In positive organizational scholarship ,we often speak of flourishing organizations. For a normal organization to become a flourishing organization it has to change. The norms, values, and beliefs of the people have to be transformed. This is the work of leadership: Someone exerts the capacity to move the organization to a more positive trajectory.
Two decades ago, I wrote the book Deep Change. In it, I argued that every individual, group, and organization is constantly facing the choice between deep change and slow death. Since it is natural to deny the need for deep change, most individuals and collectives are drifting towards slow death.
I wrote Deep Change to help people see the basic choice, to overcome denial, and to acquire the capacity to make deep change. It was written to help people discover the leader within. Deep Change went on to become a long-term best seller.
In April, a new book will be published. The Deep Change Field Guide takes readers through the introspective journey of personal transformation. The Field Guide streamlines, updates, and augments the content of the original book and turns it into an interactive self-teaching course that helps readers learn how to become powerful agents of change.
Each chapter is tied to a film that allows the student to more deeply understand the transformational process: Moneyball, Norma Rae, The King’s Speech, The Devil Wears Prada, Remember the Titans, Stand and Deliver, Dead Poets Society, and Gandhi.
Other learning tools include reflection questions and action plans that help readers think about the concepts in terms of their own situations, and identify actions to embody the concepts in their lives. The Field Guide has been designed so that individual learners can gain the same benefits that they would obtain in one of my courses. The learning tools also lend themselves to both the academic and the professional classroom.
The Deep Change Field Guide is filled with illustrative stories, exercises, reflective questions, worksheets, and film assignments to help you think about deep change concepts and apply them to your own life.
For anyone who yearns to apply the concepts of positive organizational scholarship, who wants be involved in the creation of flourishing groups and organizations, The Deep Change Field Guide may prove useful.
