In fact, a number of the best small businesses have developed and succeeded by implementing some of these principles.
Today we are seeing an increasing dynamics of global and sectoral changes. In this regard, the need for organizations to adapt is increasing, and the topic of change management becomes even more urgent.
In this article we highlighted the most popular advice that helps to reveal the breadth and, most importantly, the beauty of the issue:
- Create a vision;
- Make a clear plan;
- Plan the first achievable steps;
- Give up the past;
- Involve employees;
- Create the conditions.
Let’s talk about each of them.
Create a vision
Vision is a powerful tool for managing organizational change. It helps to overcome the problems associated with the uncertainty of the future, do not squander resources, motivate employees.
To realize this advice, when implementing strategic changes, you can use the most popular in the management of changes eight-step approach of J. Kotter . According to him, it is necessary to form an influential team of reformers who are defined with a vision of the future and distribute it in the company. Starting organizational changes from creating a picture of the desired future, it becomes possible to break the bonds that hold the organization together and move forward.
In this regard, we recall a curious case from the consulting practice, when, by entrusting the group with strategic planning to work on the definition of VISION, the managing owner went on a business trip. When he returned and got acquainted with the results, he gave out a pearl: “This is not vizhin, but illusions.”
Give up the past
Before you move anywhere, change your organization and yourself, you need to reset the shackles of the past. Openly, without prejudice, look at the current situation, determine which skills that led to success, are outdated. If this is not done, if you do not help employees rethink their habitual behavior and thinking, a look into the future will be produced through the shadows of established habits and stereotypes. In general, according to this advice, if we create a vision without first abandoning the past, we will be limited to the stereotypes of the outdated experience.
The most popular this advice was due to the model of U. Bridges , consisting of three stages: completion; Neutral zone; a new beginning.
It was used by her in a construction corporation that performs work in the harsh conditions of the Far North. When key customers reduced financing for capital construction, the structure of the industry began to change dramatically. The requirements to the quality and efficiency of the results of SMR have been raised, which entailed a change in the business model. But the problem was that the rules of the game on the market were not yet clearly formed. The management of the company decided not to hurry with the conclusion of new contract agreements. The organization began to panic, which is natural for a neutral zone of transition to a new one. The owner singled out the key employees, discussed with them the conditions for future cooperation, thereby preserving the backbone of the company. More than 70% of the staff, feeling fear in the neutral zone, gradually retired, thereby saving the organization from ballast and expanding the possibilities in search of new solutions.
Make a clear plan
The more clearly formulated goals and activities to achieve them is the more likely the positive result of organizational change. The classical model of change management, which underlies many modern approaches, offers:
- Describe the current state of the organization AS IS;
- Determine the desired state HOW TO BE;
- To formulate WHAT IT IS NECESSARY TO DO.
Such an algorithm has proven itself in cases where the formalization of the company’s activities takes place, where it is possible to calculate the key parameters of the organizational transformation. In this case, change management can simply be reduced to project management. For example, the central office of the sales office of a Western company moved to a new building in a more prestigious part of the city. These guys had everything strictly regulated up to the sockets.
But the human factor was not paid enough attention, and two of the best sellers resigned. A couple of months, the chief executive asked this question and it turned out that the sellers who had left the company were also young mothers who took the children to the nearest garden. It was necessary to somehow decide the issue of the return of excellent salesmen in the system and for them they allocated a car that brought and drove the workers to the office.
Plan for the first achievable steps
The future is difficult to determine, so hard planning of activities is not possible. Relying on this assertion, A.I. Prigogine offers a way to achieve the vision of the company to break down into main stages. The distance between the stages is determined not by time intervals, but by the occurrence of the expected events. Therefore, there is no binding to a rigid time frame.
But the measures for the first stage, which includes only achievable goals, are clearly defined. In the event that the end of the first stage has come to an end, it becomes possible to plan a move to the next event.
This approach was applied in the company that is engaged in the distribution of information technology. Management has been concerned about the changes that are imminent in the industry. To this end, the business game “Ship” was conducted, which allowed to describe the picture of the future and the place of the company in it. The formulated vision of the organization in the long term served as the basis for the development of the strategy and the initial concrete steps.
Involve employees
If a person tries to force him to do what he does not like, it inevitably causes resistance . Therefore, involving employees in the work on the new state of the organization, we increase the likelihood of success and effectiveness of the changes.
In this we can help the three-factor model R. Kanter. She draws attention to the fact that it is important for employees to exercise their skills, contribute to the common cause and understand why all this is necessary.
Once, within the framework of the implementation of the quality management system (QMS), I encountered a negative attitude, a categorical distrust of changes from the chief engineer of the company. The employee was key and the radical way of dismissal did not fit. Therefore, the chief engineer was invited to participate in the QMS meetings as a critic. In the end, he did not become an apologist for the QMS, but made an invaluable contribution to the development of the system and did not engage in undercover games, sabotage the introduction of innovations.
Create conditions
A person has a program of behavior for similar conditions, is able to adapt to new ones. It remains only to create conditions and put staff there.
In the practice of managing a simple way to create conditions, there can be simply an insistent demand for employees. So, when introducing risk-based thinking in companies, I suggest managers refuse to listen to opinions, suggestions of employees to solve problems without specifying risks and opportunities. When the leadership is persistent, the approach is quickly instilled.
An example of how the reception works with creating conditions is the Stanford prison experiment – ordinary students, randomly divided into supervisors and prisoners, so quickly entered new roles that in a week’s time, for the safety of participants, it was decided to roll back the study.
