What is change?

The business world is characterized by global competition. Those who take too long to react cannot survive in the long run. Nevertheless, many managers in transition phases cannot help but faint. Too much complexity, too much uncertainty, too much ambiguity (inconsistency, ambiguity). And too little control. What do you need to be able to handle the loss of control without stopping? Here are 6 important components:

1. Being able to cope with fear

2. Pronounced self-reflection of mental models

3. Pronounced self-reflection of mental blocks

4. Critical discursiveness

5. Creative ability, improvisation

6. Enthusiasm / innovative ability

Lewin gives the following tip: You have to involve the participants! Win them over. Fascinate them. Or make them come to realize that the change makes sense because the current state is not tenable. For this, one must first “unfreeze”, i.e. defrost. Just as no one throws a frozen dish directly into the pan and then turns to the maximum flame, it is just as wrong to simply enforce a process and expect those affected to rejoice over the accomplished facts. The participants must need to understand why the situation has to be changed.

Once the condition has thawed, the movement can begin. Now it is possible to change. Here new concepts can be tried out, new attitudes can be taken. As a rule, the system performance drops slightly during this period. Once the desired changes have been implemented, the state must be frozen again. This re-freezing process is important in order to convert change into lasting solutions. The process is now complete and stability is created for the innovations to reach their potential.

From the point of view of those affected, the change process can be divided into 7 phases: