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Change is always about action. Or for the historical, resistance approaches, inaction.
For action to happen there must be some stimulus that gets it started and keeps it going. The trigger/switch at the individual level is motivation. That foundation out of the way, who is in charge of the triggers?
The Individual
You would think it would start here. The individual most likely assumes it will start somewhere else. When an individual has chosen to do something on their own, say find a job, they are certainly responsible for motivation. They will feed that with the carrots and sticks of different opportunities. But when an individual is expected to do something they relinquish control of motivation.
The Boss
Which brings us to the first level leaders. They are the closest to core motivational action. They have the chance to effect action. Unfortunately they are the bosses- as my kids say, “stop bossing me around”. Doubly unfortunate is the fact that they are also individuals. They are saddled with the need to both act and be responsible for action. With so much action on the radar it is easy to forget that action requires motivation.
The Mid Level Manager
It is here that the carrots and sticks are stacked, measured, bargained for and grouped. Since carrots and sticks are a fairly weak motivator, force and coercion are often chosen as alternatives. So now we have an individual who is also a boss delivering blows and wishing they could somehow satisfy everyone- which would probably increase motivation and therefore the right actions.
The Acronym Leaders
At this level you get your title shortened, from seven and eight letters (and more) to 2- VP. Not only must motivation at an individual level (which of course includes the VP) be considered, but there is now an invisible core energy centered around function (read skill, focus and a certain kind of specific motivation) that has a powerful action/inaction lever. Competing motivators and competing actions (or not) appear. The more this person takes charge of functional motivators the more they tend to run head-on into disparate organizational motivators- especially if they are wrapped up in a change package.
Enter the Figureheads
SVP’s.
Their idea of individual now means something completely different. Their understanding of motivators has been tarnished by the rise through the other levels. My favorite motivator- make this make sense- has lost its importance next to, “here is the list make it happen”. The SVP’s have a confusing list of competing interests, all of our categories, plus functions in general, sometimes the combination of functions (who do not always get along- think sales and marketing), the board (since many of them sit there), which means shareholders (a category of individuals that has a serious, often detrimental effect on motivation and action)…
Which leads to the Founder/CEO/Evangelist
It is just as easy to say they are in charge of motivation as it is to say the same of the individuals. For both you might just be right. While this individual (mixing categories again) has the weight of the world on their shoulders they also have all the potential for motivation that can create both action and the motivation to act. They can guide systems, processes, structure and rewards. They can acknowledge (hint- biggest motivator for action), stir collaboration, mediate disputes and discrepancies and bring in the tools and resources to motivate worthwhile action (another hint- see make sense above).
We might have to call it a tie.
In the hierarchical structure, horizontal/matrixed or not, the top person is ultimately, on paper, in charge of motivation. In a democratic, each-person-is-a-shining-light culture, the individual is in charge of every action (not necessarily responsible, just in charge). So it is a tie. Since each person is an individual tie broken.
Which creates a nasty circular looped argument for change management to focus on the individual in terms of action. Search “change management” and you will find approaches that slot right in.
Motivation requires an input, which creates energy to stimulate action. Skip the input (makes sense is one) and go straight to the energy (urgency?) and you get…an equal and opposite reaction.
Approaches to action/change that look at the organizations world from an individual stakeholder perspective back at all the sticks, all the carrots, all of our categories and all of the other angles that influence motivated action (the best kind for change, read “Champions”) …work.
Those approaches create Vision to Work… for a change.
(couldn’t resist a plug )
Technorati Tags: Big Picture, business objectives, C level, CCM, CEO, change awareness, change failure, change management, change management consultant, End State, Garrett Gitchell, horizontal change management, Insights, resistance to change, vision to work
High level change management has two or three spots in the timeline/process where I always feel it is essential to call a conference room late-morning-into-lunch meeting to wrap our arms around the big picture. I do not take forcing the invite lightly. One of the reasons I can be bold enough to take a chunk of first or second horizontal executive time is that an interesting thing always happens…something new, something potentially “viral” (in a good way), something specific to the client organization appears. It appears in the form of a new word (languaging at its core) a diagram, chart or picture.
One of those meetings (4 hours long) at a Fortune 50 firm created all of the above- a chart, a diagram and a picture. It was a picture that bore a striking resemblance to a camel. “It looks like we drew a camel”, I said on our sandwich break… that connection, that potential analogy, that unique to that organization picture, was all it took to begin creating a model. You might call that the second step of languaging.
