
It would be really nice if such a thing as a "status quo" existed. Granted: There's a rock band by that name that was founded in 1962 . But in the context of organizations and change and organizational development, the usefulness of the term "status quo" is a non-issue. What's more, this term is actually an enemy of successful change, agile, lean or BetaCodex work: It will thwart your own change work and inhibit significant development.
The term "status quo" falsely suggests that reality is somehow sturdy or fixed, and that there is a single reality that we all perceive identically. Both these things are unwise to assume. Constructivism teaches us: we humans do not perceive a single reality, but we construct a multitude different realities that we perceive simultaneously and, in a sense, create within ourselves. And these multiple realities are constantly in flux.
The status quo is a dead parrot
And this is neither mere theory nor hair-splitting: It has fundamental implications for change work in organizations and our societies. It makes the separation of change planning and change implementation dangerous. In organizational development, it calls into question the meaningfulness of the development of "solutions" by a few before the so-called change implementation happens. It even unmasks "implementation" as a change myth per sé. If we all perceive, think, feel, create, and live different realities, how can we bring about a single, reasonably meaningful implementation strategy or solution, set milestones, "onboard" people into change, "get started" with change or "roll out" change?
In the context of organizations, the term status quo is philosophically and quite practically nonsense - and it is in itself an enemy of effective change thinking. We need a more realistic approach to change in living systems. But such an approach will have nothing in common with change management, which is based on the idea of controllability, steering and "one reality". The good news is that such an approach already exists. In theory and - proven many times - also in practice. We call the related concepts Change-as-Flipping and Very Fast Organizational Transformation.
A specific approach of this kind, which is able to make the multiple, fluxing realities of organizational members usable for constructive change work (without departing from the flawed idea of a "status quo") is OpenSpace Beta - which, by the way, could just as well be called OpenSpace Lean or OpenSpace Agile.
Words have power
But let's stay for a moment with examples of organizational language that doesn't match the complex organizational reality. Or realities. Here are a few more examples of useless, even fundamentally harmful terms that are commonly used in the context of change work.
Kick-off
Comfort zone
Milestones
Change planning
Solution
Resistance to Change
Mindset
convince
implement
execute
roll out
Here's a good exercise: try to ban these words from your own vocabulary for a few days. Consistently. You will notice that this will change not only the way you talk about change work , but also your perception of change in organizations in general, and even your thinking about change.
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Recommended book: "Essays on Beta, Vol. 1" by Niels Pflaeging. BetaCodex Press, 2020 redforty2.com/product-page/essays-on-beta-vol-1

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