The Hidden Costs of SuperficialTransformation
The Rise and Fall of a Cargo Cult, is a sharp, darkly humorous exploration of how organizations blindly imitate success without understanding its foundations.
Through candid stories, vivid metaphors, and cultural quirks, it exposes the absurdity of ritual-driven thinking and the dangers of surface-level change.
It’s both a warning and a wake-up call—urging leaders to trade mimicry for meaning, and frameworks for real reflection.
Introducing 3 Cups of Coffee—a caffeine-fueled rebellion against corporate theater. It’s about slowing down, asking sharper questions, and spotting empty rituals before they quietly derail your culture from the inside out.
Learn all about the simple, highly effective method of Three Cups of Coffee
The Three Cups of Coffee principle was born out of the everyday absurdities found in organizations: daily stand-ups that are mostly just standing (for an hour), “Agile” that translates to doing whatever the boss says, and shiny new frameworks that solve everything except the real problem. It’s a simple but ruthless filter for cutting through the noise
Table of contents
Get a look at all of the content covered in the book. Everything you need to know is inside.
CHAPTERS
1
The illusion of Improvement
10
The Cult of Belief
40
The Comfort of Self Deception
80
Coconuts
120
Espresso Yourself
130
…
About the author
Ivo Koopmans
Koopmans has made a career calling out corporate cargo cults. Those flashy frameworks and empty rituals (Junior) leaders cling to when they’ve run out of ideas.
A former Quality Director, Test Architect, and Transformation Lead, they’ve helped global organizations ditch the theater and deliver change that actually sticks.
Blending dark humor, sharp storytelling, and the “3 Cups of Coffee” method, Ivo Koopmans] teaches leaders to slow down, think harder, and swap mimicry for meaning, before the next big transformation collapses under its own nonsense.
What readers said
★★★★★
Ivo Koopmans is one of the most experienced professionals I know in both testing and Agile/SAFe environments—and hands down the best storyteller out there. His deep understanding of cargo cults in organizations brings a fresh, sharp, and often hilarious perspective to challenges we all recognize but rarely name. This book is a must-read for anyone who’s ever followed a process without knowing why—and wondered why nothing changed.….
★★★★★
A few years back I asked Ivo to be my coach, little did I know this would be a life changing event. He has a way of asking the right question (but often very simple questions like why do we do this?) sometimes making your head spin and allowing you to grow….
★★★★★
Working with Ivo as my RTE was far more than I expected, as he didn’t just help me grow. He thought me the difference between a theory and a preacher Vs common sense and application. He is the definition of a Servant Leader that will hide in the background while his people shine in the Spotlight.
ivokoopmans.com 