Leading Exponential Change: Go Beyond Agile and Scrum to Run Even Better Business Transformations

By: Erich R Bühler

Narrated by: Millian Quinteros

Length: 8 hrs and 9 mins

Publisher's summary

Leading Exponential Change (Second Edition) unveils the secrets of enterprise Agility.

The way companies manage change has undergone dramatic shifts, and organizations have tried to adapt to relentless market innovations by using artificial intelligence, Big Data, the Scrum Framework, increasingly connected people, and new mind-sets such as Agile or Lean. But all these approaches have only established disruptive change as a new, relentless reality.

In Leading Exponential Change, world-renowned consultant Erich R. Bühler shares the secrets that differentiate truly remarkable companies from those that fail to adapt to today’s constantly changing market conditions.

During his years on the front lines, the author recognized that no two companies were the same - and that what worked in one enterprise might not work in another. He studied a wide range of organizations to determine the specific behaviors and mind-sets needed to embrace change.

One thing became clear: Human beings are not physiologically prepared for constant alterations in processes, roles, and ways of working. Realizing that a new approach was needed, Bühler developed a set of revolutionary principles and techniques to create responsive people and organizations that challenged traditional thinking (and many Agile concepts).

Drawing on his experience as an international change consultant, the author takes you deep into why companies struggle to adapt even when they have the right people. He also analyzes the reasons some consultants face endless obstacles and resistance to change while others succeed.

This ground-breaking book offers new foundations to help company leaders, managers, Agile consultants, HR representatives, mentors, and scrum masters become skilled at helping others to influence change.

Here listeners find five types of Agility - including mental Agility and how to increase it! Bühler also explains two game-changing frameworks for increasing adaptability to change: The ELSA framework, ideal for environments where people welcome change, and DeLTA, which helps manage change in companies with hostile work environments.

Drawing from years of experience and employing an easy-to-follow approach, Bühler also addresses the differences between Agile and enterprise/business Agility, explores what happens to the brain during change, explains methods for improving innovation, and teaches important concepts about organizational psychology and the neuroscience of change.

Between the first and second editions, Bühler traveled around the world interviewing change consultants from different countries and cultures to verify which of his techniques had a positive impact and which ones needed to be improved.

Bolstered by this new data, the second edition of Leading Exponential Change is packed with new paradigms, practices, ready-to-use tools, and real-life stories from the author and other industry-revered consultants specializing in innovation, human resources, and coaching.

PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying PDF will be available in your Audible Library along with the audio.

©2018 Erich R. Bühler (P)2019 Erich R. Bühler

Good but repetitive

Overall the book was good. However, many times it would repeat the same thing and so I would sometimes zone out of listening to it and then have to repeat sections.

introduction into the state of mind of tue agility

First of all, to sum it up, as an experienced Coach for Agility, my verdict is this is a great book and well worth listening the 8 hours time. Erich Bühler presents an impressive, profound and comprehensive overview of the world of agility. Although most of what he is explaining wasn’t new to me, the book triggered a significant insight for me. While sharply distinguishing between illusionary change and real agility, Erich makes the point that any true transformation into agility essentially needs an exponential dynamic. This idea is building upon the Lean Startup model and is putting it in a broader context. One of many proofs of his healthy agile mindset is that he emphasises the importance of organisational simplification. Erich relates his arguments to findings from neuro science and this gives it a scientific flavor that will speak to left-brained people.
While the book is good Introduction into the world of agility for consultants coming from legacy methodologies such as Prince2, PMP or SAFe, Erich weaves strings together in a way that creates a potential learning for any reader, however seasoned she or he is. He arranges pieces of a great puzzle in an inspiring way.
The book is highly structured and very concise. It provides a reliable compass thru the state of mind of agility.
For people seeking advice, the book provides also detailed instruction for implementation. Also many readers can benefit from the trap patterns of illusionary agile adoptions described in the book. In summary, the book belongs in the shelf of any agilist and leader of a journey into true agility.

Enterprise Agile masterpiece!

I really enjoyed Erich's book.
It is easy to understand and includes a lot of examples and viewpoints from different angles, industries and methodologies.

He starts saying that although we are facing exponential change in almost every field, most of the companies are still being managed in a traditional way. He adds that exponential change, at first is slow but then it grows at really high speed and that the best companies are not those that arrive first but the ones that learn faster.

Erich shows in clear terms the differences between "complexity" and "complicated". The first refers to uncertainty which we cannot control. The second refers to a high level of difficulty which is solved with technical capacity.

Additionally, the book shows that the linear thinking concept that gave companies time to adapt does not exist anymore. We currently live in a world of exponential change led by complexity and uncertainty and companies must be horizontal, flexible and decentralized enough to make decisions instantly.

A statement from the book that concerned me was that only 33% of the American workforce was engaged at work. Fortunately, Erich tell us that new companies are treating their employees as their greatest asset and leaders are realizing that change is a mandatory requirement for facing new challenges.

Finally, I would like to say that this book is a must read for anyone who wants to understand the present and future of work, companies and management.

