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Stuck with CM too low and too late as a leader or practitioner?
If you are sitting in that spot you probably have little control or influence over corporate strategy, the strategy for the change rollout (if there really is one), the ownership of the initiative, the accountability of leadership tied to the initiative or overall timing. If you are interested in doing things “right” you are in for a long haul.
What you might want to try is to be influential, make a difference, in the speed and acceptance of the change. At its core that is what CM is about. So you are simply leveraging your core competency.
Some suggestions:
- Strip away extras (that suck up budget) like readiness assessments
- Focus on descriptions of a changed environment rather than end states
- Go with “because” as an answer to why (I know cringe factor there) and be helpful and available
- Communicate context to the timeline (rather than the strategic bigger picture)
- Accept that CM can be a project management add on and then practice CM (reach out to leaders, mentor, distribute supporting information to grow awareness, illustrate cross functional collaboration, etc)
Part of the reason CM is approached the way it is with most models and most organizations is because of the thrown in the middle pattern. Initially the idea of CM was to speed along projects. It had an “insertion” basis and so the gurus developed models to address that client need.
Things have changed; stakeholders get it and expect more.
Organizations made up of lots of people and lots of group think move slowly on the change scale.
I am beginning to think that to push that boat takes organic change management in the middle, with leaders, with new employees added to each and every change and operational tweak. If speed is the final measure then addressing that first and making a difference on a smaller scale may be the light for tackling the bigger, wider change as a web approach.
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.
 
and people, which we sometimes forget.
They are often left to make decisions on their own. When those decisions turn out to have positive results they often must jump in celebration alone. Depending on where they currently sit in the organization (and at times where their next seat seems to be) they may just have to guide someone else’s decisions. I can give you some first hand feedback from my service in those roles.
One of my cringe points is the way in which change models and approaches deal with leadership. Just like the change processes those models lead into some of the most important first steps are passed by and left out. I insist with my executive clients in a process that builds end state descriptions for all. Because the leaders will have the responsibility of delivering, deciding and explaining they must understand how their work fits in to the big picture, just like a first day employee.
They become champions of the connection of work and individuals to strategy and a bigger picture not cheerleaders for the new change/thing. Because they are the champions of that connection I would say it is their responsibility to make sure the change makes sense. It is their responsibility to make sure the train does not start until they can articulate the connection. Sorry senior leader client person that is not the role of the CM practitioner. Delivering that articulation and making sure it is heard and understood is. It is also not the role of your direct report (see previous sentence).
We can go on and on about all the things someone should do as a leader, but without the correct assumptions and perspective those fantastic leadership traits fall on dead ears and worse dead hands and change stalls or fails.
So if you are a CM practitioner start to acknowledge executives as stakeholders. If you are inserted into a change process that does not do that stand in front of the train. As a senior leader I hereby give you permission to ponder, clarify and get comfortable with your role as a stakeholder first and leader next.
Change Management at its core is a process of describing something new and different and connecting it to time and work. People respond to explanations, descriptions and new learning in different ways. That may have to do with learning styles http://tinyurl.com/2fnseg2, with interest, with workload, with promise for the future, with selfishness or with altruism. Sometimes it just has to do with catching them at the right time or off guard.
As a change agent with a full tool belt you will need to be able to draw pictures, make sounds, fill in charts, collaborate, illustrate (in pictures and words) and interact. As a client I would not hire a change agent who did not have a respectable command of-
Adobe’s Master Collection or its equivalent. http://tinyurl.com/csn4sl
Microsoft Office or its equivalent. http://tinyurl.com/yexjp89
Captivate or other training design software.
A command of CSS and HTML (not tools, but skill)
A design sense and an understanding of how design influences, grabs attention and shows concepts and connection.
The above timeline is a simple example of drawing a picture to describe, show time, place and relationship. It could be stand alone, part of a training module, the basis for changing communications or a design piece to provide structure to a written description.
The line represents time, the colors passage of both time and task, brighter colors items of significance, larger dots to show current time and place, even a pallet of colors to show teams, functions or responsibility areas.
To put all this together as a framework for guiding change takes a surprising amount of technical and people skills…
and the right tools.
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.
Good consultants (by good I mean get results and influence in a positive way) can gauge the level of electricity, power and energy needed for any given place and time. The really good ones can intuitively place those places in time along an actual timeline.
I find myself spending a lot of thought time analyzing the differences between external and internal both from a consulting perspective and individual choice. There is a smoothness to internal employees. If you were to tie that to the dimmer analogy they are like the switches that remember the last setting you had and go there first. Once the setting is there a concerted effort must be made to change it, for the next time and maybe permanently.
Contrast that to consultants who can kick the dimmer all the way up with a burst of energy at any given time. Maybe this is a little more like the voice activated switch. “Lights full level” and there is light- lots of it.
