Types of Transformational Changes from Conflicting Ethics Logics

It is well established within the organizational change, ethics, and institutional theory literatures that organizations and institutions can have conflicting ethics logics and that there are change outcomes from the conflicts. Quantitative, mixture changes such as distributive change outcomes have been frequently considered. The ethics, institutional, and organizational change theory literatures have recognized that there are qualitative transformational changes that are different than quantitative mixture changes. However and for the most part, with the notable exception of the Thornton, Ocasio, and Lounsbury (2012) typology of transformational changes, the institutional, organizational change, and ethics literatures have not considered typologies of transformational changes. And more specifically with respect to this article, the institutional, organizational change, and ethics literatures have not considered different types of transformational changes to institutional and organizational ethics logic conflicts. This article: (1) borrows metaphorically from the biochemistry transformation literature to develop a typology of transformational changes; (2) applies the typology with historical examples to conflicting ethics logics; and, (3) considers implications for institutional and organizational ethics change leadership for achieving and/or resisting different types of transformational changes.