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“Try the other side”, a friend’s nine year old daughter said to me.
“For what”, I responded banana in hand.
“To peel it, that’s the way the monkeys do it”.
This was a nine year old (kids can get me to do all kinds of new things-they are true champions) asking, I love change and it is just about the strangest request or comment I have had in years. You know what though?
I hesitated. Somehow I did not want to eat a banana differently. I have never seen anyone peel the banana from the other end. What if it did not work? Worse, what if it was better than my version of the top peel? I considered not even trying because it might be BETTER. Have you ever done this? What would it take for you to try? Of course not… Your business? Oh, of course not….
“Monkeys peel from the bottom, people peel from the top”, she encouraged.
That little extra boost was all I needed and I peeled that banana, backwards. You can guess the ending.
THIS IS AWESOME!
It is fast, its is clean- no mushed tops, no two-peels-stuck-together-that-never-come-apart, no cutting off the banana butt (my kids call that last black spot on the banana, on the bottom, the banana butt) it came clean with the peeling and zero waste. I am a complete convert. I will never go back.
How many bananas have you peeled backward lately?
Technorati Tags: Change, change excercise, Garrett Gitchell, vision to work
Change Management is often a race to stay ahead of the setting sun. By setting sun I mean demise of the initiative itself. I am running out of fingers to count the times I have been involved in or seen the complete stop of major initiatives (most in the 7 figure + range).
Here are a few reasons why this happens-
- Change Management is added too late
- Strategy does not connect well to resources and motivation
- Strategy is not present, misguided or unrealistic
- Timeline is unrealistic
- The people are unrealistic (yes sometimes there is TRUE resistance- see bullet one through four)
Change Management is often seen as a training, communications, speed the project along discipline. I cringe when I see something like “provide training, communications and accelerate project implementation”. Cars accelerate.
As a result of this perspective (one seen in both practitioner and client I might add) change fits at the beginning of the implementation of the change, somewhere a little after all of the planning, all of the designing , all of the making of the task lists. Which is exactly where it falls 99% of the time (my stat). And one step behind the setting sun.
To make this worse, and effectively make Change Management even less relevant, the practice of CM is used as an overlap to other processes. The perfect example is placing the machinations (word chosen wisely-CM deals with people) of CM under the watch of the project manager. Or in the hierarchy having CM report to HR, or IT, or Finance or any function.
In both these cases, perspective and placement, CM will be well behind the setting sun on every initiative.
Unrealistic timelines. I will leave the timing of tasks to a project management/operations discussion. It is the timing of the coordination of people and their human nature luggage that is important here. With the change process weaved into the whole from true beginning to end state there is actually is the possibility of speeding up timelines. But that will only work when the original timelines included that human nature component. Which we know rarely happens because CM is added well after that planning stage.
Strategy.
This is corporate strategy I am referring to not the strategy of implementation. Many consultants and their clients confuse the plan for implementation as strategy. Use “strategic implementation” and you might be able to language and separate the two meanings. They are different and stakeholders are not only well aware of the difference, but confused when leadership and engagement leaders do not know or see the difference.
Corporate strategy is the vision of the leaders, the possibilities in the current (or near future) environment, the direction of the organization as a whole, the business objectives on a high level to get to profit, success and sustainability. Every one of your initiatives should, and most certainly does, connect in some way with at least one part of this definition. Why is it then that there is no thread or glue to make this connection?
If you have operational change management in your organization you might actually be able to have a component that looks like the current approach to change that makes sense and works. If you understand, as a leader, that change management is about the connection of work to vision and vice versa then you will provide the avenues for that connection to happen. If you understand that the moment of the “idea” for an initiative is about the time Change Management needs to be added…
…you just might get a polar version of a day where the day is long and the sun sets right at the end state.
Technorati Tags: Big Picture, business objectives, C level, CCM, CEO, Change, change awareness, Change Design, change failure, change management, change management consultant, change management strategy, Change Strategy, Context, corporate change management, corporate strategy, End State, Examples, Garrett Gitchell, vision to work
The practice of Change Management (this is the “what I have seen” view) is missing a clear perspective of root causes. Admittedly finding the core of organizational difficulties, not just the work of CM practitioners but also day to day operations, is not easy, takes time and requires insight and empathy- a tall order. An order that should be filled though, because symptom chasing solves little, lays a bad path for the next go around and diminishes the ability of CM overall.
