How Change Really Happens
Stop trying to control the outcome
Hello Wayfinders 👋
In last week’s post introducing this new series, I named the tension that often sits at the heart of my work: the gap between how we think change happens and how it actually unfolds in the real world.
Historically, my work has been in organisations, coaching leaders, supporting teams, and running training sessions. The brief is nearly always some version of: Can you help them improve? And sometimes, yes, I can. We work on mindset, communication, feedback, and resilience.
But more and more I find myself thinking: it’s not them. Or at least, it’s not just them.
Take a manager who’s struggling to communicate with his team. The instinct might be to ‘shift his mindset’ or train him in a new leadership model. But what else might be shaping this behaviour? Maybe he’s navigating a culture where openness feels risky, or a system that demands results but offers little support.
When people seem disengaged, we often turn to motivational tools. But what if low engagement isn’t resistance, but wisdom? A way of conserving energy in a workplace where effort isn’t seen, or where decisions are made far from those affected by them?
These are not individual failings. They’re patterns. Patterns that need to be seen and then shifted.
Yet, as I said last week, our dominant models of change remain linear:
We’re trained to think in programs and processes, tidy solutions to untidy realities.
But people aren't machines, and organisations aren’t assembly lines. They’re more like rivers; they flow, shift, and respond to their surroundings. Rivers are systems. Workplaces are systems. Communities are systems. People are systems. And systems don’t move in straight lines.
So how does change happen in a system?
From change management to systems innovation
Systems change through relationships, feedback, and conditions that foster curiosity, enabling exploration and learning.
Systems innovation is my new mental model for thinking about change. It’s a convergence of ideas from several disciplines that began evolving throughout the 20th century. It draws from systems thinking, complexity science, design, and organisational development. It’s now used in fields like philanthropy, health, public policy, sustainability, and social change.
Systems innovation is not about redesigning a single program or nudging individuals - it’s about noticing patterns, surfacing assumptions, and making space for changes to emerge. It’s a continuous, fluid and adaptive practice where the desired outcome is not imposed, but revealed through interactions between people and parts.
Sometimes that means rethinking roles or power structures. Sometimes it means investing in relationships before strategy. Often, it means slowing down..
to listen
to ask questions
to look for patterns
to learn through experimentation,
and to hold the discomfort of complexity long enough for new possibilities to emerge.
It’s messier than traditional change management, but far more honest and ultimately, more effective.
This is the space I find myself in now, moving beyond linear fixes and learning to work with systems as they are: alive, complex, and full of potential.
I’m asking…
What if change isn’t something we drive, but something we host?
What if our role is less about control, and more about creating the conditions for positive outcomes to emerge?
What would it mean to let go of ‘we must do this right’ and embrace ‘let’s see where this takes us’?
These are the questions I’ll keep exploring in this series, through the lens of workplace psychology, community leadership, and philanthropy. If this resonates, I’d love you to join in.
Let’s walk this messy middle together.
Onwards and upwards,
This week’s fun stuff:
I’m listening to: Tim Minchin’s ‘The Fence’, the perfect anthem to ambivalence.
‘We divide the world to stop us feeling frightened, into wrong and into right and into black and into white…’ 🎶
I’m reading: How to End Racial Discrimination Easily + Quickly here on Substack, by fellow psychologist Todd Kashdan. Background for a project in the wings 🪽
I’m missing: Sydney. Lived there 12 years and it’s 12 years since I left. Time to book a flight I think ✈️
Love this, Ellen.