee burnout and low morale. Repeated efforts to improve wellbeing fail because the goals simply drive people back into over-activity. A new CEO sets a goal to prioritise employee well-being and publicly shares the results each month. This filters through to managers goals. Employee burnout all but vanishes as it's no longer 'socially acceptable' this group and it's now seen as a sign of failure as a manager if team members burn out (rather than a failing of the individual to not sustain the workload). Morale improves dramatically.

 

👉 Goals determine the direction of a system. Changing the goals can steer the system towards new outcomes.

 

Practical ways to make it happen in shifting collaboration norms

What kind of collaboration culture are you rewarding and prioritising with your goal set? Can you adjust - or introduce a new goal that will hold inefficient collaboration (e.g. too many meetings) in check? Healthy tension between goals creates good friction.

Can you more people in the goal-setting process?

Can you get clear on your goals (both old and refreshed), specifically what it IS and what it ISN'T. I make an actual list! This helps a goal become mistranslated into unhelpful norms e.g. overcollaboration or other over-uses of otherwise good things.

 

3. System structure

Let's start with a story again!

In a small town, traffic congestion is a daily nightmare. The local council redesigns the road network, adds bike lanes, and improves public transport, leading to smoother traffic flow and happier residents.

👉 The structure of a system dictates its behaviour. Changing the structure can lead to significant improvements.

 

Practical ways to make it happen in shifting collaboration norms

There are tonnes of structures that direct how we meet and collaborate. Have a look at:

Decision making - what are the rules (formal or informal) that dictate how decisions are made e.g. do certain decisions end up going from meeting to meeting and up chains of command?

Roles - is everything getting triple handled because no one knows quite who is responsible for what?

Documentation - do people end up producing vast quantities of documentation e.g. change logs that could be reduced, automated somehow or streamlined?

When you're changing structures, create small-scale structural changes to test their impact before full-scale implementation. The only thing worse than an unhelpful structure is another unhelpful one, chucked over the top.

 

4. Information Flows

Here's the story.

A rural area experiences frequent health issues due to a lack of information about clean water practices. A non-profit introduces regular workshops and an information hotline, dramatically improving public health outcomes.

 

👉 Information flows are the pathways through which information is shared. Improving these flows can enhance decision-making and coordination.

 

Practical ways to make it happen in shifting collaboration norms

Encourage transparency as the norm where information is readily accessible. Share meeting notes widely as FYI (e.g. a new norm of becoming a Meeting CC). Share workings and rationale, not just outcomes and decisions.

Invest in tools and platforms that make information visible, flatten hierarchies and make it easy to discuss issues across teams in real time.

Set up information sharing protocols (simple templates and norms) which are consistent across the organisation. So if you want to know X information about Y project, you know exactly how to find it without asking.

 

 

5. Self-Organisation

One final story.

A community garden project struggles with maintenance until volunteers are given the freedom to organise themselves. They establish a rota and collaborate on tasks, resulting in a flourishing garden.

 

👉 Self-organisation allows systems to adapt and evolve. Encouraging autonomy and decentralisation can lead to innovative and resilient systems.

 

Practical ways to make it happen in shifting collaboration norms

Give teams the autonomy to make decisions and organise their work.

Leaders, act as facilitators rather than controllers, providing guidance and resources. "How can I best support you?" "Let's catch up next week and you can share your vision and any concerns - we'll talk through them together"

Allow room for trial and error, fostering a culture where innovation is encouraged and failures are seen as learning opportunities. You know this! But what I mean in practice is celebrating improvements and changes you now know need making. "Now we know X, we can...." "Brilliant, now we understand that..."

 

 

I’ll leave you with this.

We usually OVERestimate (massively) what can be achieved in one year. But we UNDERestimate (massively) what can be achieved in five years.

A systems approach isn’t a quick fix and in fact it isn’t any kind of fix. It’s just a way of thinking about a problem.