Here is an example-
A method focuses on resistance of stakeholders. It lays out a series of communications, surveys, assessments (readiness which strikes me as the silliest of terms if you are automatically expecting resistance) and pretty pictures to represent the data. The data is “interpreted” and then the practitioners follow their pattern of educating on “the change process”, “gaps” (CM methods love to include gaps), transitions (ditto for this) and the five stages (or 8 steps or 10 boxes) that stakeholders must and will adhere to/pass through to accomplish the change. Everything that is gathered and collected illustrates symptoms, results of the change difficulty.
To get anywhere and to truly be successful at the end state causes need to be addressed.
Short of me (and it is truly an uphill battle) I have never seen a practitioner who takes that information gathered (because despite its poor perspective and damaging assumptions does gather some good data- I love data as much as the next practitioner) and uses it to address the root causes that have created the symptoms that produce the “resistance” that live in the house that Jack built…(I couldn’t resist).
Very often (here’s where I would like to have some good data) strategy-poor or lack thereof-is a root cause. Equally powerful is a performance system that runs counter to the objectives of the change. Culture that has not been molded to be innovative or at least receptive to enhancement can be another stifling root cause.
Therefore the first step of any major horizontal, “transformational” (if you like that synonym) change is to look with a magnifying glass (at the first horizontal I might add- might as well start the real change from the get go) at strategy, the performance reward equation and the good and not so of the organizations culture. That view through the looking glass will illuminate symptoms before they even appear sans expensive, time consuming and often detrimental data gathering.
Technorati Tags: Big Picture, business objectives, C level, CCM, CEO, Change, change awareness, change communications, Change Design, change excercise, change management, change management consultant, change management strategy, Change Strategy, Communications, Context, corporate change management, corporate strategy, Executive, External Consultant, Garrett Gitchell, horizontal change management, stakeholders, strategy, vision, vision to work
Canadians get the Change Management thing!
I am coming across Canadians in forums, on LinkedIn on the web and at conferences and I think they deserve a shout out. With them I have been able to have conversations about change entities, first level horizontal change, defining of roles, responsibilities within CM, the weakness of historic models, the old fashioned nature of CM practitioners (not a good perspective for CM) along with the many other things I have talked about here and in my other writings. And they get it!
The rub though is that they are having a hard time transferring that understanding to leadership and clients. Most feel CM is in its infancy up north. To that I say you are one big step ahead of us (US). We have the problem of a longer track record of CM (I can’t call it maturity though- I still think CM is in its infancy here too) and little true innovative thinking and action on the part of firms and clients. The innovation from the consulting side is not hitting its mark because of the power in the middle of organizations to suggest, pilot and eventually own approach.
So Canadian clients and consultants take advantage of your awareness and shorter track record to do CM well and right the first go around.
Technorati Tags: Big Picture, C level, CCM, Change, change awareness, Change Design, change management, change management consultant, change management strategy, Change Strategy, corporate change management, corporate strategy, External Consultant, Garrett Gitchell, horizontal change management, vision to work
The keynote here emphasized the future in relation to the past. It talked of the path to get here and what today and the future looks like. It pushed aside previous approaches, and important for me it did not acknowledge previous assumptions as levers for change. Things like resistance, change curves, Kubler-Ross etc. They were all illustrated as pieces of the change knowledge puzzle. They, in my words, are the frame of the puzzle.
What did the rest of the first days speakers follow with?
All of the assumptions….
Change takes time; even changing the management of change.
Technorati Tags: Change, change management, Garrett Gitchell, vision to work
My oxymoron for the day.
Because of the nature of change (and good innovative business for that matter), as soon as something is defined as a best practice it is probably no longer best. And will quickly become too practiced.
Disclosure- I have never liked this term. It tends to be either an internal organic way to justify status quo or an external effort to find the mix that a client will pay for. The first I see all the time now in organizations; the second is a common way to start a firm (and I can think of one company right off the bat in the change area).
Running a survey (in an of itself fraught with problems thanks to bias in the design of questions) for “best practices” and then creating a model around that is like taking a picture of a frozen moment in time and expecting it to happen again. Not going to.
And whose “best practices”?
For CM that could be a touchy feely, ‘”that was great” response, a feeling that things now move quicker (a nice feeling , but in no way an indicator of overall success), a comment on being acknowledged and/or a subtle justification of tireless effort. It would not be hard to create a set of questions right now, throw it out to a few senior executives and a lot of middle of the organization project and HR leaders and come up with some “best practices”. And I bet I could sell come models, templates and gain some marketing edge with the results.
