10631: Disrupting Change: What Needs to Change About Change?

Sunday, July 27, 2025

12:00 - 13:30 CEST (GMT+2)

Location: Bella Center: Hall B- B4-m7

Session Type: Symposium (panel)
Highlight: Showcase Symposium,DIG Highlight
Shareable link: https://cdmcd.co/YKLzMR

Organizer(s)

BH

Bradley J. Hastings

University of New South Wales, Australia
DG

David Grant

UNSW Business School, Australia, Australia

Session Chair(s)

PR

Patrice Elizabeth Rosenthal

Fielding Graduate U., United States

Organizer(s)

RH

Richard Hall

Monash University, Australia

Panelist(s)

MB

Michael Barrett

U. of Cambridge, United Kingdom
MS

Michael Smets

U. of Oxford, United Kingdom
JA

John Matthew Amis

U. of Edinburgh, United Kingdom
GF

Gail T. Fairhurst

U. of Cincinnati, United States
LP

Linda L. Putnam

U. of California, Santa Barbara, United States
IS

Inger G. Stensaker

NHH Norwegian School of Economics, Norway

2,500 years since Heraclitus coined the phrase “the only constant in life is change”, two change-constants seem clear: existing change theories don’t seem to powerfully capture the nature of contemporary organizational change, and these theories don’t seem to provide effective practical guidance for would-be agents of change. Overall, modern day attempts to effect change are characterized by low success rates, change fatigue, high rates of employee stress, and reduced wellbeing (Jarrell, 2017; Dahl, 2011). Given these disappointing outcomes, we think the time is ripe to pause and reflect on what needs to be renewed in respect of the theory and practice of change. In this session, we aim to be disruptive about current paradigms, methodologies, and practices related to the study of change, believing that such disruption can be used to generate new and alternative understandings of change that better meet contemporary needs. To achieve this, we have assembled a panel of speakers designed to provoke discussion and deeper reflection on the appropriateness of present understandings. The panel comprises experts on change from fields outside of Organization Development and Change (ODC) as well as experts from within the ODC Division. The external experts will first share their perspectives and experiences of change, what they see as working/not working and why this is the case. The experts from within the ODC will then respond to these reflections. In this way we want to facilitate a cross-divisional, multi-perspective, and generative dialogue on contemporary organizational change.