Why Change Needs a Storymap

Why Change Needs a Story Map

What my career taught me about change, visualization, and helping people see the journey

Change is rarely just about a new system, process, or organizational model. Real change helps people understand where they are going, why it matters, and how their work fits into something larger. That is why I believe change needs a story map. Without one, even well‑planned efforts can feel fragmented, confusing, and difficult to sustain.

That belief is also shaping the work Mark Anthony Lawson and I are building through Ride the Waves Consulting, where change leadership and visualization come together to help people see the journey more clearly.

How My Career Shaped This Perspective

Looking back, my career has always been rooted in change. From the beginning, I was drawn to shifts in business and technology and to the opportunities they created.

In the early 1980s at Prudential—when mainframes still sat at the center of large companies—I was trained in programming and began on the business side before moving into IT to help design and implement software change. At the same time, I was navigating personal transitions as well, moving from Prudential’s eastern home office in Pennsylvania to the western office in Los Angeles and shifting my college focus to earn a dual degree in business and technology.

My work at Avco Financial in California, IMS America back in Pennsylvania, and later at Merck deepened that perspective. As software matured and organizations became better at capturing, moving, and combining data, the connection between business and IT grew more critical. What once looked like separate efforts became interdependent. Data could no longer remain isolated, and projects increasingly involved business partners, shared processes, and multiple stakeholders across the organization.

The Moment I Realized a Project Isn’t a Transformation

This is when I began to see the difference between managing a project and guiding a transformation.

A project can succeed with a plan, requirements, and milestones.

Transformation asks for something more.

When multiple systems, teams, partners, and stakeholders are involved, people need a way to understand how the pieces connect, what the sequence means, and where they fit in the bigger picture. That is where a story map becomes essential. It gives change a narrative, not just a schedule.

A story map helps leaders explain:

• What is changing

• Why it matters now

• What comes first

• Who is affected

• How each phase connects to the next

Instead of leaving teams to interpret the change on their own, a story map creates shared context. It aligns stakeholders, makes the sequence easier to understand, and helps people see their role in the transformation rather than feeling that change is simply happening to them.

A Defining Example

One experience brought this lesson into sharp focus. I was selected as a Transformation Ambassador and Change Lead for a large portfolio initiative with many moving parts. Working alongside an outstanding consulting team, I helped build the change approach from the ground up—sponsor engagement, communication tools, impact assessments, and more.

A key part of that work was partnering with Mark Anthony Lawson, a visualization expert whose ability to translate complexity into clear, compelling story maps made the change easier to understand. Together with subject matter experts, we created story maps that helped people see the bigger picture across multiple projects. The first explained a new enterprise‑wide network connecting external partners to the company, and it became a valuable tool in story circles that helped people understand the past, present, and future state.

That work began more than fifteen years ago, and many projects later it helped spark the business Mark and I are now building together. Mark has remained the expert behind the visual dimension of this work, helping turn complex ideas into story maps people can understand and use.

What began with a series of maps showing how an organization’s key divisions intersected has grown into a broader belief: story maps can support change at every level—from enterprise transformation to team transitions to the way a single person makes sense of their own story.

Why Story Maps Matter Now More Than Ever

Projects may end, but change continues. People still need to learn, adapt, monitor outcomes, and sustain what has been created. That is why effective change leadership requires more than execution. It requires a story map that brings clarity, context, and purpose to the journey.

I have seen story maps add value not only in large transformations, but in many forms of change—from organizational initiatives to team transitions to an individual trying to make sense of their own story.

If we want change to last, we have to give people more than a plan.

We have to help them see the journey, and perhaps even see themselves in it.