Engine-for-Change

Today I spoke at the Drucker Global Forum about “Trojan mice” vs. “Trojan horses.” Organisational change programmes often struggle to get results despite investment, careful planning & leadership commitment. Traditional "Trojan horse" initiatives (large scale pilot projects designed for eventual system-wide rollout) struggle against the complexity inherent in large systems. The alternative, "Trojan mice," offers a fundamentally different pathway: having many people across the system with the skills & agency to test out small, well-focused changes to address complex problems. The choice between Trojan horses & Trojan mice isn't about abandoning ambition or settling for incremental tinkering. It's about recognising that in big systems, distributed action by skilled people with agency nearly always achieves more than centrally controlled, large-scale programmes. By cultivating many changemakers across the system & creating conditions where small, focused experiments can flourish, we can unlock the collective intelligence & energy needed for systemic change. Three facts about Trojan mice: 1) They fail often, fail early, & learn greatly. The cost of failure occurs early in project timelines, rather than at launch when it's too late. This is in line with what @AmyCEdmondson calls "intelligent failure"—thoughtful experiments that result in useful learning & allow teams to move forward. 2) They capture what works in complex systems - local ownership, fast feedback, & momentum that scales organically. Because changes are small & focused, they can be genuinely owned by those implementing them, creating commitment rather than compliance. 3) Most organisations are built for consistency, not novelty. Trojan mice strategies bypass this structural resistance by building agency & capability throughout the system rather than concentrating change authority in a central team. I learnt about Trojan mice from Chris Bolton @whatsthepont: whatsthepont.blog/2020/02/09… #DruckerForum