Posts Tagged ‘change management’

Top Five Indisputable Keys to Doing Great Change

Posted: June 10, 2014 in Change, skills
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dunce2I like this headline because it’s almost as obnoxious as “Everything You Know About Change Management is Wrong.” I love those kinds of headlines. Great way to offend your audience and under-deliver. Needless to say there are no indisputable things about anything and I certainly hope you are not wrong about everything.

My goal here was to force myself to choose five tenants I could put my convictions behind (and of course, get your attention) . Creativity via limitations. Here’s what I came up with.

1. What to Change

In my last assignment I often said our hardest job was not knowing how to do it but what to do it to. What do we attempt to change? That is THE question.

I blatantly steal from the Theory of Constraints here. But instead of focusing on what is the most significant process constraint to change, we focus on what is the most significant cultural/organizational constraint we need to change.

What cultural behavior or norms stop us from making improvements? Organizational silos? Incentive systems? Education? Distrust? Chaos?

They could all be constraints. Which one is the lynchpin? Evaluate and make a decision. It’s not an exact science.  You might be wrong. That’s OK. The act of trying to solve the problem next to the lynchpin will probably lead you to the lynchpin. And that’s progress. It’s part of the process.

2. Strategy and Tactics

As Eli Goldratt put it, strategy is the “What For” and tactics is the “How To,” and they need to work together.

The What For defines what we are trying to achieve. The emotions involved with the What For make it complex because people’s desires are fluid and so their attitudes towards the What For will be dynamic.

The How To will be less complex but often more complicated, as it may involve many layered steps and processes that need to be tracked.

The key is to keep bouncing them off each other to make sure they remain aligned.

3. It’s the Psychology, Duh

If you don’t understand psychology, you will fail. The complexity of the What For requires you understand the human condition. It requires that you respond to each person’s reaction to the situation individually, one interaction at a time. There’s no one size fits all. That’s called propaganda. No one likes propaganda.

Emotional Intelligence. We are all motivated by emotions. To rely solely on cold-hard facts and logic is to ignore the human condition. No one wants to be treated like a cog in the process machine. Find a way to connect. If you can’t, find someone who can. It’s worth the effort.

4. Focus, Focus, Focus

There are a thousand thousand problems to solve. Every twisting turn in the path will call for change. It’s a siren’s call. Stay focused. There will always be something else that wants your attention. Better to do one thing well than a thousand poorly.

The reasons to stay focused are many. My go to reason is that if you do the right thing well, many of the other problems just cease to exist. The other reason I go to is that focusing minimizes variables. Too many projects means too many variables. Too many variables makes it hard to know which ones are working for good and which ones are working for evil.

So what do we say to the god of distractions. Not today.

5. Go back to the beginning. Often.

Keep revisiting the first four points.

This is important especially because of point #4. All the siren calls will fill the system with noise. It’s easy to lose the signal.

It’s also important because as you dive into the tactical details going back to what you are trying to achieve keeps you out of those rabbit holes that get you so easily caught up in the wrong priorities. Because just like you have to pick and choose what to change at the higher level, you also have to pick and choose what to change at the detail level.

And for point #3, make sure you aren’t losing people. It’s a long haul. You’ll have to work to keep them engaged.

Make sure it’s all still working together.

So there it is. Ready to be put right into action. Oh, the indisputability of it all.

 

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Desire is Not a Number

Posted: June 5, 2014 in Change, educate
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desire1Change management is coaching. Coaching is teaching. Teaching is helping someone learn. Learning to learn is change management.

Round and round we go. A bit circular. A bit abstract. If everything is everything, then nothing is everything. Oh boy, getting a little deep there. We won’t go there. Maybe some place a little lighter.

Reminds me of a scene from the Tom Hanks movie “Volunteers”:

Chung Mee: Opium is my business. The bridge mean more traffic. More traffic mean more money. More money mean more power.
Lawrence Bourne III: Yeah, well, before I commit any of that to memory, would there be anything in this for me?
Chung Mee: Speed is important in business. Time is money.
Lawrence Bourne III: You said opium was money.
Chung Mee: Money is Money.
Lawrence Bourne III: Well then, what is time again?