Having done so I would have to hope that someone does not follow me to measure results. Because “best practices” for change management would first have to effect both speed and quality of business outcomes. A template in the middle of an organization (or worse function) without leadership support and a distinct tie to business outcomes is, well, just a template for something else…
So, in all fairness, what are Change Management Best Practices?
- Making a connection to the last stakeholder in the line (customer maybe?) early- even if it may be years before you connect again
- Asking why for everything
- Answering why for everything
- Engaging stakeholders more for expertise and distinct perspective than as an invite to the party because “everyone needs to be included”
- Leadership accountability
- An external and internal mix
- An external CM practitioner at the highest level of the change
- A horizontal whole system perspective
- Clear lines of communication, collaboration and task/project work that pay no deference to organizational structure- they appear (as in be there for the work and potentially disappear when that is satisfied) to get things done.
I could go on, but now that I have defined them they may need to be tweaked- that is after all the nature of change.
Technorati Tags: Big Picture, business objectives, Change, change awareness, Change Design, change management, change management consultant, change management strategy, Change Strategy, engagement, External Consultant, Garrett Gitchell, horizontal change management, organizational change, stakeholders, vision to work
I have reached a milestone for blogging. My first 100 posts. 100 tiny little blurbs of insight (I hope), knowledge, ideas, perspective, contrarianism (as I promised), practicality, practice, languaging, approach, push back, lightheartedness and voice. Thank you for turning on each of those little spots of light. I have an ongoing list of ideas that is now at 40 so the next 100 are waiting for the click of the switch.
A promise to myself was kept-no “top, pick your number, lists”. Despite the fact that they are notorious for sucking people into a blog. There was one post that had the number 3 but that is hardly a list. Well, in keeping with the change motif- promise about to be broken- for the top 100 things to keep in mind for change! …made even more obnoxious with numbering-
- 100 As I say with my kids for the word “hate”- resistance is such a strong word
- 99 The middle of the organization is a black hole for change
- 98 Horizontal has a better ring than vertical when it comes to organizational change
- 97 Talk to the last stakeholder first
- 96 Initiatives need to be led by the owner (the person with the wallet)
- 95 They can be guided by high level others
- 94 Operations and change can go hand in hand
- 93 With improvements in the first paying for the second
- 92 Smiles are the additive to the change gas tank
- 91 Laughter the petrol
- 90 End state trumps future state every time
- 89 Change curves make as much sense as bell curves
- 88 Organizational change is not the same as death
- 87 So leave DABDA for the grieving
- 86 On any given day there are a number of steps for change (hint not eight)
- 85 Change guiding (management if you like) works better when not controlled by a function
- 84 like HR
- 83 or IT
- 82 OD
- 81 and Finance
- 80 As much or more money should be spent at the front of change as the rest of the timeline
- 79 CM is an art, but artists have processes and methods they follow
- 78 A smooth change process can be repeated, but not if you think it is a science
- 77 Externals can move fast and predict people
- 76 Internals can predict their own people
- 75 That is not always a good thing (see external and fast above)
- 74 The bigger the consulting firm the more expensive and the more you will need them next time
- 73 Organic change, just like the groceries, is a lot more expensive (and not necessarily healthier)
- 72 Beware anything labeled “best practice” for change management
- 71 CM is not project management
- 70 With heavy front end investment (idea forward) CM has an effective project track with change weaved in
- 69 There is always a reason to change
- 68 There is always a reason not to change
- 67 Each stakeholder has one (at least) of each
- 66 A good change practitioner can pull out both
- 65 Just like a customer a stakeholder is always right (in their own mind)
- 64 Nine times out of ten (my stat) the stakeholder actually IS right
- 63 at least half (my stat the real one is probably higher) of change initiatives do not make sense
- 62 The 70% failure stat for change is just dumb
- 61 Beware any firm that uses only their patented approach to change
- 60 Cringe when another is using the licensed version
- 59 Change Management is not OD
- 58 OD is not Change Management
- 57 but there is a little of both in each
- 56 HR is not Change Management
- 55 Change Management is not HR
- 54 but…well you see the pattern
- 53 A CM practitioner must be smart
- 52 quick to survey the environment
- 51 great with and about people (yes obvious, but I have met a lot of them…)
- 50 good with process
- 49 clear about the effects of leadership
- 48 ego-less
- 47 full of ego (the kind that loves to guide people and business to success)
- 46 is a truly different kind of leader
- 45 must be systems oriented
- 43 must be holistic
- 42 must truly appreciate and admire technical ability
- 41 same for subject matter expertise (of others)
- 40 possesses keen intuition about people, culture and business
- 39 knows how to confront
- 38 knows how to use confrontation for compromise, to get perspective on the table and to include
- 37 CM and employee development can go hand in hand and save money in the process
- 36 Those external to the business are stakeholders too
- 35 Beware the use of the internal communications function for change (cool those jets I just said beware)
- 34 Have I said High and Horizontal yet? for the big stuff
- 33 Just like a home remodel everything becomes “big” quick
- 32 So, can I say High and Horizontal again?
