ABSTRACT
Long-drawn out change, which is what usually occurs, arises because no one has had the nous or the courage to act as a Catalyst. Being a Catalyst requires going out on a limb. One of the difficulties of being a Catalyst is that you are working with very slippery data; with feelings and hunches and barely perceptible thoughts. One ingredient of the Catalyst is to take risks which means to leave your ego at the front door as Dick Beckhard would have said. The course was held at Cranfield School of Management, where the author had done his MBA, near Bedford. In developing this transcendent function, there results high energy, a new situation, it is dynamic. A confrontation meeting involves different levels in the organisation in a meeting that either resolves key organisational differences, or sets up some strategic guidance for senior managers. Goffee and Jones use two sociological concepts solidarity and sociability to create a framework that integrates them.
