Authentic Change and the Willingness to Transform

An interview with Anne Vries about her experience of transformational change in her organization

I love working on development processes with organizations. My approach is based on the belief that the key to healthy organizational development lies within the organization itself. It’s also based upon understanding that effective change must come from within the organization, and that when you look openly and honestly to what is really there, solutions will arise.

This means that whenever I enter into a development process with my clients I am aware that we are entering into the unknown. Of course there are ideas and hopes about desired outcomes, but if change work is authentic there is always a chance that something unexpected will happen causing things to go in a new direction.

That was the case when I was hired by Anne Vries, Co-founder and owner of Idéfix in Amsterdam. She invited me to work with her organization, to re-shape the leadership structure from a single owner to a co-ownership model, but the outcome was quite different, leading to a decision to close the organization.

Regardless of having a different outcome, the process was valuable and important because it made clear that it was time for a radical change, and this is exactly what happened. By closing Idéfix other opportunities opened up for Anne and for those involved in the organization. The process made it clear that this was the right decision and it contributed to a good closure.

I sat down with Anne to find out more about how she experienced the process and hear about how she looks back on the experience.

Idéfix was a unique organization supporting people to find ways to tap into their creativity in order to accomplish their dreams

As Anne put it:

At Idéfix we wake up sleeping ideas, those ideas that haven’t manifested themselves as ideas yet but signal deeper longings and keep knocking on the door and whispering for attention. They are about…