Change can be demanding – Here’s our first 5 tips of how NOT to manage change

Andy McComments off.

Change is demanding and challenging, so knowing how not to implement change in organisations is as important as knowing how to deliver change to enable you to plug any change management gaps in your organisation’s change strategy.

Change is vital for organisations. It helps organisations to stay at the forefront of any emerging technological advancements. Transforming any business in line with new technologies helps it to stay ahead of its competitors. Consequently, organisations in addition to governments, NGO’s and charities are developing at an accelerated pace. What’s hot today might be obsolete tomorrow. For instance, do you remember your maths teacher telling you that mental arithmatic was important as you wouldn’t have a calculator at hand when you were older – yet here we are all walking around with mini computers in our pockets (Smart phones). As change is constant everywhere and all the time, there is no escaping it wherever we turn as long as we are alive.

Companies that are unable to adapt to the pace of change will be left behind or forgotten.  Retail in the UK is undergoing a real challenge for non-innovative organisations,  yet innovators in Retail are going from strength to strength.  Needless to say that change is needed by all organisations in order to survive. However, knowing how to manage change and how not to implement change in organisations are extremely important. In practical terms though, change management is highly challenging for most organisations including innovators.

It may seem odd to quote Machiavelli when discussing Organisational change by Machiavelli said, “There is nothing more difficult to take in hand, more perilous to conduct, or more uncertain in its success, than to take the lead in the introduction of a new order of things,” he was unquestionably certain in his belief that implementing change isn’t easy and that is just as true today as it was a couple of centuries ago.

In a study by Towers Watson the following information was gleaned:

• Employers felt 55% of change management initiatives met initial objectives, but only 25% felt gains were sustained over time.
• 87% of respondents trained their managers to “manage change,” but a miserable 22% felt the training was actually effective.
• 68% of senior managers said they’re “getting the message” about reasons for major organisational changes, but that figure falls to 53% for middle managers and 40% for front-line supervisors.

How questions as well as why change may fail are both equally vital

Any successful change strategy requires the positive involvement of managers and colleagues. However, in some organisations, when change has to be implemented, top management are always quick to jump to “how” – How do we execute it? How do we get people to be enthusiastic about it? How do we measure it? How do we keep the momentum going?  These “how” questions go on and on.

Given the costs, efforts and difficulties involved in change to unlock unrealised value, it’s imperative to ask the question, “Have we identified reasons why this change could fail?”

 

 

1. Change for change’s sake – No organisation should embark on change if the business environment doesn’t demand it or if there’s no vision behind the change. The idea that an organisation needs change for its own sake often provokes skepticism and derision among colleagues.  Whilst all  companies periodically needs to review themselves, regardless of the competitive landscape. It is vitally important that there should be a compelling reason for change. Emotional distress comes with any change introduced in organisations, why inflict all that pain on colleagues and other stakeholders if an organisation doesn’t have to?

2. Authoritarian leadership style and behaviours – In most organisations, change won’t go anywhere without an executive buy-in and ongoing support. However, an on the ground, a bottom-up change execution is fantastic for innovation, participation and colleagues’ morale. Leaders being authoritative in their leadership style and executing an egotistical ‘what I say goes’ behaviour is a key way of how not to implement change in organisations.

 

3. Lack of  readiness for change – There is the need for a process to determine an organisation’s potential commitment and acceptance to the effect of any change being planned. This will allow the organisation to understand how employees will respond to the change as well as help the organisation to predict potential barriers that will affect the implementation of the change. In addition, it’s reassuring and vital to know who will own the change, what resistance to the change may be experienced, how to provide the leadership to effectively manage the change and what change strategy will be utilised when implementing the change. All of these combined will help an organisation to determine if they are change ready before change is initiated.

4. Lack of resources and budget – A major element of how not to implement change in organisations is not to allocate resources and budget to change. Lack of resources translates to frustration that can easily derail the best change initiative in any organisation. If a change effort is going to succeed, then the right resources need to be aligned in order to make change success possible.

That means that people, processes, systems, finances, training, and operations need to be realigned so that an organisation has the right people in the right place with the right resources, budget and the right capacity to make change effort optimally successful and sustainable. If any of these items are misaligned, the probability of initiating and completing a successful change initiative will significantly decrease. No sustainable change can take place without resources and budget!

5. No role definition and accountability for change – A classic way of how not to implement change is for an organisation not to make anyone accountable for change. Change means new ways of working, restructuring, reorganisation, streamlining, new products, new systems, new services, merging, downsizing etc. So naturally, change can also mean layoffs, reassignments, transfers, merging or cause other impacts for employees. Who will ensure that change is on track? Who is monitoring change to ensure that it delivers the expected results? Who is keeping all the plates spinning? Roles and responsibilities are vital during change implementation.  Also is the idea of a democracy – too many cooks definitely spoil the broth in terms of decision makers in implementing change.

 

change, improvement, management Posted in: Change management