Reference no: EM133009231

The Complex Nature of Change

Change is a ubiquitous term that repeatedly crops up in management literature and haunts the mind of highly-pressured managers who have to answer for the survival and growth of their organisation. However, although the concept of change is well embedded in both academic and organisational discourse and imbued with a sense of urgency and inevitability, it remains vague and elusive. All too often 'change' is explained away and reduced to rather simplistic statements. Consider the following statements, which reflect the prevailing assumptions underlying the new 'orthodoxy' of change:

Change is now the only constant

The pace of change is accelerating

Change is a never-ending journey

Change is the very essence of business success

Although the above statements about change have a seductive appeal, they are reductionist - i.e. they tend to reduce the meaning of change to one single fact or view, limiting the possibility for a more robust understanding of the complex and multilayered nature of change.

Review and think carefully about the above statements. In what way do they limit our understanding of change?