How we work
Complex adaptive challenges can't be solved with a fixed plan. We work through a diagnostic, dialogic and experiential sequence, guided by the 8-step Complexity Leadership Model, so your people learn their way to change together.
Why it’s different
Models like ADKAR, Kotter’s 8 Steps and Lewin’s Change Model were created 20 to 70+ years ago. The 8-step Complexity Leadership Model™ integrates diagnostic OD, dialogic OD and experiential learning into one modern, rapid, inquiry-based, foresight-driven strategic learning model.
The journey
01 · DIAGNOSTIC
We start by harvesting stories (micro-narratives) from your leaders and staff to see the system as it really is.
02 · DIALOGIC
The right people come together to build shared understanding of the challenge and expose the assumptions that hold it in place.
03 · EXPERIENTIAL
Self-organized teams run short sprints of 2–4 weeks to prototype the next “adjacent possible” step.
What changes
Shared understanding of what is really going on
Shared intention about where to go
Aligned actions that move in the same direction
Transformed relations that outlast the project
Principles
Change happens when people make sense of a challenge together, not when a plan is pushed onto them.
We expose, amplify and integrate different views instead of working around them.
Stories from across your organization show the system as it really is.
Strategic foresight helps you work with “the edges” to transform the present.
Short experiments beat long plans when the path isn’t clear.
The goal is an organization that keeps adapting after we leave.
Watch · 21 min
Traditional change models weren't built for today's volatility, uncertainty, complexity, and ambiguity. In this video, Randall introduces the Complexity Leadership Model™, a modern, rapid, inquiry-based, foresight-driven strategic learning model for solving your organization's most complex challenges.
Why models like ADKAR, Kotter's 8 Steps, and Lewin's weren't designed for VUCA conditions, and what's driving today's rising complexity
How to recognize a complex adaptive challenge, with real examples like integrating merged companies or accelerating a digital transformation
The four shifts every change effort aims for: shared understanding, shared intention, aligned actions, and transformed relations, and why about 70% of the effort goes into shared understanding
How the work moves from diagnostic ("planning to learn") to dialogic ("inquiring to learn") to experiential ("discovering to learn"), guided by the PEARL Framework: Plan, Experiment, Assess, Reflect, Learn
The three capabilities of a Complexity Leader: helping people see the whole system, creating the conditions for change instead of forcing it, and engaging the emerging future to transform the present
02:10 What the Complexity Leadership Model™ is
04:20 Why a new change model is needed
09:08 Recognizing complex adaptive challenges
12:24 The three frameworks: Universal Change Framework, Innovation Sequence, PEARL Framework
17:28 Becoming a Complexity Leader
18:52 The next decade of disruption
From the blog
Complexity Leadership Model: Solving Intractable Challenges
A new change method attuned to the times in which we live: one that leverages complexity and embraces ambiguity.
Innovation Sequences for Solving Complex Adaptive Challenges
Solving a complex adaptive challenge doesn't need to be left to chance. You can intentionally architect a design that leads to widespread stakeholder commitment.
Generative Containers: Designing for Transformative Moments
Bringing together diverse people from across a system to share, listen, empathize, and learn from one another to create a shared understanding.
Introducing Hybrid OD (Organization Development)
A new approach to organizational change that blends diagnostic, dialogic, and experiential methods, tools, and techniques.
Your Organization Is a River: Why Stories Beat Surveys
Your organization is a river that never stays the same. Learn how narrative harvesting and stories help change leaders sense patterns surveys miss.
Next step
A conversation is the first step. We’ll listen first, then say plainly whether we can help.