Rosabeth Moss Kanter has such a fabulous way of saying things.  Her definition of insanity, “doing the same things over & over expecting different results,” is timeless and one that even our teenage daughter recites.  Her Change Master blog encouraging organizations to “dread” change is, again, bang on.  As she so rightly advises, “Get in touch with every negative aspect, all the things that could go wrong. Then figure out a way to get that negative force on your side. In short, “Dream your worst nightmare and invest in it.” In fact, identifying all the things that can go wrong allows you to build a practical implementation plan.

There’s a very old yet very useful tool for this that guides a group through the nightmare – or the potential barriers – to developing a plan that acknowledges & navigates potential landmines:

Vision: specify the changes you want in place – what’s going to be different in the future, whether that future is 3 months or 3 years away.

Barriers: ask everyone what hurdles & headaches they see preventing those changes from happening — “what’s giving you a pain in your stomach?” often gets very meaningful & honest responses

Influencing Factors: then have what may be a difficult but absolutely essential dialogue about which of those barriers you can actually do something about; which hurdles do you have some influence over? no influence over? or total influence over?  For example, how can you engage employees to help them see “what’s

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