People often resist change for reasons that make good sense to them, even if those reasons don't correspond to organizational goals. So it is crucial to recognize, reward, and celebrate accomplishments.
Interpretation
People resist change due to their own beliefs and motivations, which might not align with the goals of an organization. Recognizing and celebrating achievements can help facilitate necessary changes.
This quote emphasizes the common tendency of individuals to resist change, driven by personal beliefs and justifications that may conflict with the objectives of an organization. It highlights the importance of acknowledging and celebrating individual accomplishments as a means to foster a culture that is more adaptable to change. By aligning individual motivations with organizational goals through recognition, a more cohesive and supportive environment for change can be created.
In practice
In a team meeting, I shared this quote to encourage members to embrace change and recognize each other's efforts.
Tribalism reflects strong ethnic or cultural identities that separate members of one group from another, making them loyal to people like them and suspicious of outsiders, which undermines efforts to forge common cause across groups.
Organizational structures that allow divisions and departments to own their turf and people with long tenure to take root creates the same hardened group distinctions as Congressional redistricting to produce homogeneous voting blocs - all of which makes it easier to resist compromise, let alone collaboration.
The way innovating companies are designed leaves ambiguities, overlaps, decision conflicts or decision vacuums in some parts of the organisation. People rail at this, curse it-and invent innovative ways to overcome it.
The boomers' biggest impact will be on eliminating the term 'retirement' and inventing a new stage of life... the new career arc.
The middle of every successful project looks like a disaster.
I've found that small wins, small projects, small differences often make huge differences.
I think if we're going to be serious as a city, as a country, about addressing climate change, addressing inequality and racial disparities, we have to start taking action at the scale that matches the urgency of the problems.
Unlike earlier black-power movements that tried to fight or segregate for self-preservation, Black Lives Matter aligns with the dead, continues the mourning, and refuses the forgetting in front of all of us.
Let us not demand of ourselves that we alone must be the agent of change. In a fire brigade everyone passes along a bucket, but only the last person puts out the fire. None of us know where we stand in line. We may be here simply to pass a bucket; we may be called on to play a major role. In either case, all we can do is think, act, and say. Let us direct our thoughts, words, and actions to peace. That is all we can do. Let the results be what they will be.
In too many communities, too many young men of color are left behind and seen only as objects of fear. Through initiatives like My Brother's Keeper, I'm personally committed to changing both perception and reality.
Commit yourself to do whatever it is you can contribute in order to create a healthy and sustainable future - the world needs you desperately. Find that in yourself and make a commitment - that is what will change the world.
In a summer marked by instability in the Middle East and Eastern Europe, I know the world also took notice of the small American city of Ferguson, Missouri - where a young man was killed, and a community was divided. So yes, we have our own racial and ethnic tensions.
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