But seriously, isn’t change management at its heart essentially targeted coaching? Obviously I think the answer is yes. Perhaps coaching of a manager or a management team or a project team or an operations team.

Let’s try another round about.

Change requires coaching. Coaching requires motivation. Motivation requires desires. Desires are emotions. Emotions spur change.

I’m getting dizzy. Yet we keep ending up in the same place. Change. Change requires learning and learning requires desire.

Desire. What is desire? A dictionary tells me it’s a strong feeling of wanting to have something or wishing for something to happen.  Sounds good to me.

The trick in change management is finding out what that something is. Because that something is different for almost everyone.

In the process engineering world I know we almost always think that something is a number. A throughput number or a quality number. In the sales world I’m sure it’s often number of units sold or percentage of quotas met. It is not a number.

Our basic desires don’t speak in numbers. They speak in emotions: love, respect, recognition, pride, fulfillment, and so on. Find out what emotional desire they want to fill. That is the most important step.

Then and only then do you begin to ask how to achieve that. That’s when numbers come into play. That’s when data is important. Data helps us make decisions. Decisions that drive us toward our desired something.

I ran across some wonderful YouTube videos form Mike Lally on coaching. Does a much better job than I could at explaining the role of emotion in coaching.  How to Coach with Emotional Intelligence. Check him out. He has a good website as well.

I’ll leave you with this. Find your desire.

 

Change and Politics and You

Posted: April 14, 2014 in Change, Relationship Building
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prohibition_poster3Change and politics don’t mix. They don’t mix in government and they don’t mix in business. We don’t like to talk about politics. It’s taboo. Oh well, here we go anyway.

You see sometimes politics like change. If it sees advantage in it. Sometime politics dislike change. If it sees it as threatening to the status quo. And of course politics are fickle. Change that was good may abruptly become bad. Or the other way around. Makes you skittish to deal with it. You lose trust. Losing trust is bad.

I talk about politics as some abstract concept, which it is, but on practical level it is about leaders and managers. And leaders and managers are people. People whose behavior can be changed.

Politics happen for all kinds of reasons. The ones I see as most destructive to change are leaders jumping ion the latest management craze or jumping on the band wagon of the latest and hottest manager. I don’t know that either of these is avoidable and necessarily all bad.

The problem is that existing  improvement initiatives get the heave ho. Creating an environment of starts and stops. Attempts at improvements become out of joint, as Shakespeare might say.

I guess you might say we need to get used to it. This is after all a sort of ongoing change that we should know how to handle. But I’d rather not get used to it. To me these stops and starts caused by politics are juts chaos. It doesn’t have to be like this. We can change it.

I wrote about managing managers a bit ago in this blog: Change Managing the Management:  It was about educating managers about how change works. This is piece of the puzzle.

It’s not the whole puzzle. The other piece in the puzzle is awareness. Awareness of the ramifications and repercussions of swaying with the political winds.

We sometimes think everyone is in tune with all the ramifications of choices.  Unfortunately, they’re not. And the more they’re not in tune the more the term “unintended consequences” comes up. It’s not good when that term comes up.

Yes, there are certainly times in any situation that you can get bit by unintended consequences bug. But you’d much rather be bit by the unintended consequences complexity bug than by the unintended consequences clueless bug.

How do you teach someone to be more aware? That’s a tough one.

You could be blunt and say ” Hey, let’s not be that guy.” That might work. Make sure to know your audience on that one.

You can certainly start with education and communication like I mention in Change Managing the Management. This is always a good path to enlightenment.

But I like metaphors or analogies to spread complex ideas.

A good analogy for unintended consequences is Prohibition.  Prohibition is a good metaphor because it was clearly political. It had good intentions. And it snapped into place in the snap of a finger.

Unintended consequence heaven. That’s what it was. And it’s a good example because some were good and many were bad.

