All organisations work within boundaries; limits of authority, legal statute, societal norms and physical environment. They are a completely normal, often invisible, part of everyday life. Organisations deliberately create boundaries in order to help them do business more effectively. It makes sense to separate production from sales and marketing – different focus, different skills and different processes that you wouldn’t want to muddle. But once established, these boundaries can stand in the way of achieving change. Learning more about them and how to use them can help improve change management skills.

Three stand out as significant:

1. Natural boundaries

These boundaries are either natural or theoretical. Family boundaries, for example, are naturally occurring whilst a business division is a logical construct and is natural only in the sense that it seems appropriate as a grouping (for whatever reason).

• Pros – powerful affiliations and a clear sense of identity and ‘ownership’ occur around natural boundaries which can be powerful motivating forces. People will often take huge pride in their company’s brand – an expression of a natural boundary surrounding their organisation – working extremely hard for and becoming fiercely protective of it.
• Cons – they have the potential to be divisive, running the risk of a ‘them and us’ culture. You can see this in many organisations. Once established they can also quickly become entrenched and hard to flex.

2. Political boundaries

Boundaries of this nature are formed on axes of power and do not necessarily relate to natural boundaries; indeed they might cut across them. For example, the sales and production directors of a business might combine forces to overcome the objections of the logistics director to a project they favour. In this instance a political boundary has been established that crosses two natural boundaries.

• Pros – Political boundaries allow interested parties to unite behind a common objective and can therefore be powerful in providing a focus – but the goal has to be clear. They also have a multiplying effect on the individual participants’ power. It is on this basis that such powerful interest groups as Greenpeace and Amnesty International arise.
• Cons – Maintaining alignment and subverting power for personal agendas can be major stumbling blocks for these types of boundary. People can also be inherently suspicious of ‘politicians’ and behave accordingly.

3. Momentum boundaries

These boundaries are created by behaviour. Fashion on the high street or virals on the internet are obvious examples. Once sufficient people view a You Tube clip it builds a momentum of its own as people look at what other people are doing or looking at and allow it to influence their behaviours. The Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell provides a very readable explanation of this.

• Pros – Momentum boundaries are probably most useful in gaining adoption of change and can therefore be extremely valuable. It is possibly better to be making progress in some unplanned, or slightly ‘off-track’, direction than not at all since it builds an increased visibility of and appetite for the change. Momentum boundaries can also have the happy result of ‘sweeping past’ objectors to change who get brushed aside the mass behaviour of others.
• Cons – Unpredictability and maintenance of control of the change as it develops its own momentum is the most significant challenge in this direction.

Conclusions; well, you pay your money and you take your choice – all boundaries (there are others that relate to change too) can be helpful or a complete pain. It’s how you approach and manage them that really matters.

There you are then, three boundaries and now, four questions: What has your experience been? Which are the most useful or powerful boundaries in your organisation? How have you used these and other boundaries to assist change? Which boundaries do you find yourself exploiting or walking into?