How to get Beyond Leadership Buy-in
August 4, 2009
It almost goes without saying that an organizational change initiative without proper levels of leadership support is doomed to fail. Perhaps the project will be paid lip service, but it will ultimately either be ignored into oblivion or cut short of its potential with one drop of the axe.
Not only do organizational leaders have the power to make or break your project on their own, but it is impossible to bypass them to change the organization below. Individuals experiencing change will look to those in power for confirmation that they are committed to the new way of doing things. It is under intense scrutiny that leaders are watched to see if their actions match their intentions. If not, the change initiative will be dismissed as “flavor of the month” and not taken seriously.
Amid all this doom and gloom, there is a bright side. You don’t have to settle for the level of leadership support you currently have. As fellow human beings, leaders are capable of being informed and influenced.
Take the following steps to determine how to best garner the support of the most influential people in your organization. Read more
Avoid Scattershot Change: Plan Communication
July 14, 2009
No change initiative can occur successfully without proper organizational communication. When communicating for change, messages are conveyed to audiences with the purposes of keeping people informed and mobilizing the organization. Communication is the means to gain attention, educate, and get individuals and groups to take action to move the change initiative forward.
As an internal change advocate for your organization, communication is one of the main tools you use to reach your goal and desired outcome. Yet, we frequently see people who are responsible for implementing change who use communication in a haphazard fashion, without a solid plan. The resulting hodgepodge of newsletters, posters and meetings tells a less-than-compelling story of change. Read more
NEW! Pinpoint Communication Workbook
June 11, 2009
I’m excited to offer a new workbook in my series of step-by-step organizational change guides. I collaborated with my friend and colleague Monica Nakielski of Harmeda LLC to bring you:
Pinpoint Communication: Plan to Avoid Scattershot Change
Communication is one of the primary tools you will use to bring about change in your organization, and yet we frequently see communication used in a haphazard fashion. The resulting hodgepodge of posters, newsletters and meetings yield a less-than-compelling story of change.
The workbook walks you though 5 Steps that build on each other. By the end, you will have developed a complete communication plan, including a schedule and measures of success.
The Pinpoint Communication Kit includes not only the workbook, but also high-quality, presentation-ready MS PowerPoint templates. Just complete the template with the information you developed in the workbook, and you’re ready to share with your organization.
This practical guide is truly something I wish I had back when I was an internal change agent. I would have been much more organized and deliberate about how I used communication. I’m excited that it might help you be more effective as you implement change in your organization.
For more information, a preview, and to purchase the workbook, templates or kit, visit www.enclaria.com/communication/.
Spring forward: simple change is not easy
March 8, 2009
As we participate in the annual ritual of moving our clocks ahead one hour for daylight savings time, I’m reminded that even simple change is not so easy. A few observations:
Change itself is less complicated than the tasks required to align people to it. Time itself (or at least as we measure it) changed once. But in my house, that required adjusting four analog clocks, four digital clocks, three watches and two car radios.
Change results in a temporary efficiency loss. The parking lot at church was a little thin today, and I bet morning traffic will be lighter than usual at times when it was previously light. People are sluggish as they acclimate to waking earlier. No matter how well planned, anticipated or small, change requires an adjustment period.
People change on their own schedule. Although the time change is instantaneous, people will make the change when it is most convenient for them. I don’t know anyone who would set an alarm for 2:00 a.m. so they can wake up and move their clocks forward. Some people set their clocks before they go to bed, and others complete the task in the morning. My husband changed his watch on Saturday morning because he had to wake up early on Sunday morning, and wanted to have more time to adjust.
Not everyone receives the message, remembers it or understands it. Some people will show up late to work on Monday morning, having spent all day Sunday thinking it was the wrong time. Either they didn’t hear about it, heard it but forgot about it, or rearranged the slogan “Spring forward, fall back.”
Even after hearing the benefits and seeing that everyone else is on board, some people will still choose not to participate. Most of the State of Indiana stays on Eastern Standard Time year-round, preferring to change their time zone instead of their clocks. During Daylight Savings Time, they are on Central time.
Inquiry: How is your organizational change more complicated than it seems?
Feel free to chime in by adding a comment below.
Case Study: A Fizzled Balanced Scorecard Implementation
March 5, 2009
In the history of Balanced Scorecard implementations and organizational change in general, stories of projects falling by the wayside are numerous. Even organizations that have had great success and demonstrated breakthrough results have fallen away from the methodology, either due to a change in leadership or from the initiative growing stale. In the case of The Jel Sert Company, a mid-size food manufacturer based in West Chicago, Illinois, the project never quite gained the traction it needed to sustain itself, and the leadership team made the conscious decision to end it. Read more
Feedback lessons from American Idol
February 3, 2009
Like millions of others, I enjoy American Idol, but usually only after they get to Hollywood, when they are done filtering through the bad singers. Last week, although they were still in the preliminary phase, I thought I would watch with an eye for feedback tips.
Lesson #1: Short of honest feedback, people assume the best of their own performance.
