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Creative people—the entrepreneurial types, the type (E)—love change. They thrive on it. Sometimes they introduce change to improve whatever they are doing. And sometimes the motivation is simpler and more primal: to leave their mark, “I was here.”

Years ago, I was in Peru on a consulting assignment and had a free Sunday. I went to the beach. In front of me stood a beautiful sandcastle a kid had built earlier. From the corner of my eye, I saw another kid approaching the castle. I could predict exactly what he would do—I bet you can too. He destroyed the sandcastle and immediately began building his own.

And the result? A sandcastle far less beautiful than the one he had just demolished.

I witness the same dynamic in organizations. At the Adizes Institute we have several marketing brochures. Every new marketing manager feels compelled to criticize the existing brochure and create a new one. Often it is not better. It is just different.

I fall into the same trap. Whenever I write a book, I make many changes to the manuscript. But many of those revisions do not make it better. They simply make it different.

Type (E)s frequently confuse “better” with “different.” They assume that if something is different, it automatically must be better.

This is a fallacy.

And this confusion extends far beyond organizations.

In marriage, people sometimes look for a different spouse and assume the new marriage will be better. Often it is not. It is just different.

A new CEO arrives and restructures the company within weeks—not because the structure was dysfunctional, but because they want to put their fingerprint on it. The company then spends months adjusting to changes that add no real value.

A new government takes office and reverses policies simply because they were created by the previous administration. The country zigzags without long-term consistency.

A chef takes over a successful restaurant and immediately changes the menu. Loyal customers vanish. The old menu worked; the new one is merely different.

These are all variations of the same story: Destroying a working sandcastle to build a lesser one—just to say, “I made this.”

The Lesson

Before changing anything—your job, your structure, your document, or your spouse—pause and ask:

Am I improving anything? Or am I simply just making it different?

Different is easy. Better is hard.

And the two should never be confused.