The secret sauce of change
“Change is hard at first, messy in the middle and gorgeous at the end”
Love this quote on change. It’s a good reminder that change is hard. That is why people are good at change.
Data doesn’t lie
80% transformation (change) programs don’t deliver the required outcome.
78% of people in organisations (generalisation) don’t want to make change
Organisations that effectively make change, have an improved customer and employee experience & a better financial outcome.
Every organisation is working to make change – new product, new sales strategy, new investment, new plan, new operating model, new ways of doing things. Change is what continues to add value to organisations.
Organisations that effectively make changes are more customer centric, employees like working at these organisations and have a better financial outcome. So, it’s a no brainer. We need to create an environment in an organisation for change to occur and for it to be celebrated.
While nothing I have said above is really revolutionary or something you didn’t know, why is making change so hard? What is the secret sauce to make meaningful change?
SECRET INGREDIENTS TO SUCCESS
Culture – if you don’t have the right culture in the organisation, you will not be able to make the change. Culture takes time to develop and when done well, is co-developed with the organisation to get their buy in and create the culture they want in an organisation. The person I have seen do this the best is Collin Ellis.
Leadership – strong Executive leadership, where people are not scared to fight for what is important, to have challenging conversations and to take the job of navigating teams and organisations through change, as their number 1 priority. If you don’t have this, you are not going to success.
Why – being clear on the why. Why are we making change. What is it going to improve – for our customers, employees and the way the brand / product is perceived in the market?
Linking the activity with the why is critical to get buy-in.
Champions – build a strong champion network across the organisation that have Executive team support to implement a change agenda. Strong personalities to push through the hard bit and resistance piece and drive the change agenda.
Agility – as you are making change, your plans might change and you need to pivot quickly, not a 6 month review but on a day by day basis to ensure that the change doesn’t lose momentum and people don’t give up that the change will occur.
Celebrate change – making change however small should be celebrated by the CEO and leadership team. People should be encouraged to make changes in their teams, roles and outcomes. Saying change is important, is one thing but then celebrating or recognising people for change is another.
Time & money – without time and money, nothing happens. Time (resources) need to be allocated to make change. Giving people time out of their day-to-day work to do the change journey. The structure might be dedicated resource on change program or space in role(s) to have time to work on the change, not getting too lost in the business as usual.
Money makes the world go round. Funding needs to be allocated to change programs. Doesn’t need to millions of dollars, but flexible funding to make incremental changes or a larger change program is critical.
When I think about change, sometimes we overcomplicate things.
That is where the concept of continuous improvement works well. What is the key changes an organisation, department or team need to make to improve the customer experience, product, operational efficiency or to stay ahead of the market.
Having a funding model that is aligned with your planning, ensures that small, incremental changes (continuous improvement) can get done in an organisation.
Not all projects need to be large big bang, sometimes small incremental changes will have the biggest impact. See articles and documents written by Whiteark around Continuous improvement and Simplification that you might find interesting / helpful / inspiring.
If you have some other ingredients for secret sauce, please post a comment, DM me or reach out, I would be interested to chat further.
Article by Jo Hands, Whiteark Founder
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