Change is constant, but no change is the same.
New governmental regulations, innovative product and service offerings, growth, increased competition, technological development and shifting workforce requirements have accelerated the speed for change in the past years. This has led to numerous change programs and to uncertainty in organizations.
In this post, I want to share ideas on how to iterate, plan, act and follow-up change situations.
Prepare for change
Organizations need to change in order to stay competitive. Changes should trigger little by little, but changes that are crucial to organizations' short-term success need to be implemented with short notice in order to maintain competitiveness and productiveness. However, by bearing in mind that change rarely happens overnight.
Ask why change is needed?
Understand the sense of urgency
Encourage people to constant change
Adapt “change” as part of the company culture
Discover emotions
Think organizations as living systems with individuals who act and think differently. Change is always emotional. Peoples’ acts are guided by their emotions. You cannot tell others how to think or why they should be motivated until they actually reason it themselves.
People react to incentives, not to orders. Managers and employees are most motivated at work when five forms of impact are balanced:
- a society around with working team > creating a caring environment
- a company with stakeholders > providing superior results to customers
- personal development
Why people embrace or resist change? Understand the reasons and motivations for attitudes and behaviors that people have
Understand what motivates people. To find out what motivates people, you need to listen (= listening, asking and encouraging)
Involve and challenge people to participate
Participate early
Leaders should invite employees to participate to change throughout the process. By letting people participate to change, the actual change becomes familiar and less distant. People engage in implementation, and actually understand how the change will affect themselves. This way change is not forced, but reasonably adapted to peoples thinking and behavioral.
Start designing change with a group of representatives from each level of the organization
Challenge people to participate, and make sure you have the correct people onboard
Evaluate what works, now and before, and what is the pain. Reflect these successes and pains to business: how those actually matter to business success
Give an initiative to employees, but no design for organizing or Implementing it in order to achieve the target. When designing change process, include achievable milestones that can be achieved and are common for the whole company
Do not overdesign. Have a plan, but keep it flexible. Prepare for possible scenarios, also to the worst possible one as change always has its uncertainties
Maintain focus
Cultural background can reflect on peoples’ emotions towards change. In global organizations, employees’ might think the same, but act differently. What matters in change situations is a clear common target.
Wide-ranging goals do not have any impact on people’s emotional side. If an organization aims to be the best in the world they should define what it actually means in communications, leadership, marketing, etc. If an outcome is unclear or too many goals are established, changes are easily forgotten or put aside.
Motivated employees require a target that inspires and challenges them. Incentives are one of the links between people and change. Behavioral changes are dependent much on having the right incentives in place.
Have a clear goal on what you want to be good at
Focus on the most crucial changes. Avoid overwhelming employees by the number of changes, as it generates uncertainty
Try to have as little projects as possible, but at the same time, have the courage to split enormous projects into smaller ones
Integrate change factors and articulate those in a one-page summary
Have the right incentives in place, why change is important to this target group? Set indicators to measure change
Active leadership
There is no such thing as successful change without organizations’ engagement and leadership. Leaders are shaped and influenced by their surroundings. Leadership is a lifelong process that cannot be taught. Employees should remember that leaders are also people. They are as vulnerable as anyone else and can fail just like you. Leaders do not have the correct answers and strategies in their hands. They do not know what will happen next, they can only predict and prepare.
Leaders, give people reason for pride and commit them to something larger they can believe in – the initiative. Keep ownership of change inside the organization also when having external help. Organization and peoples’ performance should be followed-up against company strategy.
Leaders, be role models (apologies, you are the role models)
With leaders charisma they motivate and engage employees through change, support, listen, encourage and give results to an organization
Turn the change to a story. Have the organization as the hero of the story, and use the change as a story line
Communicate.
Not understanding what is going on, is a major risk when undergoing change. It makes employees feel uncomfortable and uncertain of their status. Fear is the worst persuader when people need to be innovative. Fear makes people work harder at what they did in the past, and blur what they should work with.
Communicate the vision to each organizational level by linking it to company strategy and to change
Consider who are the people responsible, and for what they are responsible for. This will help to identify target groups, why the change is important for them and, what are the messages they require
People interpret messages differently. Maintain unity in communication
Maintain positivity in communications, but consider cultural differences, and encourage people to ask if there is something unclear
Use two-way communications channels to allow people to participate
Constant interaction
The benefit of keeping change ownership inside the organization is that you are aware of what is happening, in theory as well as in practice. This enables to communicate closely with people. You can respond to people’s questions or concerns with terms that they are familiar with, as you are at the same page with them.
Change is not something you do for people, you do that with people. The act of support is mutual for employees and leaders. Keep up the spirit even in challenging times, and share your knowledge. Leaders of the future are even more depended on asking guidance from others.
In change, “change agents” are often used for facilitating change. Their mission is to support one or several change dimensions: common ground, common meaning, common interest, or common behavior. They guide, create interaction and to some extent, supervise the change framework. Possible pilot members who are engaged in the project can later work as internal change agents/ specialists, supporting others.
Ask guidance
Consider resistance as feedback, not as an insult
Reward or celebrate on improved performance. Consider if incentives should grant on an individual level or team level. In some organizations, formal and informal individual incentives are even considered harmful to organizations’ culture
Name change agents from inside the organization. Have them with different backgrounds: long or shorter work history; and from multiple levels of the organization
Reflect the change
Spare time for implementing and adapting change to people's behavioral, but at the same time keep in mind that change needs a gentle push as well. Follow-up should not only be financial but also emotional.
Continue asking WHY the change is needed along the way and consider what would happen if there would be no change.
Set indicators to measure the change in employees’ behavioral.
Ask how people feel?
When change occurs, try to get results fast. Achieving preset milestones creates positive energy among people
This post is based on my Haaga-Helia IBMA Leading Change -course assignment from 2015.
ความคิดเห็น