Leading through Change and Conflict

Change is hard, but the popular claim that seventy per cent of change fails has no reliable evidence behind it. This module traces that claim from Kotter to Hughes, separates change from transition using William Bridges, and maps kinds of change with By's scale. It explores change fatigue and the 2026 public service context, and uses Nokia's burning platform memo to examine what urgency does to people.

A model is a lens, not a recipe. This module revisits Lewin, Kotter's eight steps, Hiatt's ADKAR, the change curve, Bridges' transition model and Gleicher's change formula, tracing where each came from and how strong its evidence is. The 1000 Lives Campaign in NHS Wales shows a model used with discipline, measured honestly and embedded in a lasting institution, Improvement Cymru.

Some change cannot be planned, only grown. This module contrasts planned and emergent change using By and Burnes, then introduces Weick and Quinn's continuous change, Stacey's distinction between uncertainty and disagreement, Heifetz's technical and adaptive challenges, and Weick's sensemaking. The Leeds restorative city case shows how one organising idea, working with families, moved children's services from inadequate to outstanding over eight years.

Resistance carries information. This module draws on Ford, Ford and D'Amelio's view that change agents help create resistance, Piderit's work on ambivalence, and three lenses on threat: Oreg's dispositional resistance, Rock's SCARF model and Rousseau's psychological contract. It explores loss and Kegan and Lahey's immunity to change, and uses the NHS National Programme for IT to show what happens when early objections go unheard.

People do not simply receive a message about change; they make sense of it together, often when the leader is not in the room. This module draws on Weick's sensemaking, Balogun and Johnson's study of middle managers, Denning's springboard stories, the Heath brothers' Switch, and Bushe and Marshak's dialogic organisation development. Welsh Government communication during Covid-19 shows why consistency builds trust and reversals spend it.

Culture decides what a change becomes once it leaves the plan. This module uses Edgar Schein's three levels of culture, a words and systems matrix, and the McKinsey 7S framework to show why changes stall when shared values and style are untouched. It sets out five levers for culture change and examines South Wales Fire and Rescue Service, where completing actions proved not to be the same as changing culture.

In public service, change happens in public, and legitimacy is part of the work. This module explores political direction, accountability, many owners and statutory duties, then uses Mark Moore's strategic triangle, the five ways of working in the Well-being of Future Generations (Wales) Act 2015 and Arnstein's ladder of participation. Local government reorganisation in England and the Welsh default 20mph limit show how permission is earned and lost.

What if change started with what already works? This module explores Cooperrider and Srivastva's appreciative inquiry and its 4-D cycle, Bushe and Kassam's evidence on when it transforms, positive deviance from Pascale and the Sternins, and Bolden's review of distributed leadership. Compassionate Frome and the Wigan Deal show communities as partners rather than recipients, and why asset-based working is a culture to grow, not a tool to adopt.

Every system project is a change project, and scale magnifies everything, including silence. This module covers how UK government assures major projects through NISTA, the National Audit Office's four root causes of programme trouble, optimism bias and Lovallo and Kahneman's outside view, a technology-enabled change grid, and the NAO's evidence on reorganisation. Birmingham City Council's Oracle programme shows what happens when these lessons are missed together.

Conflict is information before it is a problem. This module gives leaders a shared vocabulary using Karen Jehn's task, relationship and process conflict, tests the popular claim that task conflict is good against the meta-analyses, and draws on Lewis Coser's functions of conflict and Louis Pondy's five stages. The Handforth Parish Council meeting and UK data on the cost of conflict show why how a conflict ends matters.

Escalation rarely feels like escalation from the inside. This module offers a map of how conflict grows, using Glasl's nine stages, Deutsch's crude law of social relations, Pruitt and Kim's conflict spiral, and research on attribution from Ross to Malle. The 2021 Best Value inspection of Liverpool City Council shows how suppressed challenge escalates quietly, and five practical moves help leaders act while talking still works.

There is no one best way to meet conflict, so the skill lies in choosing. This module compares dual concern models from Blake and Mouton, Thomas and Kilmann, Rahim, and Pruitt and Kim, examines what style instruments can and cannot measure, and uses Berne's transactional analysis to look at the register of a response. Ofsted's response after the death of Ruth Perry shows institutional choices in hearing challenge.

The hardest conversations are rarely about the facts. This module explores Stone, Patton and Heen's three conversations and their moves towards a learning conversation, the Crucial Conversations path to action and its limited evidence, Rosenberg's Nonviolent Communication and Kim Scott's Radical Candor. The statutory duty of candour in Wales shows a difficult conversation made into an organisational duty: say what happened, and stay in the room.

Most conflict in public services happens inside teams and across professional boundaries. This module uses Tuckman's stages and Lencioni's five dysfunctions to read a team, Lau and Murnighan's faultlines and newer meta-analyses on when divisions harm, Tajfel and Turner's social identity theory, a corrected account of Robbers Cave, and Edmondson's psychological safety. The East Kent maternity investigation shows why a common purpose is a safety system.

Much conflict in public services is caused by change itself, and fair process matters most when outcomes hurt. This module uses Colquitt's four dimensions of justice and Brockner and Wiesenfeld's work on process and outcome, then examines P and O Ferries, the Birmingham bin strike, the Employment Rights Act 2025, the dismissal and re-engagement Code and the Welsh social partnership duty, ending with six moves for contested change.

Every leader brings one instrument into every change and conflict: themselves. This module draws on Heifetz's holding environment, Heifetz and Linsky's advice on managing hungers and separating role from self, Karpman's drama triangle and Emerald's Empowerment Dynamic, and Gross's well-evidenced model of emotion regulation. Jacinda Ardern's resignation and Gibbs's reflective cycle show why knowing when, and tending the instrument you lead with, are part of leading.

Change and conflict are one story. This capstone introduces no new theory, instead reading three substantial cases through the frameworks of the programme: Tata Steel's closure of the Port Talbot blast furnaces, the rollout of Universal Credit as examined by the National Audit Office, and Northumbria Healthcare's conflict management system. Together they point to four lessons for leaders: voice, fairness, systems and steadiness.