Elise OldingI had an interesting discussion today (along with many others lately). The topic centers on why it’s difficult to get an organization to embrace methods to deal with the people issues – communication, engagement and overall involvement.
For those of us that do this sort of work, it seems obvious why you need good communication and organizational engagement – supported by an organizational readiness methodology. The benefits are a successful project, happy constituents and everyone getting what they want. But, to those we are trying to convince about funding this sort of work, it may not be so obvious. And, even when we do get to do the proper communication, put together peer advocacy groups and gain stakeholder adoption, it isn’t always clear how our techniques contributed to this. It’s the invisible solution to the invisible problem.
The paradox is that we are selling change to the powers that be while asking them to change to adopt a new way of working! It is also likely that we are offering a solution for a problem that they don’t think they have. I think this is the part we need to work on.
A few ideas:
- Probe for what management thinks the issues are – what are the problems they are worried about. Address these specifically and explain simply and elegantly what you will do.
- Have your ducks in a row. Do your research – have some case studies and metrics about how a change methodology can improve project success.
- Be able to articulate the tactics you will take and how you will be able to measure the success of those tactics and be able to adjust them if they aren’t working.
- Keep it simple. Explain the people dynamics in business terms – what the costs are of specific issues and how organizational readiness can address them. The top three to five are enough.
- Have a budget in mind and a rough timeline of the activities.
After you have sold the idea that you need to address the people issues, the work begins. Congratulations and good luck!
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Category: Uncategorized Tags: change management bpm
4 responses so far ↓
1 Richard Watson August 25, 2010 at 7:22 am
Elise,
John Kotter continually reminds us that establishing a sense of urgency is the first step in leading change.
Over my career, I’ve created that sense of urgency by presenting storylines with the unavoidable moral: change is necessary. A couple of examples from my experience:
- Look at how much money we are wasting paying our reference data providers for the same data multiple times – we need to distribute that data more effectively.
- Look at the myriad application platforms we have, all competing for development, maintenance and operations resources that are overwhelming us – we need to consolidate to a small set of platforms.
You need to tread a fine line with the people you need to convince, between hitting them so hard with a torrent of risks that they are paralysed like rabbits in the headlights, and firing them up so much they go out and grab the first solution that comes to hand (usually buying something).
Richard.
2 Elise Olding August 25, 2010 at 12:37 pm
Excellent points Richard, thanks for sharing. Above all – understand your organization and what the best way to communicate is. There is no “one size fits all.” Others?
3 BPM Quotes of the week « Adam Deane August 28, 2010 at 3:00 am
[...] Change Management – Elise Olding The paradox is that we are selling change to the powers that be while asking them [...]
4 Adam Deane August 28, 2010 at 1:09 pm
* For change to happen people have to do something different, a change of culture and people will not change until they understand what’s in it for them.
* To change culture you have to change performance measures.
* To change performance measures you have first to develop a shared vision, a new way of working together.
* No-one should be expected to know the best way to change their way of working, they need help and guidance from people who have done it before
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