Change regenerates enterprises

Nature teaches us that to live we must always change. Every two hours we change the skin of our lips. Every twenty days that of the whole body. We are programmed to transform ourselves non-stop: not for fashion, but to continue living. Every day we kill millions of our cells to renew ourselves.

It is a wonderful phenomenon called apoptosis: from the Greek 'falling further', like the leaves of the tree that fall in autumn to allow the plant to become better again in spring. This continuous death and rebirth is vital; it does not happen randomly or in isolation, but in harmony with our surroundings. If we live in balance with ourselves and the environment, we are well.

Nature teaches: change and harmony are essential. Constantly changing to improve ourselves is the rule.

However, companies are not programmed to change, like our bodies. If a business model generates profits, one tends to defend it, not to change it. There is a fear that change will destroy value. But all around us everything changes relentlessly: technologies, processes, customer needs, markets. He who stands still while everything changes, dies. Not changing means choosing extinction.

Continuous change is therefore also needed in the company. Change, in harmony with the internal and external context, possibly anticipating and leading external changes. And this is only possible by leveraging the entire corporate ecosystem: colleagues, customers, suppliers, investors, start-ups, innovators in academies and research centres, institutions, business partners, social communities, social activists. All participate in the collective change and can fuel it, to manage it in harmony and not against the corporate stakeholders.