Yesterday’s post had me peeling bananas upside down with a nine year old. Now I am wondering how many things I can peel differently in my own life as well as within my client’s organizations. This little exercise says a lot about change management.
- Change must make sense
- Sensible change must improve something (which makes sense)
- There will always be a little (or a lot) of hesitation (I will cut slack and say the a lot could be “resistance”)
- Even bought into the change, we have to transition
- All of this needs to be understood and acknowledged for the next person to change
- Change does not necessarily take time, but it does take a different focus
- Things are different after the change, which is a good thing
- If the change does turn out to make sense there is no turning back
From the end state back (admittedly in this case I am doing it with hindsight)-
This backwards banana thing makes complete sense (it is faster, cleaner and just fun). I will never peel a banana the old way again. It has not happened yet, but I will see someone peel the old way soon. I will notice. CM guy that I am I will understand what I went through to change and acknowledge that process for the someone. In this case it should be a quick change (and it can be easily demonstrated and measured). It will take awhile for both of us to instinctively “go monkey” and flip that banana over.
Odds are I will have to, short of and including the demonstration, illustrate the sensibility of upside down banana peeling. And I will have to pause and be patient during the hesitation. The worst thing I can do is take the hesitation as a no (or assume a no from the start) and begin to strongly push the monkey thing.
This monkey peeling makes sense.