How to Coach Yourself and Others Essential Knowledge For Coaching | Page 58

So popular thought has moved away from the concept of
freezing. Instead, we should think about this final stage as being
more flexible, something like a milkshake or soft serv icecream,
in the current favourite flavour, rather than a rigid frozen block.
This way 'Unfreezing' for the next change might be easier.
Given today's pace of change this is a reasonable criticism. But it
might help to get in touch with what Kurt Lewin was actually
saying. In 1947 he wrote:
A change towards a higher level of group performance is
frequently short-lived, after a "shot in the arm", group life soon
returns to the previous level. This indicates that it does not
suffice to define the objective of planned change in group
performance as the reaching of a different level. Permanency of
the new level, or permanency for a desired period, should be
included in the objective. (Kurt Lewin, "Frontiers of Group
Dynamics", Human Relations, Volume 1, pp. 5-41)
Lewin's concern is about reinforcing the change and ensuring
that the desired change is accepted and maintained into the
future. Without this people tend to go back to doing what they
are used to doing. This is probably what Kurt Lewin meant by
freezing - supporting the desired change to make sure it
continues and is not lost.
More modern models of change, such as the ADKAR model, are
more explicit about this step and include Reinforcement as one of
their phases. I've also read this final step of freezing referred to
as the lock-in effect. Establishing stability only happens when the
new changes are locked-in.
Thinking about change as a journey might make you think that a
journey has a beginning , middle, and an end. While this is useful
when thinking about the process of change the reality is that this
journey doesn't have an end. Lots of rest stops maybe! Some
opportunities for settling down for a while. But no end. So be

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