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Category Archive: Leading Change

How To Survive In The Age Of Disruption

Posted by on September 13, 2017

I recently spoke on this topic for a new client. We are all accustomed to what I called developmental and market change. To address this level of change we must constantly lean into process improvement and in some cases execute a significant realignment. However, disruption requires nothing less than dramatic transformation to survive much less thrive. This post by Steve Olenski was spot on:

“Disruption has become the rule among companies of all stripes, and it’s coming from every angle. When PwC surveyed CEOs for its annual chief executive study in 2014, the majority of respondents said changing consumer behaviors, rising competition, and shifts in distribution channels were forcing massive change in their industries.

Fast forward to 2017 and nothing has changed. If anything disruption is coming even more fast and yes more furious.”

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Developing A Change Leader Mindset

Posted by on August 30, 2017

Sadly many leaders of very large companies are still trying to manage change or avoid it altogether. Change is an ever present inevitable truth that simply cannot be avoided. Leaders are dealers in the hope that our future beyond change will be better than our present reality. This post by Forbes Coaches Council is worth the read:

“Trite but true, change is the only constant. Having spent over 25 years working with leaders and companies to create change, I’ve decided we are approaching change all wrong. Our approach has always been focused on managing change. Our mindset needs to be on leading it.”

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Changing Company Culture Requires A Movement

Posted by on July 5, 2017

Every organization will encounter change in their markets and they will adjust with innovation. Sometimes, the change is so dramatic in scale that it qualifies as a disruption and that requires a total transformation. One of the major issues that must be at the top of the list is the changing of the company culture. This HBR post is very helpful :

“Culture is like the wind. It is invisible, yet its effect can be seen and felt. When it is blowing in your direction, it makes for smooth sailing. When it is blowing against you, everything is more difficult.

For organizations seeking to become more adaptive and innovative, culture change is often the most challenging part of the transformation. Innovation demands new behaviors from leaders and employees that are often antithetical to corporate cultures, which are historically focused on operational excellence and efficiency.”

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4 Critical Factors In Communicating A New Vision

Posted by on June 28, 2017

After you know that you have top down buy in to the new vision for your organization, you need to create a team that can develop a strategic plan that will allow you to move into the future. I cannot tell you the number of times I have reached this point in the process with great new ideas and the approval to implement the necessary changes only to fail.

The next step is extremely important is communicating the changed vision. In all my years of doing this, I think this is the beginning point of where the process starts to break down. We all have served on teams and worked for months on change initiatives and come out of the process totally together and passionate only to meet one year later trying to decide why the plan died.

What we simply fail to remember is that we have thought, discussed, and even hotly debated these ideas for literally hundreds of hours and the people who are on the front lines for execution have had no exposure whatsoever. We always undervalue the process of bringing everyone else up to speed and wonder why in the end they simply don’t get it.

There are several key criteria for effective communication:

Keep It Simple
Use Multiple Forums and Methods
Repetition, Repetition, Repetition
Environments That Allow Give and Take

The only way I have found to know that people have got it, is to let them hear everything they need over time and then let them ask questions and give back to me in their own words what we want them to understand.

Another very important aspect of communicating vision is that the leaders must be prepared to immediately walk their talk. John Kotter writes based on his research, “Nothing undermines the communication of a change vision more than behavior on the part of key players that seems inconsistent with the vision.” If the vision is empowering teams and the top leaders of the company are still micromanaging everything you can be sure the plan is dead.

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6 Characteristics Of An Effective Vision

Posted by on April 21, 2017

When we think of the word vision we are drawn to a picture of the future of how things can be better than they are in the present. Most vision casting does a good job of painting a hopeful image of the positive benefits involved but not a very realistic job of the costs involved to get there.

This is a major problem because when the negative forces and fears involved in the change process start to appear and people are not prepared they can give up very quickly resulting in the death of the vision. John Kotter in his book Leading Change lists all the characteristics that should be included in an effective vision:

Imaginable: Conveys a picture of what the future will look like
Desirable: Appeals to the long-term interests of employees, customers, stockholders, and others who have a stake in the enterprise
Feasible: Comprises realistic, attainable goals
Focused: Is clear enough to provide guidance in decision making
Flexible: Is general enough to allow individual initiative and alternative responses in light of changing conditions
Communicable: Is easy to communicate; can be successfully explained within five minutes

The change process for most people is extremely difficult because of the fear of the unknown. There are powerful forces involved that will try to maintain the status quo at all costs. The pain of the present must be contrasted with the pain of the change process so that the people will know that the option of no change is not realistic.

