In today’s turbulent markets and the rapidly changing business world, companies – in order to become and continue to be successful – need to have a close observation of the market, a valid perception of future trends and the curiosity and willingness to learn, invest and take risks.

To successfully respond to future market needs, the pattern of the company will have to be adequately changed at the right point in time: transformations need to take place and be led successfully since they are critical for a company’s future.

This topic has been addressed by many authors. In contrast to numerous articles which often show a detailed recipe how to deal with transformations or transitions, respectively, we would like to take a more fundamental or philosophical view: Why is a transformation really so business critical – so to speak inherent of a company’s development? What is the nature of a transformation which can also be seen in different disciplines? Why do blurred perceptions hinder successful transformations?

How can this be observed in real life examples? And, concluding from these statements, what are therefore the canonical critical success factors?

Definition and Analogies

Generally, we define a transformation of a company as a macroscopic transition from one stable order pattern to another going through a stage of crisis-like disturbance (see Kruse, Peter in: Prof. Peter Kruse über Changemanagement, interview, e.g.  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FLFyoT7SJFs).

Although this definition is targeted to describe transformations or transitions of companies similar definitions can be found in different contexts, e.g. in natural sciences. In this article, we take a closer look at the nature of transformations in Physics because many parallels can be discovered which help to understand the nature of transformations in companies.

In 1962, the term paradigm shift became popular (see Kuhn, Thomas: The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 1962): In his book The Structure of Scientific Revolutions Kuhn put the argument forward that science does not progress via a linear accumulation of new knowledge but undergoes periodic revolutions also called paradigm shifts. Briefly speaking, phases in which knowledge is accumulated basically step by step - defined by Kuhn as normal science - are alternating with so-called scientific revolutions which increase the maturity level of the respective area.