A friend tried out for American Idol a couple of years ago, and shared her experience. Evidently, there are several rounds of auditions with other judges before the final round with Randy, Paula, and Simon (and now Kara). Which means that that the judges in previous rounds passed all the bad singers and crazy personalities by allowing them to think they were good enough to go on to the next round. If you think about it, this is not much different from every day at work. Lack of feedback – or lack of honest feedback – allows individuals to go on thinking that their bad behavior is acceptable and effective.
Lesson #2: Request permission to provide feedback before giving it.
The people who try out for American Idol expect to be given feedback, even though they may not agree with it. Otherwise, they stay home. If they sign up for it, they have to listen, or at least stand there while you say it.
Lesson #3: Modify your approach based on the performance and their attitude.
Watching Simon Cowell give feedback, I noticed he has four different approaches.
- Beaming praise. When someone deserves it, he doesn’t hold back the good feedback.
- Genuine critique. Contestants that have talent but need to work at improving receive kind words and specific suggestions.
- Confirmation of doubt. When the contestant is not good but also not in denial, Simon says something like, “That wasn’t good enough, now was it?” He lets them down somewhat easily by simply confirming what they already know.
- Direct and rude. For contestants who believe they are destined to be stars but who are truly untalented, Simon provides the response he has become famous for: direct, rude, and insulting. He tries to knock these contestants down a notch to bring them into reality, and if that doesn’t work, at least it makes for good television.
I’m not a proponent of being rude and insulting, but being direct does have its place. In my experience, the immediate response to direct, honest feedback is usually defensive and denial, but the recipient usually does listen in the end.
A personal lesson about impersonal email
January 16, 2009
I learned a lesson today, and like most good lessons, it was learned the hard way.
If you are a subscriber, you’ve probably figured out that I use a few autoresponders – canned email sent at preset intervals to try to get you to take some action, in my case, to call me and set up a sample coaching session. And like a good citizen of 2009, you’ve put up with it because in today’s world it’s expected that you will get these messages when you sign up for a mailing list.
So I was playing with my autoresponders today, trying to make them sound more sincere and somehow more salesy at the same time, and something I did made a few of my subscribers receive up to four separate emails at once. I did not realize it until one of these recipients immediately sent me a note with a four-letter word and also called and left me a message on my phone to unsubscribe her. Deservedly so. If you were also a recipient of an email deluge from me today, please accept my apology.
The experience today confirmed something that had been nagging me about using the autoresponders. You can’t really connect with people with an impersonal email. Even though I wrote it, I don’t even know when it is sent or who it is sent to. That’s not communication!
Although I’ve been tempted to reach out personally to email subscribers, I’ve hesitated because it seemed like I would be violating some internet norm if I actually tried to contact you in person. My perception was that if you sign up for a mailing list, you expect to receive impersonal marketing emails, but if a real person contacted you, it would somehow freak you out. Could that be true? Have we come to the point where we prefer to receive impersonal messages from computers instead of real communication from a living person? I hope not.
For now, I have turned the autoresponders off. If I use your email address to send you an original message intended just for you, I hope you are not offended. I’m not trying to be a pest or a pushy sales person. I’m just genuinely curious about what you’re up to that brought you to my organizational change website.
And I do hope that you will take me up on the offer of the free coaching session. It’ll be half an hour of focused attention on you and your change initiative with an objective point of view. Call me to schedule a time to talk.
Podcast #1: A new intrapreneur reflects on large-scale transformation
January 6, 2009
The Enclaria podcast series features interviews with change agents. Hear how others break through obstacles while they pass along lessons learned from their organizational change endeavors.
Nine months ago, Jim Ryan, Manager of Strategic Planning at Embarq Corporation, changed roles within the Fortune 500 telecommunications company. Although he kept his job title, his role morphed from implementing strategy – developing strategy, creating measures and scorecards, and rolling out the plan to the organization – to implementing one of the strategic initiatives – creating an entirely new business from scratch within the same organization. From his new vantage point as an intrapreneur, he describes the differences between implementing change within an existing large company and building a new internal venture.
Eight Fundamental Ingredients Of A Successful Change Initiative
August 20, 2008
Organizational change is a complicated endeavor. The forces at work that continue the status quo are formidable, but not impossible to overcome. Set yourself up for success by laying the foundation with these eight fundamentals. Read more
Common challenges of organizational change
July 7, 2008
In my conversations with organizational change practitioners, I’ve noticed there are at least seven common challenges they face:
- Leadership buy-in - how do we get the leadership team, especially the CEO, to take on ownership of the changes?
- Communication – how do we move beyond the prescribed speeches by leadership and get everyday managers and employees talking about this every day?
- Motivation – what are the best incentives to use to motivate people to change?
- Overcoming skepticism – how do we make people understand this is not “flavor of the month?”
- Project justification – how can we quantify intangibles so we can justify key change projects?
- Subjugating the urgent – how do we keep transformation from taking a back seat to firefighting?
- Longevity - once we build momentum and change starts to happen, how do we ensure it survives turnover in key positions (especially the chief executive)?
What are other challenges you face?
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