In 1964, American management psychologist Harold Leavitt developed the Diamond Model (now commonly known as Leavitt’s Diamond) as a methodology to analyse and understand the effects a change program would have on an organisation.
Without a doubt, I believe this tool and its philosophy are one of the first steps to develop a change management program.
If you’ve worked in this industry in the past, you know there is typically a general lack of information, a wide range of assumptions, and many cause-and-effect variables which need to be gathered and debated before a change strategy is determined, a plan is written and approved, and the program launched.
Leavitt’s Diamond is the ideal tool to help you gather, collaborate and make sense of this data.
Like the Best Business Tools, Leavitt's Diamond is Simple
Anyone can use the step-by-step approach to understand how a change in one part of the organisation will affect others. (Think of it like a Ripple Effect or Butterfly Effect.)
Many times, I’ve used the tool to:
- Consider where the change beings and how it will affect the other areas of the organisation. This includes consideration of how to integrate or separate ‘our’ change program from other change programs occuring at the same time inside the company.
- Generate a comprehensive list of questions about the potential change. This is the tool’s single best attribute. The Diamond helps articulate questions about what you don’t know.
- Facilitate research gathering about the change.
- Interview key stakeholders to learn their perspectives about the proposed change.
- Extract insights and create ideas to deliver as part of the change program itself.
How Familiar Are You with Leavitt's Diamond?
Depending upon how much you may know already, I’ve divided this long post into five sections. Please use the buttons (right) to jump to any section, then use the blue arrow in the bottom right corner to jump back to the top.
The sections include:
- A review of the tool itself
- An outline for the four Diamond quadrants
- Instructions to use the tool
- Suggestions to run your own workshop involving key change champions and agents
- Explore a sample list of questions for each quadrant. (Over the years, the questions from my workshops have grown longer so I’ve created a separate post. Clicking the button right will open a new window.)
If it’s helpful, I’ve also created a free six-page overview you can download here.
If you have any opinions or thoughts on Leavitt’s Diamond, please add your thoughts or comments at the bottom of this page.
Otherwise, let’s get into it.
Overview of Leavitt's Diamond
Starting in the late 1940s, Dr. Leavitt conducted industry-first research into the role that human behaviour played in an organisation’s success.
As a professor, consultant and mentor in this emerging field, Leavitt believed organisations were a complex system with at least four ‘variables’ that determined its overall success.
- People define the group of employees who do the work to keep the organisation moving forward. This group should be analysed first as they are the group who will be asked to change as part of the overall program.
- Task (aka Process) represents how people get things done, if not how they (could) do their best work every day.
- Structure outlines how the company is organised to work most efficiently, such as in teams or departments, as well as where they are located, such as different locations, different states or countries.
- Technology helps people to do their job better, producing more effective and sustainable work. This quadrant includes technology hardward and software, even communications.
Leavitt saw the variables in these four independent yet inter-dependent quadrants as something to study to understand how any change – large or small – would affect the overall system. More so, by understanding the vertical, horizonal and diagonal impact, he believed the organisation would be most successful and implementing the change and ensuring it ‘sticks.’
At the turn of last century, organisation leadership felt change was an isolated incident. However, by the mid to late 1940s when many businesses recalibrated after World War II, the increased complexity brought more interest from senior leadership in how to manage change as it rippled across the business.
Leavitt created the Diamond Model as a metaphorical shape to demonstrate how the outward influence from one quadrant affects the others, and vice versa.
Change Comes Understanding Integration and Collaboration
Leavitt argued successful integrated change requires an understanding its key aspects, such as:
- Analaysing the connections between each component
- Detailing how (or if) the organisation operates and collaborates now
- Looking for healthy connections between different departments, teams or groups. With this collaboration, Leavitt believes trust and rapport would not magically appear, and more so, without colaboration, the change is unlikely to occur or stick.
- Deciding which quadrant will the change begin, and when (If there is a staggered launch, who will change first?)
- Recognising how the initial change in one area will affect the other areas
- Finding the right balance of actions among the four quadrants.
What Each Quadrant Represents
People: The Ones Who Do The Work
People are the organisation’s employees.
They not only do the work required to ensure a successful organisation; more important, some or all of these employees will be asked to change in the future.
In this quadrant, you should focus on the leaders, managers, and employees generally who take initiative and influence others.
Think too of their overall roles and responsibilities, their culture, and the silos they create to insulate and isolate themselves from the rest of the organisation.
Oftentimes, you may find it handy to fully understand or explore the internal supply chain: how resources and/or information begins, flows and adapts inside the organisation as it creates the products or services.
In terms of the potential change program, your Goal of this quadrant is to …
- Understand how the potential change will affect or impact roles and responsibilites, such as shifting or merging tasks or activities of the individual or team members.
- Identify how the potential change will affect culture, such as moving from a reactive to an entrepreneurial mind-set.
