Use the Five Ps to understand your organization and manage change

The Five Ps–Purpose, Philosophy, Priorities, Practices and Projections– is a model that depicts a system-wide view of an organization. Above all, you can use this model to understand your organizational culture and to use culture to manage change.

Core culture is in the image below, at the very center. To sum up, it is the Purpose, Philosophy and Priorities. These are the principles and values guiding all facets of the organization. The Purpose and Philosophy are typically stable. But you can change the Priorities as the strategy changes. You can incorporate new areas of focus in the Priorities. To clarify, Priorities guide what employees focus on and pay attention to.

The Five Ps

Alignment of the Five Ps

Once you have defined the Purpose, Philosophy and Priorities–the Core Culture–you can bring change by aligning the Internal and External Practices and the Projections with the Core Culture attributes. The diagram below shows examples of Internal Practices, External Practices, and Projections. Each must be aligned with the Purpose, Philosophy and Priorities.

Alignment of the Five Ps

Use this organizational change model as a simple tool to understand the different facets of your organization and guide change.