- 31 CM is not a second career- beware the executive turned CM practitioner
- 30 if they have 10 years of true CM external experience I will cut them some slack
- 29 My favorite technique is “emergency” half day executive meetings
- 28 Surprisingly I can almost put them on my calendar ahead of time
- 27 It turns out there is a lot about CM that is pretty consistent
- 26 or is it the clients?
- 25 or is it just people?
- 24 Client interaction on large engagements has stages- 3,6,9 months and the 2 year mark
- 23 System implementations have a distinct “people side”
- 22 Ram something down my throat and I will spit it out
- 21 Spit out CM initiatives are ugly (and expensive)
- 20 CM is not a good environment for third parties for the lead role
- 19 Use a third party and you get 30+% less and pay the same
- 18 Is it me or is CM actually getting visibility these days?
- 17 Beware consultants carrying tools
- 16 A hammer does not build a house on its own
- 15 Org charts are revealing
- 14 don’t have one? give me a week and I will create it
- 13 you are dreaming if you think your organization is matrixed
- 12 and a little short sighted if you think that is a good thing
- 11 Authority and Responsibility can be powerful for CM
- 10 If you do not answer why in words that work for each stakeholder you will fail
- 9 If you jump to when before why you will probably fail
- 8 If you focus solely on how you will miss the big picture (see why above)
- 7 Where is good, especially if it has an “about people” component
- 6 because it can answer who
- 5 the right “who’s” not the pumped up, time and money wasting, include everyone kind
- 4 inclusion should be about skill for the initiative first
- 3 Change is FUN!
- 2 Change can suck
and finally, number one on the list
Did I miss anything?
Well, there is always 200…
Technorati Tags: Big Picture, business objectives, Buyer, C level, CCM, CEO, Change, change awareness, change communications, Change Design, change failure, change management, change management consultant, change management strategy, Change Strategy, Communications, End State, engagement, External Consultant, Garrett Gitchell, resistance to change, stakeholders, vision to work
The chief energizer and “bouncer off of ideas” in my life Alan Schnur woke me up and reaffirmed some beliefs I have about the last year, smiles and laughter (or lack thereof) with his blog post for today-
http://tinyurl.com/ygj9dbz
Yes of course, smiles and laughter have everything to do with change management.
The ones at end when you can be happy about success
The ones in the middle that are a result of camaraderie and shared sacrifice/difficulty
The ones during the project track that have to do with humility and self-deprecation
The ones at the beginning when mapping out dreams and visions
The smile from a compliment along the way
The laughter of a team bouncing ideas
The quick smiles between team members locked up in day long working sessions
The smile you get when you hand over an unordered coffee
If I could package up the smiles and laughter as actual tools in the Change Management Tool set, I would. In your initiatives make time for banter and low key exchange to get the release of laughter and the warmth of smiles.
Especially after the last year or two.
Technorati Tags: Alan Schnur, Change, change management, Communication, executive communications, Garrett Gitchell, Insights, vision to work
There is some authority that is worthwhile. Stripping it away can make the end state creep farther and farther in the distance. Worthwhile authority is the kind that can garner respect, then assume responsibility and finally be measured with accountability. The places for that are:
- the owner of the change
- the external change management consultant
- each of the implementers for stakeholders groups/process/phases
- team leads and individuals with specific needed skills
What are some ways to remove that valuable authority?
- Committees
- Passing an initiative completely to a consulting firm
- Small budgets
- Crunched timelines (that urgency thing again)
- Following a previously failed initiative
- A dictatorial approach missing empathy
Let’s take them one at a time.
Committees
Are good for gathering information, comparing perspective and approach, proving or disproving numbers and facts and creating camaraderie (or not). Are bad for the actual process of change management because no one has to be in charge. Authority is completely stripped away. Not only authority, but responsibility. That being the case why would the committee decide to have accountability? Spin change out of committees and watch the stakeholders fold their arms and dig in their toes.
