Assess the cultural landscape early: Successful change programs pick up speed and intensity as they cascade down, making it critically important to understand and account for culture and behaviours at each level of the organisation. Organisations often make the mistake of assessing culture either too late or not at all.

Thorough cultural diagnostics can assess organisational readiness to change, bring major issues to the surface, identify cultural factors that will support or inhibit change, and target sources of leadership and resistance. They identify the core values, beliefs, behaviors, and perceptions that must be taken into account for successful change to occur. They serve as the common fact baseline for designing key change elements, such as the new organisational vision, and building the infrastructure and programmes needed to drive change.