Transforming organisations for organic growth: The DNA of change leadership

Abstract

Abstract Organic growth has put transformative change on the corporate agenda. Poor records of change have led to a search for alternative ways of leading change as most contemporary theories are neither narrow enough nor broad enough. This article presents a view that leaders should take account of chaos and use a systemic view when changing their organisations. Applying principles of self-organising and spreading change by minimum intervention provides facilitative environments that better sustain change. This is best done by searching for the organisation-specific DNA of change leadership. The success of leadership intervention during change will depend on the inner condition that we exhibit as change leaders, as well as our abilities to read change signals correctly, to time leadership interventions and to set out a few basic principles holding the organisation together under chaotic circumstances – elements in leading transformative change.