With apologies to my economist friends, the notion of demand elasticity can be applied to the status quo in an organisation.
Embedding change in an organisation is remarkably hard, the status quo is capable of absorbing lots of punishment, and when the belting is over, it re-asserts its dominance, simply be being the “way things are done around here”.
It seems that when all the mumbo jumbo is culled, there are only two tools available that ensure you can make changes stick.
- Change processes such that there is no going back. This can mean all sorts of things, but essentially, the option of reverting to the old way must be removed. Weather you do it in an afternoon, or incrementally is just a question of management tactics, so long as doing it incrementally is not a cop-out.
- Change the people. Pretty nasty this, and has all sorts of implications, legal, moral, and the impact on survivors, but it remains that people make organisations work, and if it is not working, some stern action is required.