The third step, now I hear a year later, after an all hands presentation by the client, was a wildfire spread of the analogy to different parts of the company around the world. Which has since morphed into functional and regional interpretations of the camel analogy, chart, picture and model.
It is nice that a camel can go a long time without water, can stand extremes of heat and has a face that takes a little time getting used to. All great languaging leverage points. Those up and down humps are also helpful to illustrate passage of time, levels of effort and participation. Carry that a little farther and you could say certain parts of the camel are better at carrying a heavy load (and certain camels are stronger).
This type of analogy languaging has happened a couple of time with clients… Maybe we should count them as deliverables…
Technorati Tags: Big Picture, C level, change communications, change excercise, change management consultant, Communications, Executive, executive communications, External Consultant, Garrett Gitchell, Insights, Value, vision to work
Contracting between the actual owner of the change and the external CM practitioner is a crucial piece of the foundation for success. That contract- both the formal written version and the informal initial interaction- lays out expectations, introduces the client to a new and better understanding of the change process and glues the owner to the practitioner in a people and business relationship.
The insertion of anything in the middle of this business and person to person relationship is always detrimental.
Some reasons-
Third parties want to “own” the relationship- their definition of ownership is revenue based. Their way to protect that is to always insert themselves between the consultant and the client. And that helps Who?
Third parties skim the budget dollars. Direct contracts are at or less than those with a third party. Experienced consultants know that. So you can either save (by splitting the difference) or you can feel good about compensating the talent that is tied to your end states rather than burning dollars on overhead.
By using a third party you turn consulting into a commodity. Commodities have a direct tie to pricing. So the consultant gets a direct offer from another client at 50% and you assume they will stay? You, as a client, chose to use a third party so you have broken the ethical connection. As you can imagine consultants feel very little tie to the third party firms…
Third parties (no matter what they say) do not “know” your business. I have interacted with recruiters, staffing firms that think they are somehow consulting, consulting firms that somehow became staffing firms (unbeknown to them), internal contracted recruiters and internal recruiters. Except for the last one (and maybe the penultimate) they “knew” what they needed, but did not understand the whole picture (as in you within this initiative and the consultant and what they do and provide) . If I were a client paying upwards of 50% for this work I would have huge expectations for the “relationship”.
They do not find your talent faster. If a consultant has a LinkedIn profile you can find them with a phone call. And you get the added plus of relationship building right from the start.
They certainly do not find the best. Third party work for the best consultants is always fill-in. Because of the compensation difference between third party and direct they will be focusing how to fill in the missing revenue.
This is an important post because there is a trend to using more and more procurement type situations for true consulting. I have had to go through the dance (and waste a lot of precious change management time) a couple of times for high level roles because the client organization insisted on it. Judging by my own experience this is an area where there should be some loud shouting from clients and consultants.
The contracting relationship, the core of the process, is being sanded down and it is having an effect on implementation.
Technorati Tags: Buyer, CEO, change management consultant, engagement, External Consultant, Fees, Garrett Gitchell, Gate Keeper, Insights, Value, vision to work
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.
Technorati Tags: Big Picture, business objectives, C level, CCM, CEO, change awareness, Change Design, change failure, change management consultant, change management strategy, Change Strategy, Context, corporate strategy, External Consultant, Garrett Gitchell, horizontal change management, Insights, organizational change, Value, vision, 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
Guiding large scale change, as you have read in previous posts, is a balancing act between big/small, close/far, future/past and wide angle/zoom. All of these relate to “personal depth of field”. Change benefits from using the correct lens at the correct time. Let’s face it some of us have the wide angle attached and some the macro zoom. That is good if leveraged.
Same tree, same standing spot, same time- different lens.
How long does it take for you to see the tree from the previous vantage point? Or how much did you want to see more of the first picture?
I personally want to see what the swing looks like…the neighbors yards, clouds in the sky?… I know it could all be important at some point.
Just as important as looking at the texture of the bark and the positioning of the branches should I decide to climb the tree.
With change management you must know when to use each lens, who to choose to manage that perspective, how to communicate the knowledge gained and how to break the block between those who see the bark and those who see the sky.
