Designing & Leading Change

Overview

Grove CEO Gisela Wendling, Ph.D., and Grove Senior Associate Sarah DeWitt are offering a redesigned, in-person Designing & Leading Change workshop. Together, they help participants step into what it takes to lead change with vision—working with critical turning points and the momentum of change to generate transformational outcomes.

Drawing on Sarah’s experience leading change within organizations and Gisela’s decades of consulting—supporting leaders through alignment and breakthrough moments—the workshop offers a grounded, integrated approach to applying the Seven Challenges of Change in practice.

Using the Seven Challenges of Change™ and the Wendling Liminal Pathways Change Framework™, you will explore organizational change not only as a sequence of stages, but as a dynamic interplay between the structures that guide the process and the human dynamics that determine its success.

Participants are invited to bring an organizational change challenge they are currently navigating—as a leader, team member, or consultant. Gisela and Sarah will share The Grove’s proven methods, equipping participants with practical approaches to initiate, guide, and realize meaningful change across a range of organizational contexts.

A Hands-On Learning Experience

You will experience a hands-on, lab-style learning environment where you work directly on your own change challenge, learning not only from the facilitators but also through the rich exchange with fellow participants and their real-time efforts to move change forward.

You'll also discover the change capabilities you already possess and those you wish to develop using our new online Transformational Competency Assessment based on The Change Maker’s Competency Wheel™, The Grove's new competency model. 

This Course Is for You If:

• You are an organizational leader seeking frameworks and approaches to strengthen your ability to anticipate, guide, and lead across the full arc of change while sustaining momentum within your organization.

• You are a process consultant seeking to strengthen your ability to design phase-appropriate change processes using The Grove’s integrated frameworks and templates—working skillfully with the distinct challenges and opportunities that arise as clients move through change.

• You are a visual practitioner or facilitator seeking to deepen your ability to design and visually facilitate key turning points in change processes, helping groups navigate critical moments with shared understanding and forward movement.

Learning Objectives:

• Develop your capacity for visionary change leadership
  Learn what it means to guide high-engagement change processes and explore the evolving role and responsibilities of leaders of change.

• Gain fluency in The Grove’s core change frameworks
  Work with the Seven Challenges of Change™, the Wendling Liminal Pathways Change Framework™, and the Change Maker’s Competency Wheel™ to understand both the structure, dynamics, and comptencies associated with transformational change.

• Design and guide effective change processes
  Learn how to organize and facilitate a process design team, design key meetings and project roadmaps, and engage in ongoing contracting around goals, roles, and results.

• Strengthen your transformational leadership competencies
  Identify the competencies you want to develop and practice essential skills such as opportunity framing, deep listening, powerful questioning, self-awareness, and working with creativity and uncertainty.
  

• Apply visual and systemic approaches to change
  Explore the Grove Graphic Guides® and learn how to support dialogue and shared thinking at a whole-system level.

What This Course Is Like:

• Interactive, reflective, and practice-based
  Led by Gisela Wendling, Ph.D., and Sarah DeWitt, who together bring more than six decades of experience supporting leaders in organizational and social change, integrating practical application with deep reflection to support lasting impact.
  

• Grounded in proven frameworks and thought leadership
  Draws from Visual Consulting: Designing & Leading Change (co-authored by David Sibbet and Gisela Wendling) and Gisela’s The Liminal Pathways Study. Selected chapters will be provided for pre-reading, with hard copies available at the in-person workshop.
  

• A reflective and confidential learning environment
  Offers a safe, supportive space for deep dialogue, shared learning, and meaningful connection within a small cohort.

• Applied to your real-world challenges
  Provides dedicated time to work on a current change initiative from your organization or client context.

• Informed by real cases and diverse contexts
  Incorporates case examples from successful projects across private and public sectors.

• Hands-on and visually engaging
  Includes practice with innovative visual tools and Grove Graphic Guides® to support systemic thinking, alignment, and engagement.

• This workshop takes place at Tides Converge, in the historic Presidio.