- See how the potential change will impact how people or teams get their work done most effectively, such as understanding how long will it take for any learning from relevant training becomes standard behaviour.
Process: How Things Are Done, How To Do The Best Work
Process – also known as Task – is the methodology or steps that people do or use to get things done.
When applied properly, Process helps them do their best work every day. You should focus on exploring these procedures, protocols and systems, as well as the communication that support these efforts. Also, don’t forget to look at the risks if processes aren’t followed.
In terms of the potential change program, your Goal of this quadrant is to …
- Understand how and why the future state will differs from the current state. You should also know why one process was chosen over an alternative.
- Identify and quantify those specific areas of difference. For example, if there’s a reduction in the number of steps, how much time might be saved with a more effective process? Depending upon this future state, are the existing roles suitable? Which are? Which won’t be?
- Gather data to organise and prioritise the necessary processes changes, particularly to measure the rate and success of the change. You’re going to need milestones.
Structure: How We Are Organised
While it may sound similar to the People quadrant, Structure differs in that it shows how people are organised within the enterprise.
You may find the structure is by departments, or by teams (within or between departments), by locations, or by hierarchy and influence. Is this structure working now? Why and why not?
In terms of the potential change program, your Goal of this quadrant is to …
- Understand how people are organised or grouped and why. For example, what is the current state? and how should we be structured to support the future change?
- Determine who has control or influence – again, possibly based on hierarchy or politics – to see how the work is performed and managed
- Understand how boundaries, either real (such as geographical) or perceived (such as work silos), will influence and affect how the change will be accepted or implemented
- Understand how work flows throughout the organisation by communications, either formally (internal communications) or informal ly (plain ol’ gossip)
Technology: Helps People Do Better, More Effective Work
Technology covers any element or aspect that enables employees to do their best work.
Remember, technololgy can be tangible (such as equipment, hardware and software) or intangible (such as training or communications).
In terms of the potential change program, your Goal of this quadrant is to:
- Understand how much will ‘future automation’ (what/how much work will be done by computers) versus what will need to managed or completed by employees
- Determine the perceived future skills and knowledge requirements of current staff and prospect employees
- Decide what/how much training is required for relevant staff to adjust and excel with the change
Amongst all four areas, Leavitt believed that the most successful change meant understanding how the organisation works now, realising where the change will start and flow throughout the organisation, and finding the right and proper balance between actions to incur so the change is absorbed and embedded in all four quadrants of People, Process, Structure and Technology.
Leavitt’s original instructions were simple and specific.
- Define the current situation of each quadrant (What do we do now? How do we act now?)
- Determine where and when the change will start, explaining the change in simple terms
- Based on the proposed change, what will be the impact on the other quadrants?
To be honest, I don’t always find these questions work so well for myself. I personally prefer to have the context of the future change in the back of my head before I look at how the organisation works today.
Here are my adjusted instructions.
1. Identify what the change will be in the simplest terms.
Include when the change will shart and in which quadrant.
Enquire if there will be other change programs happening at the same time.
You might find the Seven Questions to Start a Change Program a useful discussion as you begin working with Leavitt’s Diamond.
2. Based on the potential change, how do the different quadrants work together now?
With the future change in mind, discuss how the organisation works at the moment.
For example, if the change will be a new technology system (for ex: installation of new CRM software), how does the organisation work now to manage customer relationships between …
- Technology and People?
- Technology and Structure?
- Technology and Process?
As the group discusses the current state prior to the change, you will see how natural it is to also start thinking of potential questions about the future state.
3. Draft every potential question.
In essence, it’s a simple brainstorm exercise, except the team is coming up with questions instead of ideas.
You can conduct this part of the workshop live (with flipcharts, whiteboards or paper hung on a big white wall) or online (any virtual collaboration tool, like Miro or Mural). See more details below on how to conduct the workshop.
Here are some sample questions to start. You can download a more complete list of potential questions at the bottom of this article.
- Identify the Process/Task used today, including key tasks, methodology or steps, routine, existing maintenance, for example:
- What processes/tasks are you (or staff) expected to use now?
- How effective is the process or task? Has staff ever suggested improvement or ways to make the process more effective?
- Who chose this process over other alternatives?
- Are there any benefits to this current process, particularly in comparison with the potential new process?
- Where do staff learn how to do the process? Was the training effective, and why?
- How do you (or staff) get work done?
- Why does the work unit exist?
- Define how People do their job within their work unit, for example:
- What are the values, beliefs and behaviours they work within now?
- What is the overall work culture for employees?
- What are their current roles and responsibilities?
- What are their current skills?
- What are they trained to do?
- How are they organised by teams, and why?
- How effective is their leader?
- What is their response to the proposed chage?
- How are they motivated now?
- Determine how the Structure affects people working together, both inside and outside their regular teams, for example:
- Who’s in charge of the team? Are they an effective leader? Is there another ‘leader’ who is more influential?
- Are you centralised? Decentralised? Does this work? How has working from home affected the team?