Technorati Tags: Big Picture, Change, change awareness, change excercise, change management, change management consultant, change management strategy, Context, Garrett Gitchell, Insights, vision, vision to work
I re-formatted my computer yesterday and instead of using my imaged backup I chose to start from scratch. Which seeded a train of thought about Chosen Change. As individuals there are countless opportunities to choose change- jobs, hobbies, friends, networks, environment, etc all have the potential to be tweaked, molded and turned upside down. The more that is upended at once the greater the possibility of different perspective, approach and, possibly, results.
While virtually impossible in most cases there are large systems that would benefit from upending chosen change- (caveat US and California viewpoint) the educational system, the health system, the legal system, the political system, fill in your own.
What about corporate scenarios then?
The argument against (yes this is real resistance) is that the level of effort, upending, behavioral adaptation needed makes Chosen Change impossible. It is usually viewed as, “starting over”. But in many ways isn’t that what happens when a company is sold? Or folded up into another? Or a new company is started by a previous employee (who soon becomes stiff competition)?
I would personally side with the resistors if it seemed show stopping assumptions would carry into the upended environment- with cultural assumptions and habits that is likely. If however the chosen change forced the assumptions to no longer be valid something new-in a good way- could come from upending.
Let’s call a truce between those who savor beginning again and those who see a time and resource black hole by letting this discussion be part of the change process early on. What comes out of the dialogue that follows might just be enhanced end states. Certainly it is a beginning for strategic collaboration and transparency.
Technorati Tags: Change, Change Design, chosen change, End State, Garrett Gitchell, horizontal change management, Insights, vision to work
It occurred to me while working on a paper for an upcoming change management conference that silos will always exist in some way. There are times when that is a good thing.
Tight intact project teams
Virtual organizations tasked with specific deliverables
Boards of Directors (OK that one is good and bad)
Transactional functions
I am potentially using the picture on the left to illustrate a change entity in an organization. The straight spokes represent functions and the circular connections illustrate project, program, initiative, transformational effort (from the inside to the outside).
The holes in this web can represent modern silos.
You can carry this analogy along to say those are the groups protecting themselves. Or those are teams disengaging to complete tasks. Maybe those are the breakdown spots in the weaving of a web of collaboration?
The separate web an outsourcer? Or a partner?
The strands to the sides external influences?
Try using this picture to view the potential of your organization rather than the pyramid of constraint that is the org chart.
Technorati Tags: CCM, change awareness, Change Design, change management, change management web, Garrett Gitchell, horizontal change management, Insights, vision to work
Change success (the accomplishment of business objectives near and long term) requires connecting work and motivation to vision/idea/change and vice-versa. That means strategy must make sense and the "make sense" must be transferred to the employees in a way they will accept.
While this seems obvious I find most executives understanding it only on a surface level.
If this loop of idea and work does not exist and/or is not understood then that is the first step in the process of introducing change ideas. With a clear understanding of what it takes to get things done, assuming a change idea will facilitate that process, anyone in the organization should be able to communicate an idea.
Convincing may be a more data/emotional discussion.
An organization that does not have a communication channel for ideas for change has a serious structural problem.
In my own work with change management I make a point of weaving that channel somehow into the formal or informal structure to make it easier for the next idea to be heard.
Technorati Tags: CCM, Change, change management best practices, Communications, External Consultant, Garrett Gitchell, horizontal change management, Human Capital, Insights, vision to work
 – thinking that change can be "managed"
- reliance on tools, templates and method
- using inexperienced change agents
Middle of the organization change tends to draw clients and consultants into an exercise in creating "engagement".
If somebody likes to run they run. Good luck "engaging" someone who does not.
The core problem is that most organizations do not truly have OCM (Organizational Change Management) built into their corporate strategy. So "change engagement" tends to spend time addressing symptoms rather than root causes. "Un-engagement", lack of sponsorship and hit and miss buy-in are the cough, the sneeze and the runny nose.
Not connecting strategy to competency and not filling in competency for strategy is the cold that creates the system.
In keeping with that analogy, if you market the cold medications effectively you can stay busy- because the still-sick-patient will feel great. In that scenario you will be forced to make the mistakes on purpose ("manage" to match your marketing, pretty forms to fill out and change agents that are affordable in the middle of the organization).
As a client it makes sense to keep yourself healthy- corporate strategy that blends business and people, assume senior change consultants have a quiver full of forms/approach and to budget and pay for experience.
Technorati Tags: Buyer, CCM, CEO, Change, change management, change management consultant, Change Strategy, client, corporate strategy, engagement, External Consultant, Fees, Garrett Gitchell, Insights, middle of the organization change, vision to work
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