Increases in alcohol poisoning, DUI arrests, prison inmates, organized crime and so. Lot’s of fascinating stories out there on this.

Here’s a nice infographgic:  America’s Hangover: Prohibitions Unintended Consequences

 

Teach a Person to Change

Posted: April 9, 2014 in Change, educate, Relationship Building
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Change One Person at a Time

light2We like to talk about process change. We like to talk about cultural change. About organizational change. We like to talk about big picture change.

But change is fundamentally about people changing. In fact it is about one person changing at a time. Because change is, at the end of the day, well, personal.

And we don’t like to change. It’s hard. It’s hard even for those who embrace change.

We know that to help change along we need to talk about the benefits. We need to talk about how the need for change isn’t anyone’s fault. It’s just a need, a constant need. We know about good goals and good communication.

But what about me? This is about my personal relationship with change not some need or goal or mission statement. It’s about me. The individual.

I always like to tell people that you change the world one interaction at a time, one choice at a time. You hold the door for someone carrying a bag. You smile at a stranger. You buy local. One interaction at a time.

It’s the same for business change. You change the organization one person at a time. One interaction with that person at a time.

It’s like being a guidance counselor. You talk to individuals about their needs, about how they react to change. Each person’s relationship with change will be different. Some will be nervous. Some will be afraid. Some will be resistant. Some will be bitter. Some will be cynical. Some will be all for it.

Find out. Find out for each person. What are their concerns. What are their needs.

Their needs may have nothing specific to do with the given project. Assuage their fears. Help them understand process. Get them engaged and remove the unknown. Or other behavioral options that might be called for.

Bring them enlightenment.  Don’t be the light. Give them the light.

Help the person with change and you help everyone and everything. And yes, it takes time. It’s time well spent.  Teach people to change and they will change the world.

Who are you and why are you here?

Posted: March 17, 2014 in Change, Relationship Building
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“Know thyself” is a good Greek saying. As a change agent I’ve always thought “Know thy role” is also a good saying. And as a change agent one of the things I’ve found most helpful is tackling the slippery idea of role.

What is a change agent’s role? The biggest challenge I’ve discovered is arriving at a common understanding of that role. Does everybody involved think it‘s the same thing? The answer is usually no. That’s OK. It provides us with the opportunity to think a little deeper and know thy role.

The three groups that need to be on the same page: you, the management and the team. 

Let’s start with you. What do you think your role is? This is probably different for each of us. It might be different for each project. That’s OK. The goal is to understand your expectations of yourself for this project. If you don’t have clarity, who will? 

You might define this yourself. You might define it along with your manager. Defining this before you start helps you know where to insert yourself and where to draw lines. Of course you always you need to be adaptable, but having a starting point is priceless. 

Now, what does management think your role is? They probably have ideas of what you will and won’t be doing. They’ll probably be different than your ideas. That’s OK.  A little negotiation may be in order. Negotiations often hinge around perceptions, wishes and realities. Be positive but real. If your role has to change, try to make sure all parts of the role you defined are handled by someone. 

And lastly, what does the team think your role is? Here is where you’ll probably get the most variety of belief. This is also going to be more of an education than a negotiation. Based on the agreements made above, you’ll walk through the approach and what it is you’ll be doing. And sometime you’ll need to talk about what you won’t be doing. 

That’s not to say there won’t be any negotiation. The team’s level of sophistication will enter into the equation. Some teams may need you to do things others wouldn’t. Again, be positive but realistic. 

Why is this important? 

Obviously, it starts out as just good communication. We should talk about these expectations as part of the greater project anyway. But in the end it’s about relationship building. You are working towards avoiding misunderstandings that lead to disruptions in flow. About minimizing the “Why are you doing that?” scenarios that lead to friction about the wrong things. How many times have people thought you were over stepping your boundaries when you thought you were just doing your job? That’s never good for trust, I am sure of that.

And the reality is you can’t do everything. So having everyone on the same page about your role also allows you to begin defining other people’s roles.

