Winning Plays for Implementing Change
“To survive and succeed, every organization will have to turn itself into a change agent.” – Peter Drucker
Progress cannot happen without change, whether in personal life or business, in strategy, process, technology, or leadership; it’s inevitable for everyone. Adoption and acceptance of the changes can be a huge barrier to a successful outcome. By following a change management framework, it will benefit your team, your teammates, and your results.
Over 75% of leaders believe their business transformation program is at risk of failure from the start. Our experiences of the Top 5 “Why” success is at risk:
- lack of visible leadership
- lack of communications and the reason for the change
- lack of listening and trust-building
- lack of flexibility and agile adaptation
- lack of celebrating success
Change Management and Lessons Learned
Learning research indicates it takes 21 days for a new habit to stick. Many people are reluctant to change, no matter what it is. Resistance can quickly turn into fear and anger. The key to avoiding this is to have a strong plan. It’s all about managing the resistance and discomfort of change by utilizing approaches that have proven successful over many years on a wide variety of change initiatives. What we have seen happen frequently is the tendency to create only communications that only focus on the announcement of the change and ignore the human side, the psychological aspect that lasts throughout the complete change process.
Here are 10 items that we have found leaders can utilize to enable successful change:
- Simplify the message
- Remove Barriers
- Find early adopters and change agents who are willing to help promote the benefits and invest their time into helping others see the opportunities ahead and adapt during the transition
- Review the vision that builds excitement about the future, while recognizing past accomplishments
- Lead with Speed
- Respect the growing pains
- Recognize and reward desired behaviors
- Be visible and humble
- Your actions speak the truth
- Reinforce, Communicate, Reinforce, Communicate
Contact us and let us know your vital few in leading change on your team.
By: Gary Tammaro, Managing Director