So the internal runs into problems with the amount of energy available for any given thing. (I can’t resist this… and the guru insists creating urgency will deal with that…electricity delivered at high levels comes with a cost). Amping the energy, pushing up that dimmer switch when it already had a setting has repercussions. Hence the need for the internal to be so smooth.
The external meanwhile must overcome the many times in their career when they chose the wrong dimmer level- sometimes too intense sometimes to calming. While the external can deliver the power instantly there is always a chance of overload.
The consultant who learns to understand the effects of the different levels of input, intensity and energy soon gets good at doing the same for clients and stakeholders matched to their culture and environment. And this strikes me as one of the big reasons clients bring in consultants (and I do mean consultants here not contractors). Consultants, who are good, have the ability to orchestrate the movement of that slider- cranked up when appropriate, subtly lowered at other times.
If you turned the switch on its side it could be labeled context on the left and end state on the right. Lowering the lights grounds you in the moment, brightening the room lets you see ahead…
In business/life people have to work together to figure out, to make a plan, to accomplish tasks to get to results. I start with that assumption and follow with the assumption that every organization has a process and a structure to get to the results sentence period.
Is this naive? As in having or expressing innocence and credulity.
It turns out the process and the structure are always there. The effectiveness and application of both is the issue. Enter Operational Change Management. Everyone who has anything to do with CM will agree that at its core it is about illustrating a goal, having energy behind the goal, getting participation, following the change path and reaching an end state. Well look at that. Those steps match perfectly with the core operational steps. And I might add look like the hundreds of models I have seen out there.
If it is this simple why is it that it never (yes I chose that word on purpose) happens?
Each of the steps in my first paragraph have major stumbling blocks thanks to people and money. CM done well, at higher levels connects the two. CM that is not done well seems to only address the people (and process). I have yet to see an organization (and few practitioners with the understanding and visibility needed) that can weave this connection.
Maybe it is just too big a task? Maybe it is because organizations do not have anyone, or any entity, responsible for the gluing? Maybe it is because the attempt is either first made internally without external help or done solely on a model from an external influence? Am I naive in thinking it is entirely possible to weave this people, process, money and method web?
I am trying to think of the title for this operational change management person…
VP of the Big Picture?
SVP of PM (people and money)?
Den mother (father)?
Ah, you say, what about VP or Organizational Effectiveness, VP of People, COO? First one is process, second is people, third one is close. CEO… maybe (in a naive perfect world).
I am not going to work toward an answer here. A solution though is running around in my head since we have laid out the root causes… I can just picture being able to pour something out of a can and have it spread over and through the organization. The something would carry languaging, process, structure, collaboration, method and B-12 to all the right places.
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.
 Change Management consultants are often thrown into a complicated mix of programs, projects and initiatives like a paratrooper in a war zone. This certainly is not my recommended way to engage a CM practitioner. It is however, one of the best opportunities for leveraging the external resource.
Change happens so fast, and is happening so fast that there is rarely the time or the ability to focus on connections, hidden crossovers and similarity. Externals have a knack for seeing overlaps, hidden threads across functions and replication. That has two advantages for a client- on the business side it will reveal potential cost savings and on the people side it shines a light on shared frustration.
When an external is brought in it is a signal that what they will address is important enough to be parachuted in for. A savvy client matched with an external equally so will use this strategically to both call out and address the business and the people side. Pinpointing the landing spot of our paratrooper can focus awareness in a particular area.
The paratrooper as an analogy for our CM external is a good fit because both land quietly, find their way around before they are noticed and when the target is apparent make themselves known. I snicker a little thinking that they are there either to rescue someone or to take someone or something out. The snicker continues because our analogy is still holding.
My focus is typically from a larger, higher perspective but in watching and hearing of a lot of middle of the organization/organic change I am beginning to realize that our (my) paratrooper strengths can be used for quicker and possibly more powerful effect.
I have been shown refreshing splashes of soda in thousands of commercials over my lifetime. To date I have had one taste of Coke and one of Pepsi. Period. The ads, obviously, did/do not work. Force feed images all you want. People can actually make their own decisions based on fact and emotion (enjoyable emotion not the kind that makes you wonder how you got there).
So why do many change initiatives use a “sell the soda” marketing model?
If Change Management really does need to be sold you are starting off well behind the curve. If emotion has already been rubbed raw by that approach in the past there will be no curve (maybe a deep trough).
Explaining would be a much better approach.
My own version/model is to use the 5 W’s –Why, What, Where, When and Who. Effective Change Management communication is about putting the change in a context that makes sense from the stakeholders individual perspective. Disseminate information then connect it to work and motivation. The emotional tie will follow.
You may even get some urgency out of that glue. Not the “I have to have a soda (change) now (not sure why- just know I HAVE to have it)” urgency, but the, “that makes sense I am excited to participate” kind.
When all the connections are made and the work is done and change is visible, maybe then a tall, cool sensible glass of…water is in order.
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