Change Managing the Management through Education

Posted: March 6, 2014 in Change, educate, Relationship Building
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keys2

It’s so easy to get caught in the trap of focusing all out energy on the team members who we are asking to change. They’re on the front line. If they’re not engaged and bought in, nothing happens.

We tend to give managers a pass as long as they consent to the project or mission of change. In fact sometimes we like it if they consent and then go away. Life is easier that way, at least until management balks at the proposed change or doesn’t get it.  Then that’s not so great. It’s actually quite frustrating.

So we need to address the obstacles of management as much as the obstacles of the team. We need to have an approach with them as well.

Again, the context and the environment will obviously need to be assessed. Let’s look at a couple familiar things we can do.

Strengthen Relationship with Managers

Managers are often stretched thin and will have limited time to work with you. Do you already have a relationship with management? If so, that’s a bonus. If not, you need to begin to build some bonds.

I like to start by telling them what I think I am going to be doing. This is especially important if they didn’t ask for your help. Set the expectations. And then expand the expectations and tell them what I think they are going to be doing. They might disagree. That’s OK. Time for some negotiation. Dialog around the expectations can be a good way to increase understanding of the process.

Then I shoot for some education. Here’s what we’re going to do and why. I don’t want them to just nod in understanding. I want them to regurgitate the ideas and concepts. Then I want them to explain it to the team so the bond between them, the team and me is strengthened.

Communicate and Continue Education

Communicating often to management on progress is important. Find as much one-on-one times as possible. Unfortunately, the project update seems to be the only exposure you have to them.  Take advantage of it.

I’ve found that bland project updates on tasks and milestones, while necessary, leave so much opportunity for improved understanding on the table.

Keep educating. There is so much more to learn as you get deeper and deeper into a project, the nuances and detail that drill down beyond the high level concepts.

Take your status update and make it an education tool. We completed this task. This task is important because we learned this and sets us up to do that in line with this concept and goal.

For example, we put in data collection around A, which allows us to track B which allows us to trend C which allows us to make better decisions on D. We‘ve created a feedback loop that allows us to become a learning organization. This allows us to go on to the next task. Badda bing! We’ve expanded and reinforced understanding.

Remember, change is about education. Education for everyone.

When Empowerment is a Four Letter Word

Posted: February 27, 2014 in Change, Relationship Building
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fist1

I used to tell my last boss I was an abstract kind of person. He would laugh and say don’t you mean obtuse. He was joking of course. Though there are times when I think it is true.

Like with the idea of Empowerment. I capitalize it because that’s how I see it when I hear management say it.

Because when I hear them say it I think, I don’t even know what that means. I mean, I know what empowerment means. But I don’t know what Empowerment means.

This is where the obtuse part comes in. I’m like I don’t think I know what Empowerment looks like yet alone how to implement it. And then I get snarky because I don’t like feeling obtuse and I say, I don’t think you know what it looks like either.

Now, to be fair to myself I think perhaps it is less obtuseness and more extreme dislike for management buzz words that sets me off.  And Empowerment is one of them.

So obviously empower means to give power. That can mean a lot of different things to a lot of different people. Some good, some bad. Power has way too many connotations and implications and insinuations to be a healthy conversation piece.

I prefer to think of it as giving people influence. Because is influence is really what you want them to have.  And as we all know, influence is power.

Give people the tools and skills to influence behavior and processes, which vary of course depending on the goals and environment. Give them some self-determination. Because having self-determination makes us feel better about our situation.

This is great. But there’s one thing that’s usually missing. It’s not the commitment. It’s not the resources. It’s the trust.

(I think I’m going to give myself a bonus every time I use the word trust. Because it always boils down to that.)

But this time the trust is not between the change agent and the team. This trust is between management and the team. Management has to show that they trust the process.

Management often states in good faith that they trust the team and the process. Then they undermine it in word or in action, often in the form of control. The unwillingness to give up control. I don’t really trust you if I second guess everything, if I micromanage the process steps, if I have to run everything up the ladder, if I throw barriers in the way. That’s not trust.

What do we want management? We want trust. Without trust Empowerment is just another four letter word.