Big 3 (or whatever the economy has left us with)
They are good for throwing a bunch of hands at specific work and deliverables (although for the second you would do well to always ask why- deliverables suck up budgets like a teenager at the mall). They are also good at doing their absolute best to completely strip you as the leader and your organization of authority. Their business model is based on spread and that happens slowly without authority (so it behooves them to get as much as possible even if it is someone else’s).
No Money
Don’t do it if you can’t do it right. Doing it right is budgeting from the beginning for inevitabilities (if you do not know what they are you are already late in the use of your change management consultant). Stakeholders all the way to the most recent hire are amazingly astute about the use of money in organizations. Start too many things with too little budget and you will have the authority of an incumbent in their last week. Which leads us to the next two bullets-
Urgency
Urgency based on excitement for a clear end state- the kind of energy that builds in a garage in Palo Alto is good. The chicken with its head off kind will create lots of smirks and little movement forward. My apologies to Mr. Kotter, but stakeholders are not only astute about change management they are often higher on the bell curve (at least in terms of that area of knowledge) than their leaders. So trying to “create urgency” is a recipe for unloading your authority…in…well… an urgent manner.
No Time
No time as an impetus to not start an initiative that is bound to fail is a godsend. With the right authority it can be a risk mitigator. Crunched timelines (usually because of small budgets) often create the previous “chicken urgency”. Time is not something that is easy to control, but it is measureable. With good use of authority- the kind that leverages knowledge and skill- time can be manipulated in your favor. But you will always have to pay for it with cash (see two bullets up).
Following in the Footsteps of failure
I can not think of anything good about this one, although on the surface failure should be a chance to re-invent and re-energize… which often is what change management is all about. Erosion of authority comes fast with failure. Should you be the next in line to be thrown to the wolves keep two words in mind- Humility and Empathy (gets those right and you will be able to add Confidence).
Empathetic Dictators
Your oxymoron for the day.
I almost do not have to explain this one. There are admittedly a few situations where strong authority (the legal “you have to” kind) is powerful for change. It is however precarious. It has the potential to create all but our first bullet in a single initiative. And thanks to the ego of leadership puts most change initiatives in our penultimate category.
Gauge when to push, when to empower, when and where to spend and be realistic in measuring how long that might take realizing that people change behavior of their own accord unless they are ready to be guided by authority- either or the knowledge and the leadership kind.
Technorati Tags: Big Picture, business objectives, CEO, Change, change awareness, change failure, change management, change management consultant, change management strategy, End State, engagement, External Consultant, Garrett Gitchell, horizontal change management, resistance to change, stakeholders, vision to work
Gail Severini http://gailseverini.wordpress.com/, for your Canadian version of some of Change topics, has nudged me to explain CM’s potential to strip (my word , use blend if you want something less intrusive) authority.
Analogies I love so first think of this-
The Panama Canal is too small for many ships and a few are as close as 4” in width. Tugs must guide those ships in without the slightest touch to the side (which can rip through the hull like a knife in butter). So one tug takes one side, a second the other side. They push against the ship, and each other effectively, with just the slightest angle forward. Forward to the end state of the waiting canal and pulling train.
If this is a little mini change initiative, I know should they choose to not have that slight angle, they will push and push and go nowhere. If they disagree on the need to get to the lock opening (or enjoy the trip around the Horn) there will be no movement. If the canal authority has some performance measure that separates the achievement of the two tug operators the ship will hold its place.
Odds are neither operator can see more than a short distance past the prow of the ship. Or worse each has done this before in their own special way. They may also know once there they will just have to turn around and do it all over again.
Where does this leave us with the real change initiatives and authority?
- Anything that creates a new shared goal is a first step.
- Anything that acknowledges the pieces that fight change- performance measures, seeing the present versus envisioning the future, rewarding shared effort, stripping individual acknowledgment (unless it reinforces “shared”) etc- will guide perspective and connection.
- Including operational aspects in large change initiatives or even better timing initiatives correctly helps- need sales to participate…sales just had a record year… next year is your change year since they will not be able to meet the new numbers which could make them receptive to any end state that makes the year after next better for sales.
- Guiding change from the top but using the initiative to develop next horizontal leaders ( Directors, VP’s, Senior Managers depending on the organization and initiative size).
End states must be clear and shared, operational aspects should be included to create ties horizontally and vertically, implementer roles are visible enough to encourage growth and participation but not create a whole new level of authority.
Stay tuned for tomorrow for the things that seem like they work but do not…
Technorati Tags: authority, Big Picture, Change, change awareness, Change Design, change management, End State, engagement, Garrett Gitchell, stakeholders, vision to work
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