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Patrick, the baby of my extended family, started kindergarten
last week. As a graduate of pre-school, we thought he'd be
right at home in his new class. But after the very first day,
he firmly announced that he wouldn't be going back to school.
When questioned about this decision, he admitted that the
teacher was nice enough, and all his friends were glad to see
him, but (and to Patrick, this was the deal breaker) there was
no naptime. No naptime!
In Patrick's school, 5-year-olds are being asked to "pay
attention" from 8 am to 3 pm without an opportunity to
rest and recharge. Have we learned nothing about educating
young children? Which started me thinking about my work
I've spent the past twenty years helping individuals and
organizations thrive on change. Yet, recently, I've seen
leaders making some of the same mistakes I noticed two decades
ago. Have we learned nothing about managing change?
I don't mean to minimize the complexity and chaos that leaders
are facing. Rapidly changing technologies make yesterday's
choices obsolete. The turbulent economy increases pressure to
"do more with less." Companies rely on a shifting
stream of alliances competitors one day and partners the
next and sometimes both at the same time. Corporate
reorganizing is becoming an annual affair. Mergers and
acquisitions are on the rise. Customers are demanding
"better, faster, cheaper" everything. Competition is
fierce. The pace of change is accelerating. And employees are
increasingly skeptical about committing to business strategies
that are constantly being redefined.
Yet this is our reality and in this world, leadership
success belongs to those who can keep a work force resilient,
positive, and engaged while dealing with the tsunami of change
that is turning our organizations upside down. Here are the
most common mistakes leaders make managing large-scale
organizational change and the lessons we need to reinforce.
Mistake: Not understanding the importance of people.
As much as 75 percent of all major restructuring fails, not
because of faulty strategy, but because of problems with the
"human dimension." After years of research studies
and statistics, we know this for a fact. And yet, as recent as
last month, a vice president facing the transformation of her
department asked me if she/ really/ had to include her
employees in planning for the change.
Lesson:
Organizations don't change. People do
or they don't.
If employees don't trust leadership, don't share the
organization's vision, don't understand the reason for change,
and aren't included in the planning, there will be no
successful change regardless of how valid the need or how
brilliant the strategy.
Mistake:
Neglecting the emotional side of change. Transformation
requires a redefinition of who we are and what we do. It's
often unpredictable (responding to unforeseen circumstance)
and unnerving (requiring employees and businesses to reinvent
themselves while they are at the top of their game). It can
twist people's past success into their greatest obstacle for
the future. It's highly emotional.
Lesson:
To lead an organization (or a department or a team) through
transformation, it is not enough just to appeal to people's
logic, you also have to touch them emotionally. Change
leadership is about creating meaning. Employees need to be
engaged by a vision of the future, and to be inspired to
execute that vision. This takes leaders with a deep
understanding of human emotion, who can see the power of
intangibles and can capture the imagination of an entire work
force in the pictures they paint and the stories they tell.
Mistake:
Not being candid.
Under the rationale of protecting people, leaders present
change with a too-positive "spin." And the more they
"sugar-coat" the truth, the wider the trust gap
grows between management and workers. Organizational
communicators, perceived as the purveyors of corporate
propaganda, lose credibility as well.
Lesson:
Honest communication goes beyond simply telling the truth when
it's advantageous. It requires an unprecedented openness
and transparency; a proactive, even aggressive, sharing of
everything financials, strategy, business opportunities,
risks, failures. People need pertinent information about
demographic, global, economic, technological, competitive, and
industry trends. They need to understand the economic reality
of the business and how their actions impact that reality.
Mistake:
Defining "change communication" as what employees
hear or read from officially sanctioned sources.
Reflecting this belief, leaders focus most of their attention
on traditional communication vehicles speeches,
newsletters, videos, intranets, e-mail, etc. Yet, from the
employees' perspective, traditional communication accounts for
only 10 percent of what convinces them to change.
Lesson:
The most powerful change communication, accounting for
90 percent of what impacts a work force, is divided evenly
between organizational structure (whatever punishes or
rewards) and leadership behavior. Rhetoric without
congruent action quickly disintegrates into empty slogans. A
communication strategy that is not aligned with organizational
systems and the actions of leaders is useless.
Mistake:
Trying to lead change with command and control tactics. In
a command and control culture, only top executives are
expected to solve problems, make decisions, and set the change
agenda. Such a limited view not only places an enormous burden
on senior management to come up with all the answers, it also
restricts the contributions of the rest of the organization
and widens the division between them and us.
Lesson:
A company's competitive advantage is a combination of the
potential of its people, the quality of the information that
people possess, and the ability to share that knowledge with
others in the organization. During transformation,
leadership's primary challenge is to link these components as
tightly as possible. The most successful change strategies are
highly collaborative. Developed in participative sessions,
these strategies capitalize on the wisdom, experience, and
creativity of employees throughout the organization.
Carol
Kinsey Goman, Ph.D. coaches executives, facilitates management
retreats, helps change team develop strategies, and delivers
keynote speeches and seminars to association and business
audiences around the world. Carol is the author of nine books,
including This Isn't the Company I Joined: How to Lead in a
Business Turned Upside Down. She can be reached by phone:
510-526-1727, e-mail: CGoman@CKG.com,
or through her website: www.CKG.com. |
