In 1995, Harvard Business Review published an article by Harvard professor John Kotter that has shaped how leaders have approached organizational change ever since. Based on his observations of more than 100 companies, he outlined a series of eight steps that he argued were necessary for successful transformation.

Since then, countless change consultants, trained and certified in methodologies based on similar principles, such as the ADKAR (awareness, desire, knowledge, ability, and reinforcement) model, have applied his principles diligently, but to little effect. Study after study finds that the vast majority of organizational transformations fail. There is, put simply, little evidence that Kotter’s principles are effective. 

Yet not all transformations fail. Some, like the color revolutions in Eastern Europe or the struggle for LGBTQ+ rights, prevailed under the most difficult conditions. Over five decades, Everett Rogers painstakingly documented successful and unsuccessful change efforts in every field you can imagine. Here are three counterintuitive strategies that actually work. 

Kotter’s first principle is to create a “sense of urgency.” On his website, he stresses how important it is to “build momentum that excites people to pursue a compelling (and clear) vision of the future . . . together.” The idea is that for change to be successful, you need to communicate it quickly and at scale to build momentum.

However, decades of studies suggest otherwise. In fact, research has shown that when we’re presented with facts contrary to our beliefs, we tend to question the evidence rather than our own preconceived notions.

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