ADAPTABILITY ASSESSMENTS · CASE STUDY
| INDUSTRY | ORG SIZE | DURATION | SCOPE | CLIENT |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Cross-sector (financial services majority) | 38 change leaders, multiple organisations | 1 day 30 October 2025 | Multi-firm change leadership cohort | Dutch Caribbean cohort (anonymised) |
A one-day ADKAR® × AQ® masterclass moved a Dutch Caribbean change-leadership cohort from framework-first to people-first.
| SITUATION | |
| Change leaders across the Dutch Caribbean — from banking, insurance, government, retail, and aviation — had strong ADKAR foundations but kept running into a recurring pattern: initiatives that stalled at adoption despite the right frameworks being applied. Regional convention treated change as a training problem: if knowledge was transferred, behaviour would follow. Certified practitioners knew the picture on the ground was more complicated, and were looking for a sharper read on why their people kept responding to change so differently. |
| IMPLICATION | |
| Without a way to read individual adaptive capacity, ADKAR was being applied uniformly to teams that were anything but uniform. The risk was repeated cycles of stalled adoption — and a slow erosion of confidence in change frameworks themselves, when the gap was never the framework. |
| APPROACH | |
| On 30 October 2025, Peggy Cecilia Spong (ProSci-certified change practitioner and Lean six sigma Master Black Belt) and Christina Sprock (AQai® Certified Partner) co-delivered The Change Catalyst: Merging Structure and Adaptability for Success to 38 leaders from Curaçao and St Maarten, spanning banking, insurance, government, retail, aviation, and independent consultancies. The day opened with Lego Serious Play, mapped ADKAR alongside the AQ® dimensions, and put every participant on the other side of the change equation through their own AQ Me™ assessment. A fictional company, Willemstad Wired, anchored the afternoon: six personas blending AQ profiles with ADKAR stages were handed to small groups, who built tailored leadership questions and focused support actions for the person in front of them. |
WHAT AQ® REVEALS AQ® measures adaptability — the capacity to navigate change, complexity, and uncertainty — across three dimensions: Ability, Character, and Environment. Unlike engagement surveys or personality tests, AQ® measures what people can do when the ground shifts, not how they feel or who they are. It is the only validated framework that lets leaders predict, develop, and scale adaptive capacity. |
| RESULTS | |
Participants left treating change as a human-capability question rather than a training problem — asking not “have we communicated enough?” but “what does this individual actually need in order to adapt?” Overall satisfaction landed at 8.5/10, with 93% of respondents saying their expectations were met or exceeded and 100% indicating they would recommend the masterclass to a colleague. The cohort’s collective AQ profile — lower mental flexibility, higher work stress, and a near-introverted majority — gave the practitioners a sharper read on the dynamics inside the very teams they were trying to lead through change. |
“ It was a completely different angle of dealing with personnel — trying to understand what is needed to equip a person, encourage them, and lead them to climb successfully over the hill in a respectful way. — Masterclass participant |
| PRACTITIONER SPOTLIGHT |
LED BY — Christina Sprock, Founder Virtus Creates · AQ® Certified Partner, Level 1 & 2 Specialism: Human side of change · Psychological safety · Leadership & culture Sectors: Cross-sector Christina Sprock partners with organisations to strengthen leadership, culture, and workplace performance through consulting, coaching, and executive development — specialising in organisational culture, psychological safety, change management, adaptability, and team effectiveness. christina@virtuscreates.com CO-FACILITATED BY — Peggy Cecilia- Spong, MBa, Founder the Change creator, Lean Six Sigma Master Black Belt & Prosci Change practitioner.
Peggy Cecilia-Spong partners with organisations to support them with change during innovation, through consulting, coaching and training - specialising in Lean Six Sigma, change management, program management and project management.
peggy@thechangecreator.com |
CLASSIFICATION: PUBLIC
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