Written by Senior Performance Consultant Natalie Macaluso.
If there is one common theme I am hearing in the organisations I’m working with at the moment, it’s the pace of change – both externally and internally. I’m finding teams are feeling the pressure of continual and accelerated change and having to learn to be adaptive and agile in the face of it as they still need to deliver results. High-performing teams are the ones who are able to not just hunker down in the storm but who can learn to spot the opportunity in crisis, manage it and thrive within it.
Change can take many forms – including market shifts, new leadership, or private equity backing. As William Bridges puts it:
“Change is situational – be it the new CEO, the new team, the new policy. Transition is the psychological process people go through to come to terms with the new situation.”.
To stay competitive during such transitions, organisations, and the people within them, must adapt effectively. Strong leadership is essential to guiding teams through this process. Without the right support, even the most well-intentioned transformation efforts stall and often fail. In this article I delve into why they commonly fail, how you can avoid falling into the same pitfalls, and how you can begin to form a compelling narrative to get everyone on board. Drawing heavily on what we’re seeing in our client work, in the below I share some practical tips to help you make sure your change transformation is successful.
Why do change projects often fail?
An interesting stat by Gallup shared below that 50% of people transformations fail:
So why do change programmes fail? We tend to see them into a whole range of issues, but these are what we see most often:
- A lack of clear vision/strategy – even if that top-level why is clear, there may be a complete disconnect with the everyday focus and day to day of what people are actually doing. Equally, the strategy might just not be clear or motivating.
- The vision/strategy is not clearly communicated – It might not have been communicated in a way that has been understood, digested or engaged people.
- Leaders are not aligned to vision/strategy – this may even materialise in active resistance to change – “I’ve been doing it this way for 20+years – what’s the point of me changing the way I do things now?”
- A lack of understanding of emotional journey – the human element of needing time and space to digest and respond to the impact of change and what it means for someone is often overlooked.
Against this backdrop of accelerated macro change in the world and how commonplace it is for change programmes to fail, it’s more important than ever to make sure that your change transformation is well planned and thought through.
So how do you ensure your leaders first develop an awareness of the need to change and then move beyond that to become a catalyst that supports the rest of the organisation through the transition? The answer lies in how well you build a compelling case for change, align and engage your people, and create space and time for others to understand what it means for them. In short, how can you create the right conditions that make it easy for others to embrace and become a part of the change that needs to happen?
Webinar Recap
On the webinar session we ran last month, I shared some principles to help leaders do exactly that. Here you’ll find some of the key talking points we discussed. I share them here to help get you thinking around the change you are looking to make in your organisation.
Understand how people deal with change:
It’s all too easy to slip into thinking that it’s painfully obvious that change needs to happen to reach a new level of performance. Below I share a useful framework to aid in visualising helping your people to navigate change.
Getting your story straight:
What’s your WHY? Here I share some guidance on forming a clear compelling case for change to help your people navigate the transition ahead of them:
- Are you clear on your ‘golden thread’?
- What do you want people to Think, feel and do?
Telling your story:
Here are some questions to start getting specific and clear around the change and who you need to bring along with you. Here are some pointers to start you forming a narrative that aligns and engages different leaders and teams
At the start of any change journey, giving careful thought to the above is key in bringing others on board and making change feel like it’s done with them, not to them. It’s important to note that this is just the first step in getting your story straight. By getting your story straight, you can start to help others see the need for change, include them as part of it and ultimately engage them in bringing it to life. Getting clarity on your case for why change is needed and planning who you need to engage along the way you can take the first step in making sure the step change you need is delivered.
If you’re about to embark on your change journey and need help in getting your story straight, feel free to get in touch. We’d be delighted to share more about our work in this space and how we help Executive teams get clear on what they’re trying to achieve then support them to align and engage their leaders and teams to achieve it.
