The S-curve
Organisations are living systems; that's a fundamental insight of business ecology. So, we applied the S-curve to organisations and discovered its huge explanatory power.
Nothing that is to grow stays the same. Business thinkers tell us that change is the one common factor of organisations and organisational activity: that change is chaotic and unpredictable. But the S-curve provides an anchor in describing the future course of change.
We did not develop the S-curve. The 'S-curve' characterises a universal process that - unless interrupted or destroyed - is followed by everything that comes into being:-
Creation > Development > Growth > Maturity/'Harvest' > End
"Everything" really means "everything". Your own life or the life of a product like a mobile phone. The rise and fall of a bee colony, or that of a nation. It illustrates the growth and decline of organisations or of an economy, a market, a career, political power, an ecosystem, or the whole earth, or a relationship.
Progressing through the respective stage of a growth process poses different challenges that require shifts in performance emphasis to overcome. At an individual level these shifts require very many behavioural changes – no individual can make them all. Invention is really something very different from control.
To secure performance in a team or an organisation, it is thus important to know which S curve stage is providing the strategic context and thus the nature of the contribution required.
We've found that all of our clients have an immediate understanding of the S-curve and the value of its analysis. They quickly appreciate fitness for purpose, readiness for change and what needs to be done in individual, team and organisational contexts.
Click the links below to see how our approach to organisational development is connected to the process of growth.
Read more detailed information on the S-curve