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Successfully guiding your organization through a transformational change requires the stuff that true leaders are made of. Moving from the comfortable status quo into a new era is not a foregone conclusion, and trepidatious attitudes can be difficult to convince. If the right steps aren’t taken to bring about a process of change, resistance could imperil the plan and old habits could reassert themselves in no time. While not an exhaustive analysis or comprehensive list, I have listed five principles for transforming organizations that I consider essential.
Have a Good Reason: Most people do not want to change and feel incredibly anxious about it. Including me. So there needs to be a good reason. The change may be needed to respond to a sudden or approaching threat, or the change may be needed to take advantage of an opportunity. Either way, the change must feel necessary or it will surely be resisted. For example, a cost cutting strategy that has no other justification than that it will improve profit margins and increase manager incentive pay is a change for no good reason, because it is short-sighted and self-serving. However, a strategy of process improvement, through adoption of new information technologies that enhance productivity, is justified by the logic of opportunities for both the firm and the worker. This change may cut costs, add value, or both, but it is not self-serving. Creating a sense of urgency is important, and urgency needs a real reason.
The Vision Thing: The need for a motivating yet achievable vision is incredibly important. Not only does the vision need to be bold and audacious, it must be imaginable through clear articulation and communication. The members of an organization must also be empowered to act on the vision. The vision includes the purpose, values, and stretch goals that the organization maintains, and represents the aspirational glue that binds everyone’s efforts together. Members of an organization must believe in the vision, seeing it as a desirable future that has an air of attainability. This means that not only does the vision itself need to have these qualities, it must be disseminated well so that others resonate with its boldness and the achievability
The Flywheel Effect: I like Jim Collins’ use of the flywheel analogy to describe the need for building momentum slowly through concentrated effort. This makes me think of that old adage that Rome was not built in a day. When I started my blog in October 2010 I felt very self conscious about launching it with only one article, so I launched with two articles. This was not much help since two articles did not feel like very much content either. I thought that I would probably never get many readers besides friends and family, but I did not let this stop me from starting. I just kept writing, and now over two years later I have posted over 100 articles, some of them thousands of words. Plus, I am re-published online in Paperblog’s Philosophy Magazine and my articles now get about 6 thousand views a month on this site. It is my sustained effort over time that has made the difference in these numbers, and exhibiting the flywheel the blog required more effort in relation to reward in the beginning. Now that I have momentum I have been able to slow output to only 1 to 2 articles a month while I am busy with other work, yet still maintain the same level of views. Sustained effort is a must for realizing a transformation.
Direct and Honest Communication: In talking about the need to a motivating vision I emphasized that it must be communicated well to be effective. Communication is incredibly important for all aspects of change management, not just in presenting the vision. A big transformation brings many unknowns with it, and the last thing that people want is to find out that there were things that were known to management, but kept secret from them. People also want to know what they should be working on and why, so clear guidance is necessary. Lack of communication can result in gaps, duplication, stepping on toes, fire drills, wasted time and energy, and worst of all distrust. Poor communication can leave members of an organization feel like they are being lied to, taken advantage of, being strung along, or like second class citizens. It is utterly de-motivating to find out that the report you have been working on for the last few years has been not been looked at in the last six month, because someone else is producing a new report now and no one told you. You think to yourself, should I start working on my resume? Or did I just not get the memo?
Establish Trust: Direct and honest communication helps to build trust, but trust must also be established in other ways. A transformational leader must take people through the gap between old and new eras, like an explorer with a map to a mysterious land drawn from rumor alone. If I am going to follow someone through the dark dense uncharted jungle then I want it to be someone I can trust not to leave me sinking in quicksand, to cut me loose, otherwise I might start to think I would be better off on my own, or not entering the jungle of change at all. I am more likely to trust a leader who I feel has my back and personal welfare in mind, that they desire to see me succeed along with them, and that they have the capabilities to help me manage and prioritize my workload toward shared objectives. Recognition of accomplishments and development of new skills is helpful. Without trust a strategic transformation will have a diminished chance of success, and change tends to create distrust, so I think dealing with this principle is the most important. Unfortunately, trust can be difficult to gain back if it is lost for any reason, even seemingly small reasons.
Jared Roy Endicott
Works Cited
Collins, Jim. ”Good to Great”. Fast Company. Oct. 2001. Web. 28 Mar. 2013.
