Adaptive Strategy & Organizational Development
Root Change helps organizations clarify strategy, align teams, strengthen systems, and adapt effectively in complex, dynamic environments.
Enabling leaders to navigate complexity, adapt, and advance organizational goals
We support leaders of organizations and coalitions in connecting strategy, structure, and learning to adapt from the inside out. By helping leadership clarify direction, align teams, strengthen decision pathways, implement practical plans, and build practices for ongoing adjustment, we create space to test ideas, coordinate action, and drive results that advance organizational goals.
Our approach includes:
- Strategic advisory & planning, including development of 100-day plans, actionable roadmaps, and systems-oriented strategies
- Organizational capacity assessment, leveraging tools such as C-BAR (Capacity-building Assessment Rubric) and OCA (Organizational Capacity Assessment) to identify strengths, gaps, and high-leverage improvements
- Organizational strengthening, aligning roles, responsibilities, governance structures, and cross-team coordination to support adaptive, sustainable performance
- Implementation support, helping leaders translate strategy into measurable action while building internal capacity and alignment
Stories & Insights
Trust Capital: What Two Years of Participatory Action Research Taught Us About Economic Development
What Belfast Taught Me
Development at the Speed of Trust: How Learning Is Helping Shape the ERC Way
Reflecting on the ERC Annual Retreat: Emergent Co-Creation for Dynamic Collaboration
Adaptive Strategy & Organizational Development in Practice
Build-Win-Sustain Framework: Root Change developed the Build-Win-Sustain (BWS) Framework as a practical tool for strategy planning and strengthening long-term social change. The framework provides a comprehensive set of resources—including planning templates, workshops, and the Beat the Backslide board game—to help practitioners map objectives, prioritize actions, and coordinate efforts for resilient, equity-driven impact.
Global strategy reboot for 10-country organization: Root Change worked with Children International’s leadership and country teams across 10 countries to strengthen organizational effectiveness, revise strategy, improve learning systems, and support innovation. By combining human-centered design, rapid learning cycles, and collaborative problem-solving, the initiative strengthened the organization's ability to innovate and adapt at scale.
STAR – System Transformation and Results: Root Change developed STAR, a performance assessment and capacity strengthening system for organizations engaged in collective action. Used by hundreds of civil society organizations, STAR combines assessment, coaching, experimentation, and action planning to help partners improve organizational performance, strengthen collaboration, and contribute more effectively to shared system-level goals.
Piloting a New Strengths-Based Anti-Poverty Model: Root Change supported the Child Center of New York in designing and piloting Cash+Community Works, a strengths-based, peer-driven anti-poverty model serving 300 families in Queens. The model combined peer groups, direct cash investments, family-generated data, and individualized goal planning to help families build on their strengths, track progress, and identify community-driven pathways toward economic mobility.
Linking NGOs with Capacity Services (LINCS): Root Change facilitated LINCS, a local capacity services marketplace that helped connect NGOs’ organizational strengthening needs with qualified local service providers in Bolivia, Ecuador, Vietnam, Bangladesh and Zambia. Through network mapping, marketplace-style exchanges, facilitated negotiations, and customized service contracts, LINCS helped local NGOs, government actors, and service providers align demand and supply, co-create practical solutions, and strengthen local capacity systems.
Field-building in capacity strengthening: Root Change helped shape the field of capacity strengthening in development by authoring the original organizational capacity assessment tools, and influencing USAID’s embrace of Capacity 2.0, its Local Capacity Strengthening Policy, and the Agency’s approach to collective action.