People also need to be told on the front end that sacrifices are probably going to need to be made and there will be discomfort involved during the transition. However, if the vision takes the group to a better and more viable place then all the costs involved will be worth it every time.

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How To Thrive As A Leader In Uncertain Times

Posted by on March 10, 2017

When everything is going well most people really don’t pay that much attention to the overall attitude of their leaders. On the other hand, when things start falling apart that is the critical place they go to see how much trouble are we really in as an organization. This Forbes post gives leaders several practical tips:

“We human beings are wired for certainty. A lack of it tends to trigger anxiety that drives people to resist anything that may further threaten the status quo…regardless of the cost. Good leaders not only work to dial down fear but to tap the passion, ingenuity and innovation it too often stifles.”

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6 Roles Of Short Term Wins

Posted by on January 6, 2017

One of the major mistakes we make in major change initiatives is that we oversell the long term goal at the expense of dealing with the short term problems. People do want to know where they are going but they want to know even more what does all this mean for me right now?

Once the new change plan has been implemented it is critical for everyone involved to experience the benefits of short term wins so they can stay motivated for the future and the change that is yet to come. John Kotter list several roles that short term wins play:

Provide evidence that sacrifices are worth it: Wins greatly help justify the short term cost involved.
Reward change agents: After a lot of hard work, positive feedback builds morale and motivation.
Help fine-tune vision and strategies: Short term wins give the guiding coalition concrete data on the viability of their ideas.
Undermine cynics and self-serving resisters: Clear improvements in performance make it difficult for people to block needed change.
Keep bosses on board: Provides those higher in the hierarchy with evidence that the transformation is on track.
Build momentum: Turns neutrals into supporters, reluctant supporters into active helpers.

Therefore it becomes critical in any change planning to build into the strategy several things that can be done within the first six months that may be small in scale but clear wins that everyone can celebrate.

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6 Reasons Why Change Initiatives Fail

Posted by on December 15, 2016

Someone has well said that the pain of the present must be greater than the fear of the future for change to actually take place. Even with that level of motivation, many times change initiatives don’t work regardless of how bad the current reality may be. I have made all of these leadership mistakes and this Forbes post was a good reminder:

“In today’s more volatile and unpredictable business environment, change management has to become part of the culture and business plan. Not just something that leaders decide they need to adopt at some point when their business model is threatened or failing. I have led my companies through significant transformations and made many of these mistakes. Don’t do the same thing.”

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Leaders Who Get Change Right Know How To Listen

Posted by on November 11, 2016

We have all heard it said that for change to work the pain of the present has to be greater than the fear of the future. With that said, the ability to accurately asses the cause of the problem and apply the right solution are critical path issues to any success. This HBR post values the ability to listen and learn:

“Organizational change comes at a cost. It requires people to sacrifice something they value, whether it’s time, money, responsibilities, control, status, comfort, or relationships. The more your change effort disrupts those things, the more people will resist or even rage against it.

That helps explain why failure is so common, but there’s more to it. In a PWC survey of more than 2,000 global executives, managers, and employees, only 54% of respondents said their change initiatives succeeded — and the most frequently cited problem (by 65% of those surveyed) was change fatigue.”

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3 Critical Questions For Leading Change

Posted by on October 31, 2016

I want to tell you a simple story that illustrates what every leader must do to lead their team or entire organization through the change process. You are the leader of a team that has been involved in an outward bound teambuilding session for two weeks.

Your team is out in the open and you are eating your lunch on the ground. The weather conditions are changing and you are monitoring the situation on weather radio.

In first scenario, you as team leader say to your team in a stern voice get up and follow me right now. A few people respond but the majority stay in place. Now you raise your voice and yell I said come with me.

The second scenario you say as the leader we are going to move. Here is the plan, we are going to stand up together at the same time and form a single file column and make sure no one runs or gets left behind. The group is very hesitant to get up and it takes time to get everyone in a line and progress is slow.

The third scenario is you say to the team there is a tornado less than five minutes from here, follow me to that brick building and we will all be safe. Everyone moves and no one is hurt.

In the first situation the leader tried to use positional power which almost never works anymore, especially with the next generation workforce. The second scene was a perfect example of trying to manage the change process instead of leading. The major reason most change initiatives fail is they are over managed and under led.

The bottom line for me is this based on our simple little story. Leaders always need to answer three questions when they want an individual or an entire organization to change. What is the Problem? How are we going to Solve it? Why is this important to You?

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