Organizational rust and cholesterol

Organizational rust and cholesterol develops in every successful organization over time. In the book "In search for excellence" Peters and Waterman identified the 43 most successful companies in the US in 1980. Out of those 48 companies that were outperforming all other US companies only three would make the list today. What happened to the others?

It's an easy question to ask and much harder to answer. The background issues can quite easily be identified, the cure is much harder to prescribe.
A successful organization develops over time one or more of the following:

• Misuse of resources. The once successful departments get the majority of resources out of old habits.
• Misaligned strategy. What was once a great strategy and market position is today just stubborn actions.
• Leadership dissonance. Blame and backstabbing is spreading throughout the leadership team on different levels.
• Organizational immobility. Misalignment and inability within the different organizational units to move forward. It's one step here and one step there but never synchronized and at the right time.

How can this situation be fixed or even avoided?

In a recent HBR article on the theme "Change for Change's Sake" the authors argument that organizations should practice small and larger regular changes to practice the change organizational muscle. They propose a questionnaire that can easily help identify when it is time to initiate a small or larger change in order to avoid rust and cholesterol. 

An interesting thought is to measure the number of ongoing changes in an organization. How well are we at actually change? Do we have an ongoing readiness for change? What different types of changes do we have ready to apply if and when we need them?

What level of rust do you have in your organization and which changes of different size can you make use of?