- How are duties divided among the team? How do these activities impact other teams, or how do other team’s work affect this group?
- Who manages quality control?
- What is the work flow?
- What is the communication flow?
- Identify the Technology employees use to produce their work, which tend to fall into two parallel groups:
- What tangible equipment enables and supports the business; for example, computers, software, devices, monitors, routers (anything that enables communication and work flow). Of this list ….
- Will the new technology change work efficiently with the old/existing technology?
- How was the new technology chosen? Was any part of the technology trialled with actual employees? What was the response??
- What tangible and intangible tools will be used implement the proposed change, including things such as seminars and training materials, the culture and values of the organisation, mentors and coaching, post-workshop materials and follow-up training
- What tangible equipment enables and supports the business; for example, computers, software, devices, monitors, routers (anything that enables communication and work flow). Of this list ….
Afterward, facilitate the team to remove the duplicate questions, organise the questions into groups, refine or edit the questions to improve the answer,
4. Analyse the impact of the proposed change
With all the questions in front of you, you and the team can now consider how the change will affect the organisation.
- Where does our change start?
- Are we ready? Are our people willing and hardy?
- Can we define the change as simply as possible? Start with the quadrant where the change will start, and explain the change in the simplest (but not simplistic) way
- Based on this change, what will be the impact on the other quadrants?
Before I get into the instructions, let me say two things.
Leavitt’s Diamond works for any size change program and any size organisation.
You will find the tool equally useful for large-scale transformational programs to a simple internal policy change.
Big change programs (a transformational program that’ll take years to implement in multiple countries, as you will to plan an internal policy change, such as implementing a new expense report system for a segment of your employee base.
Leavitt’s Diamond works for both formal (live/online) situations and informal conversations.
- Formally, I’ve invited key people to join a meeting to discuss and debate the potential change. Our team ensures we have people from all relevant areas. We’ve physically completed the Leavitt’s Diamond in the meeting itself, so senior executives can undertand both how the change will be perceived by the employees, as well as what elements need to be considered for an effective campaign. I’ve been impressed the tool works as easily with whiteboards or flipcharts or via online collaboration tools.
- Informally, I’ve used the tool by myself. With a single A4 page folded into four quadants pretending to be the Diamond tool, I analyse each category, hand-writing my notes and questions to structure my planning and potential meetings with key stakeholders.
In other words – like all good business tools – Leavitt’s Diamond is completely flexible.
To put Leavitt’s Diamond into practical use as a workshop exercise, I invite 4-6 people who are familiar with the organisation, positive about the potential change, and articulate enough to help determine the questions. I try to use as many members of the change team as possible, especially if they may be conducting the interviews.
Either on flipcharts or via online collaboration tools, I divide the group into 1-3 person teams assigned to one of the four quadrants. In the first step, I ask the participants to list all of the questions they have about the impact of the proposed change to their quadrant. After 5-15 minutes, I’ll rotate the teams among the quadrants to continue to build out the questions.
- If the change program or change team is small, I’l have the group work together through the meeting to create the list of questions. Obviously, dividing into small groups is unnecessary.
- If the change program or team is large or complex, I may run multiple workshops to get as many questions as possible. I’ll also set up whiteboards or online collaboration rools to create Leavitt’s Diamond on separate pages.
You should not worry if a question gets put in the wrong quadrant. You should first focus on getting as many questions as possible. After, you can re-categorise the questions as you sort and summarise.
Scroll down to a link to download a comprehensive sample of possible questions. Use these general questions to help define the questions which align better to your own organisation’s change.
Steps After the Workshop
Once I feel like I have more than enough questions – admittedly, a subjective decision – I’ll work with the group to assign the questions from Leavitt’s Diamond to different people in the Change Team. They will schedule and conduct the interviews with others to get the answers.
I stress two things to the potential interviewers:
- You learn as much about what you don’t know vs. what you do know.
- You want to speak to as many different levels and types of staff. You especially want employees who are both for or against the change.
Weaknesses of Leavitt’s Diamond
While it’s a great tool, it’s also not perfect. Leavitt’s Diamond does not:
- Consider external influences, such as customers or joint venture partners
- Provide a road map on what to do
Like every tool, you’ll need to analyse what the tool helps you understand to be able to apply the insights in the most relevant way possible.
Finally, here’s an excellent article on Leavitt’s Diamond at 60: What Is It Future in the Age of AI? by Nicole Downs on Medium. (You will need a subscription to read the article.)
From both my own change workshops and training, I’ve compiled a growing list of questions in each of the quadrants of Leavitt’s Diamond. The list grows upon each workshop, so I created a separate post to avoid this article getting longer and longer.
Click Sample Questions for Leavitt’s Questions. (It will open in a new window so you don’t lose this page.)
Any thoughts or advice on using Leavitt’s Diamond? Any other keys tools you’d suggest prior to developing your plan? Feel free to add your thoughts and comments below.
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