Want to Drive Change? Get This Team

How to design the right change leadership team

How to design the right change leadership team

Picture by Randy Fath/ Unsplash @randyfath

If you want to change fast, do it alone. If you want to create long-lasting change, do it together.

Nupedia, the precursor to Wikipedia, was a failure. The organization was designed with a top-down approach. There were seven-stage review processes and endless committees.

This command-and-control culture made it impossible to do any work at Nupedia.

Jimmy Wales, the catalyst behind Wikipedia, took a different route. He understood that long-lasting change is built by a group, not by one person.

The Hidden Power of Instigators

In Wikipedia, a large team of collaborators runs the operation, not the CEO. They all change and evolve together.

By implementing an editing policy based on trust, Wales was able to build a decentralized, successful company. He created the vision and then stepped back.

In The Starfish and the Spider, Ori Brafman and Rod A. Beckstrom build a case for letting a catalyst, not a CEO, lead …