A life lived in fear is a life half lived: 5 Lessons on Change Management from Strictly Ballroom

Did anyone else realise that Paul Mercurio (who played Scott Hastings in the movie Strictly Ballroom) won the seat of Hastings in the Victorian election over the weekend?

Because of this reminder of 1990’s nostalgia, I re-watched Strictly Ballroom on Sunday and realised not only is it a movie about ballroom dancing, it is also about change.

Hear me out! The movie is full of examples of what it’s like being an agent of change:

💃 You will feel unsafe and alone – Challenging an established status quo is hard. Federation president Barry Fyfe had a vested interest in keeping things the way they are and would do anything to keep his power and status – including lying, cheating, manipulating and intimidating others. Some people agreed with Scott but were too scared to speak up. As a result, he felt incredibly alone and wondered if he was making a huge mistake.

💃 The risk might seem too great – Everyone around Scott told him he would only lose – his partner, the Pan Pacific championships, his status as one of Kendall’s dance studio’s top dancers. It made him falter a lot and really question if he was doing the right thing.

💃 It only takes one person to support your change to get momentum, and it doesn’t have to be someone with formal influence. Once one person publicly supports change others will follow, and before you know it you have a critical mass of people standing behind you. First, Fran – who was at the bottom of the dance studio’s social order - was the only one who supported Scott.  Then Fran’s dad and abuela got behind them. Crucially, Les decided to finally tell Scott the truth and begged him to follow his heart.. AND started slow clapping when the music got shut off, and was joined by the rest of the audience. Everyone else then got on board (even Liz!) to support Scott and Fran.

💃Sometimes you won’t get all the change you want, and that's ok. Disrupting the status quo and getting people to see things differently is often a big enough achievement, and it opens the door for more changes in the future. In the end, Scott didn’t win the Pan Pacifics – he was disqualified – but he didn’t even care. He got to dance his steps, his way - and even better - he fell in love! Expecting to be able to dance his new steps and also win the competition was perhaps a bit too unrealistic.

💃 The movie’s central theme – that a life lived in fear is a life half lived – should be the mantra of every change agent and change leader. What kind of legacy will you leave if you were too scared to stand up for what you really believed in? If you put your own self interest above the greater good?

What lessons did you get from the movie? If you haven’t watched it in a while, I cannot recommend it enough. It’s such a banger.