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Change … to catalyze health, well-being and healthy development – in people, organizations and communities. The Challenge of ChangeChances are, you’re in the business of change. Whether you work in government, the private sector, social enterprise, the human services, or the voluntary sector, change is your business. Whether your goal is health promotion, crime prevention, community economic development, or environmental sustainability, change is at the heart of your work.
We’ve been in the business of change for years. We’ve worked closely with people and organizations in diverse contexts, from urban to rural, from grassroots to government. And, like many of our colleagues and collaborators, we’re noticing that our very best efforts just aren’t creating the kind of change we know is needed.
As the ancient philosopher Heraclitus observed, “everything flows, nothing stands still” … “nothing endures but change.” So, change is ever present. But is all change healthy change? We think not. And we suspect you’ll agree. So here’s the challenge for every individual and every organization engaged in the business of change:
1. How do we learn to cultivate healthy change?
2. How can we invest our time and our resources in those areas where healthy change can most productively grow and flow?
3. What are the most effective levers for healthy change?
Changing the Way We Think About Change
At West Coast Integral Initiatives, we’ve made a study of change. Our inquiry has brought us to the work of world-renowned thinkers, researchers and practitioners such as Robert Kegan, Don Beck, Susanne Cook-Greuter, Bill Torbert, Otto Scharmer, Dee Hock, Peter Senge and, of course, Ken Wilber. Our learning has drawn on leading-edge research into the complexity of human experience, including human and social development, psychology, leadership, organizational development, and governance. And we’ve made some helpful discoveries.
Changing the Way We Make Change
We consider ourselves to be seasoned professionals, well-experienced and well-informed. But these discoveries have helped us to question our assumptions about change, and our theories about change. We’ve learned about universal principles of change, and patterns of change in people, organizations and communities. We’ve sought out evidence-based practices for facilitating change. And we’ve used our own professional practice as a learning ground, finding ways to better align our values with the work we do to make change in the world.
Healthy People in Healthy Communities: We Can Do It!
Our goal is simple: facilitating effective and sustainable change that fosters healthy people in healthy communities. And our approach is both simple and complex: using an integral “whole systems” framework to guide thinking and practice, and to promote greater accountability.
With an integral framework to support our change-making, we pay attention to all of the factors that influence health, well-being and healthy human development. And we pay attention to the multiple ways in which we can foster healthy people in healthy communities. The integral framework provides a map that reflects the complexity of our lives, and the contexts in which we live, reminding us that our change efforts will be most effective when they engage the whole person in the whole community, and when they address our potentials as well as our problems.
How do we get started? We need a vision big enough to hold our collaborative change-making. We need an integrative meta-framework to bring our thinking and practice into greater alignment with our vision and values. And we need some practical tools to help us get on with the work. And that’s where The CHANGE Initiative comes in.
The CHANGE Initiative in Action
The CHANGE Initiative is a project of West Coast Integral Initiatives. With leadership from Tam Lundy and Ali Grant, and supported by custom-tailored teams of skillful practitioners, we’ll help you to catalyze and lead your own change initiative. We will also work with you to expand capacity in your team, your organization or your community, through learning events, workshops, and hands-on mentoring.
For individuals, teams, organizations and communities that want to deepen their learning, and reflect on their practice, The CHANGE Initiative offers three innovative and practical workshops:
• The Challenge of Change: An Introduction to Integral Perspectives and Approaches to Change
• Healthy People in Healthy Communities: An Integral Lens on Leadership
• Integral Approaches to Collaboration: Taking our Thinking and Practice to the Next Level
For more information about these and other workshop offerings, go to Learning Events and Workshops.
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