There is a Method to the Madness of Change

Posted: February 25, 2014 in Change, educate, Lewis and Clark Method, Relationship Building
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oldmap1

 Methodologies abound in change management and process engineering. I’ve worked extensively with a few, been exposed to a few more and have read about countless others. I have my opinions on many of them but that would take days to ramble through and not necessary today.

What I want to talk about today is the need to define your own approach. I don’t mean you need to invent one (That would be quite the assignment), and I don’t wish for you to regurgitate the text book definition of a method you favor. What I mean is that we all have a way of approaching projects that have evolved over time based on our own experiences and our exposure or study of methodologies.

What is the benefit of doing this, you might ask. Sometimes we are so busy doing our jobs we don’t take time to reflect on how we are doing them. This is a good exercise to explore how we currently think even if you never show it to anyone. Our approaches should be fluid so this is good periodic exercise to see how we are changing.

I have come to find that there is nothing like having to explain your approach as a way of synthesizing what it is. You must organize all the thoughts and actions you might take into a workable and actionable framework. You must clarify the reasons and objectives behind these thoughts and actions. You must clarify expectations and roles.

You might also find holes or weaknesses in your approach. If necessary you can then go in search of tools and techniques to fill the holes. A good motivator to search out knowledge.

As you do this you begin to see where a whole trove of philosophies you’ve adopted fit. Like all the blogs that have come before this for me. These ideas and techniques all fit somewhere in my method. Then they begin to become more present. More available.

Once you have done this your ability to walk a new partner through your approach becomes much easier . Communication becomes so much easier. You feel much more in control.

You might even have more than one approach depending on the context of the project. That’s good. Flexibility is valuable.

I’ll end by giving you an abbreviated example of my approach. I call it the Lewis and Clark method. You can tell I’m not a professional method designer because first letters of the sections of the method don’t spell anything. They just make sense. This method assumes I already have a vision or a goal for my project.

Explore, Map, Analyze, Decide, Move, Repeat

Explore

Look around. Get to know the people, the lay of the land. Educate. Build bonds. Build skills.

Map

Visualize the situation. Get down as much as you currently know that lies between you and the goal. Don’t map too far ahead. Educate. Build bonds. Build skills.

Analyze

See what the map tells you. Gather more information and data based on what you know and where you want to go. Look at the map again. Find some places you can reasonably get to. Educate. Build bonds. Build skills.

Decide

Make the best decision you can with what you currently know. Be flexible. Take what the beast will give. Choose your destination. Identify necessary resources, give assignments and roles. Educate. Build bonds. Build skills.

Move

You can send a scout by doing a prototype or you can do a pilot by using a whole team. You just need to move and be directionally accurate. Educate. Build bonds. Build skills.

Repeat

Once you are near or at your sub-goal you start over by exploring the new conditions.

—

This is just a shell and I could add all sorts of actions around relationship building and communication and so on. I could visualize it. Make a presentation with all sorts of paths and graphics (which I did do about a year ago).

But this alone allows me to talk about my approach with ease. Once I had more specifics on a project I could begin to fill in with more specific tools and techniques I might use.

You’ll notice I repeated educate, build bonds, build skills. That’s the piece for me that is so often missing. So I put it in all phases to remind me.

Your approach will look different because we all have different backgrounds and experiences. Give it a try. See what you can learn about yourself.

Do Something, Get Something

Posted: February 19, 2014 in Change, Relationship Building
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hand2a

Convincing people that things need to change is hard. Convincing them that change is good is harder. Convincing them that they should actively pursue change is hardest of all.

There are so many good methods and techniques and tools for pursuing change. They are, however, of limited value if you can’t get your team to take the change steps willingly.

It comes back to trust. And this time it is two kinds of trust.  The trust that they place in you and the trust they place in themselves.

Trust can be built in many ways. One way to build trust is by giving without expecting. For example, if I am working with a team I make sure to understand the people, the process and the current environment. I learn about things related to what I am there to help with and but I also learn about unrelated things and general conditions. I look for things that they are struggling with and I try to find a way give them something to help.

