Along with understanding the nature of commitment, and with mastering the competencies for winning intellectual, emotional, and spiritual commitment, a leader needs to ask and answer the question: What level of commitment is needed to effect the change that I am seeking? The answer is dependent upon the level of change involved. The lowest level of change demands little more than new behavior—doing something better for example, or doing it in a new way, or finding a fix for a problem in an existing system without changing the nature of the system itself. At this level of change, things chug along in first gear. The lowest level of change can usually be accomplished with political commitment, and can be accelerated by either intellectual or emotional commitment.
Higher levels of change involve shifting gears upward. They require learning and looking at things in new ways. The nature of the system itself must change: A society relinquishes dependence on institutions in favor of individual initiative, democracy replaces dictatorship, a life insurance company becomes a full-service financial company, aging people transform themselves into a force for change, an arrogant industry embraces customer service. In changes such as these, a whole new story begins. Rather than applying remedies, something new will be generated. Such change transforms systems: A new lifestyle is adopted, a conversion occurs, the identity of those involved changes, not just their behavior, and the understanding of how the system works is revolutionized. Sometimes, something more than learning is required—perhaps rethinking the very ground of learning, asking how we learn, or adopting a whole new way of learning.
Higher levels of change necessitate challenging old beliefs and adoptingnew ones, or they offer a test of identity, or they call for the trials and sacrifice that accompany passion. This kind of change requires at least the amalgamation of intellectual and emotional commitment, and perhaps commitment that can flow only from the spirit.