When the primary metric we grade people on is revenue, is it no wonder the focus is on it? When we talk about impact, but measure it using a financial metric, is it surprising the focus remains on revenue? And when organisations gain a certain level of influence and power, they tend to want to keep the status quo. People are similar.

Change becomes a threat. It is acceptable if it doesn’t negatively impact revenue, influence, status. In fact, most business case templates require this to be outlined.

Lining up incentives, including, no especially, the incentive of the story we tell ourselves and others, is key to change. Additionally, when we find the incentives, we can follow them to the find the true values of people and organisations. If we can shift the incentives and remain true to the values, change is slightly easier.

Photo by Josh Appel