Change is not just a fact of life but also a sign of life. All human systems, including organizations, networks and sectors have life cycles in which complex intertwined, interacting components achieve optimal functioning then decline, sometimes into dysfunction. The inability to embrace this reality can lead to old solutions becoming new problems among other organizational maladies. Situational, short-term interventions, or fixes, cannot address the need for systemic change and transition. Further, falling into a pattern of reactive change allows external events to control and dictate the life and direction of an organization. That coupled with a natural tendency for organizations to develop protections and retaliations against perceived threats of change can rob an organization of the ability to direct and control its own future. In fact, entire communities of organizations can reflect the same pathologies of reactive response and entropic stasis.

In the TLC Toronto work, we began to observe a sequential cycle phenomenon.   As leaders within the consortium were able to start to transform themselves and their own organizations through new mindsets, tools and resources, their capacity to imagine and develop change on other levels (community, collaborative) began to emerge. Much like the repeating patterns of fractals, it appears that change manifests in similar ways at different levels. We believe that, if we can support change on the individual and organizational level, change will emerge on progressively larger scales of activity – in organizations, networks, communities, sectors and eventually in whole human systems.

There are many variables involved in the sequential cycle phenomenon, but in our experience, individual organizations free of disruptions will implement cycles of change in periods ranging from six months to two years. On the level of overall community change, the same sequential cycle phenomenon plays out but over a considerably longer period of time. On the community level, the status quo’s protections and retaliation against change are more variegated and complex. Sadly at times it requires the existing status quo cycle to fall completely into dysfunction before real change can be initiated. We believe that consortia like the TLC Toronto can do much to intervene and address such community dysfunction, especially if they can be sustained over extended periods of time.