I can prove change management is broken

The Five Stats That Prove Change is Well and Truly Broken

If you’re responsible one way or another for change and transformation in your organization, and you’re finding it difficult … well, no wonder.

Here are five sobering statistics from the last three years.

From a 2023 Gartner report:

“The average employee experienced 10 planned enterprise changes in 2022, up from two in 2016. And there is no reason to expect the pace to slow.”

TL, DR: Change is faster and more ubiquitous than ever.

From a 2023 Bain report:

“Only 12% of business transformations achieve their original ambition.” (That’s an 88% failure rate. It makes that infamous McKinsey “70%” rate look positively aspirational.)

TL, DR: Change is failing more than ever before.

From a 2024 Bain report:

“5% of those companies involved in digital transformation efforts reported that they had achieved or exceeded the expectations they had set for themselves.” (That’s a 95% failure rate.)

TL, DR: Digital transformation fails almost every time.

From a 2026 DDI report:

“Just 8% of executives demonstrate the ability to lead change effectively, leaving a full 92% of top leaders unprepared to steer their organizations through transformation.”

TL, DR: Leaders aren’t ready or able.

From that same 2023 Gartner report:

“The share of employees willing to support enterprise change collapsed to just 38% in 2022, compared with 74% in 2016.”

TL, DR: Employees aren’t willing.

So in the face of that, what do we do?

Modern Change Mastery

Whatever the current recipes for change are, they’re really not fit for purpose.

Change Signal is about cutting through the blather, the BS, and the noise to find the good stuff that works in change.

The podcast continues on. I’ll be relaunching the newsletter in April to go deeper into what modern change mastery really entails.

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