Agustin Varela - Agile Facilitator (@aguvar)

Outstanding Resource for Agile Change Leaders

This is one of my favorite change leadership books especially in the context of helping digital organizations navigate an agile transformation. Erich opens his book with a discussion of exponential acceleration and moves to numerous concepts such as empiricism, organizational health, and an exponential mindset. While not explicitly mentioned, he further provides compelling arguments supporting the theory of social construction of technology and how it impacts digital companies. He also includes sufficient discussion of the deeper factors of organizational change such as conflict, emotions, preparation, and resistance. Given my agile coaching specialization and past research into socio-psychological effects of Scrum, I especially liked his strong focus on people and the discussions around behaviors, neuroscience, and psychology. Overall, Erich’s book is unequalled in its breadth and nice balance of theory, models, and techniques to lead change. Just a few of my favorite takeaways include the SCARF model, the deep dive into enterprise social systems, and the ELSA and DeLTA frameworks. This book has my highest recommendation for change leader anywhere.

From Agility to Exponentiality !

When I read about successful startups or unicorns, I always ask the same questions : how did they scale ? How did they go from 0 to 1 Million in a very short timescale ?

Unfortunately, common entrepreneurship books seem to focus more on the business side while agilists often emphasize the techniques and practices of iterative and incremental product development without diving into the details of how to ignite what Erich R Bühler calls exponential change in an organization.

In Leading Exponential Change, Bühler masterfully bridges the gap between different disciplines like product development, agile methods, organizational development, behavioral psychology and neuroscience to explain why should organizations care about shifting from a linear change approach to embrace the exponential change, and most importantly how they could achieve it.

The book offers not only a solid theoretical foundation for accelerating change in an organization and thus creating product and services that scale beyond the organization limits and constraints, but also a wealth of tools, techniques and methodologies to allow anyone to start making impact and contribute to their organization transformation.

The author starts by explaining what Exponential Change is and it's importance for modern organizations. Then, using a smart mix of science, real world stories and actionable advices, he guides the reader through a transformational journey of the organization.

I have really enjoyed the book and I found it had succeeded in offering the right balance between abstract concepts and ideas and detailed recommendations on how to use them in real world situations. I have particularly appreciated the chapters about Enterprise Social Systems and ELSA and DELTA frameworks for leading change initiatives in organizations.

I recommend this audiobook for business leaders, agile coaches, managers and anyone who wants to go beyond the benefits of agility. The narration is clear, well articulated and entertaining.

Malek KAZDAGHLI
Agile coach & practitioner

Great Stuff

I will listen to this again and expand its use in my work. Easy to understand the simple common sense idea proven to work.

Innovative ideas to make sustained change happens

In these times where the digital transformation is changing how to do business in a volatile, uncertainty, complex and ambiguous world, Erich provides insights on how micro-habits and simple changes have the potential to impact on the organizational culture significantly to achieve the business goals.

The author shows why Agile is much more than Scrum and Kanban, and how different methodologies should be used based on the company situation.

This well-written book has given me guidelines and frameworks to implement now and set my team up for success in a moment of constant changes. The real cases exposed here are not only examples of how the change happens, but also they are inspiring.

Leading Exponential Change is a must-read book for leaders who need to deal with transformation changes, as well as for individual contributors who want to be part of change initiatives in their organizations.

Important book for every change agent

This audio book is very interesting to hear. It has many tools that you can apply immediately, and it also has many real-world examples which makes it entertaining to hear. I particularly enjoyed the chapter about Enterprise Social Systems.

Neuro-sci-backed Lots of Practical Change Know How

Like Yin to the Yang of change management approaches and separations between process and empiricism, I hold in high regard and laud Erich Bühler’s Leading Exponential Change: embrace of new approaches as our gateway to the new era of exponential change. Erich takes change professionals on a journey of tool and method discovery, guiding them with a series of neuro science-backed approaches and ideas. This is a great book to enlighten the change driven mind to shift it away from the old linear ways of adopting change and move it towards adoption of change at an exponential rate. He bridges the gap between theoretical knowledge and purposeful application by teaching change consultants with Agile mindsets of all types how to turn scarce resources and knowledge into exponential business value. Along the way practical advice on culture, governance, process, motivation, and other directives will inspire the reader to think outside the box and build the creative muscles that hold the key to contagious outcomes. ~Matt Kirilov

Unmissable Book

Leading Exponential Change is an indispensable book for any change agent, especially Managers and Coaches who are thinking on start a change strategy in their organizations or in their clients, as well as for all those who have been faced failures in their change management strategies. It’s a book full of experiences and very good techniques and practices to carry out from day 1. The connections to Neuroscience, psychology of thought, and the links to the Agile philosophy, are essential complements to understand the foundations of a successful change process, learning how to make it exponential and begin to be initiators of successful change strategies. In the same way, the micro habits shows how continuous improvement leverage lasting changes in the long term. Definitely Leading Exponential Change is a book that can not be missing in your library.