Perhaps a contact to reporting resource. Hey, I think Bob might have data on that topic. Or a link to an article on how people are dealing with a customer service problem. Or maybe I take some of their data and do an analysis and create a chart that says hey look I noticed this trend you might be interested in.

Just give it to them. Don’t belabor it. Let them take from it what they will. That’s it. You can do this for the manager. You can do it for a team member.

Here’s what that just accomplished. You showed them you are paying attention. You gave them some of your expertise without asking for anything. You’ve demonstrated your capabilities.

This might sound disingenuous but it’s not. It is good human relations. When building a relationship with a friend you do things for them you think they would like. It makes you feel good to do this. You get a serotonin boost. It makes them feel good. They get a serotonin boost.  You don’t ask for anything in return. You’re trying to build a bond. The bond is what you are getting in return.

And it’s not disingenuous because everyone knows you are there to get things done so no one is going to be surprised when you finally ask them to get involved.

Then there is the trust they have in themselves. You can help them with that. Because the more trust they have in themselves the less daunting the challenges of change will be.

Find out what their skills and capabilities are. Illustrate to them how those will translate to even unknown future tasks.

And if you find out they might be missing a key skill, then do what you can to help them acquire it. Provide education, examples, practical application. Build their knowledge, build their confidence, build their trust in themselves.

When in doubt, lend a hand.

Can You Hear Them Now?

Posted: February 17, 2014 in Change, Relationship Building
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ear2

People know when you’re not listening.

That’s it. That’s today’s important lesson. Trust me, it’s far more significant than it seems.

To understand why it is so significant we start with basic human condition of needing to feel valued. This need doesn’t go away just because you are at work. In fact feeling valued is one of the few things that can turn work into something more than just work. How sweet is that? Pretty sweet.

There are people who have thought about this a lot, whether personal or work related. Check these examples out. http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/theory-knowledge/201206/relational-value and http://blogs.hbr.org/2011/06/the-only-thing-that-really-mat/)

You can provide feelings of value in many ways, like through recognition or appreciation, and that’s important to do.

But you can destroy all that value building by doing one little thing: by not listening.

Let’s try an empathy exercise here. Let’s go back and reflect on our own personal and professional lives and even our childhoods and think about how you felt when you thought someone ignored you, cut you off, gave you a canned response, poo-pooed you, brushed your concerns away or was clearly distracted. I’m going to guess you didn’t like it. You felt you weren’t being taken seriously. You felt you were being dismissed or belittled.

Now, should we be tougher and have thicker skin and be more Zen about these things? Sure. Are we always able to do that? No. And just because I think you can handle being dismissed doesn’t mean I should do it.

That’s why listening is so important. Because it’s powerful. Because it’s personal. Because it’s subtle.

Especially because it is subtle. It’s the art of communication. It’s why companies spend billions of dollars a year crafting their messages to consumers. You have to work at it.

The art and science of listening is then to gain information and understanding while not sparking negative reactions.

The good thing is listening skills can be learned. There’s a whole school of thought around the idea of active listening. There are books and training and gurus aplenty. Lots of good resources out there like this http://www.studygs.net/listening.htm. These resources provide you with the science but remember that there is an art part.

You have to avoid the pitfalls of applying these listening tools mechanically, though. You have to make your listening is genuine or at least project the feeling that you are trying to be genuine.

The mechanical application ends up in a scenario where someone is sitting across from you and waits for you to finish and says “I hear what you’re saying” or “Let me repeat what I think you said.”

What the hell? is what I think. Are you a robot? Did you just read that off the Quick Tips sheet from the Active Listening class you just went to? You seem intelligent. But you just listened to what I had to say and the most personal and thought out thing you can say is “here’s what I think you just said.”

OK, so that what is a little harsh. But the point is don’t be a robot.  Because I’m not a robot. Just prove to me that you were listening.  Treat me as individual and behave like you’re having a unique interaction. Because that’s what I feel it is.

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