The main objective of this presentation is to encourage openness to change in the workplace. It will help you understand what are the steps to leading successful cultural change and go over some case studies of successful, semi-successful, and unsuccessful change within organizations.
3. 3
Signs an Organization May Need
Cultural Change
1. Organization metrics take a turn for the
worse
2. Performance against competition
3. Disengaged workforce
4. Sub-optimal leaders
5. Identified and missed opportunities
6. The changing world has left you behind
6. 6
Step 1: Create a Sense of Urgency
Why is urgency important to a
change effort?
• With a sense of urgency, the
organization understands why
change is no longer optional.
7. 7
Step 2: Guiding Coalition
What is a guiding coalition?
A guiding coalition needs:
1. Position power
2. Expertise
3. Credibility
4. Leadership
8. 8
Step 3: Form Strategic Vision &
Initiatives
What is a change vision?
What the organization, department,
product or service will look like after
specific changes have occurred.
9. 9
Step 3: Form Strategic Vision &
Initiatives
What are change initiatives?
The actions required to get from
point A to Z. The actions to
implement and sustain the change
must make sense.
10. 10
Step 4: Communicate Change Vision &
Enlist Volunteer Army
Keys to Effective Communication of Change
Vision:
Keep it simple
Multiple forums
Repetition
Leadership by Example
Explanation of seeming inconsistencies
Give-and-take
12. 12
Step 5: Empower Broad-based Action &
Remove Barriers
“A great leader inspires people to have
confidence in themselves.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
“They create more leaders. The ideas of the
hero flying in to save the day, to solve all the
problems, just doesn’t make sense.” – Peter
Anderton, TedTalk
13. 13
Step 5: Empower Broad-based Action &
Remove Barriers
How Structure Can Undermine Vision:
The Vision
Speed everything up
Give more
responsibility to
lower-level
employees
The Structure
But independent silos
don’t communicate
and slow everything
down
But there are layers
of middle managers
who second-guess
and criticize
employees
14. 14
Step 5: Empower Broad-based Action &
Remove Barriers
• Provide needed training
• Align the systems to the vision:
Performance review and compensation
practices
Recruiting and hiring
Promotion decisions
Feedback processes
Deal with troublesome supervisors
15. 15
Step 6: Generate Short Term Wins
3 Characteristics of Short Term Wins:
1. It’s visible
2. It’s unambiguous
3. It’s clearly related to the change effort
16. 16
Step 6: Generate Short Term Wins
Role of Short Term Wins:
• Evidence sacrifices are worth it
• Reward change agents
• Help fine-tune vision and strategies
• Undermine cynics and self-serving resisters
• Keep bosses on board
• Build momentum
17. 17
Step 7: Consolidate Gains & Make More
Change
• You must get the job done!
• Complacency hurts change
• Resistance is always waiting to reassert itself
• The problem of interdependence
D
B
C
E
F
A
18. 18
Step 7: Consolidate Gains & Make More
Change
Step 7 Successful Major Change Effort:
More change, not less
More help
Leadership from senior management
Project management and leadership
from below
Reduction of unnecessary
interdependencies
19. 19
Step 8: Institute New Approaches in
Culture
• Culture - Norms of behavior and shared
values among a group of people
• Norms of behavior - Common ways of
acting in a group that persist by rewarding
those who fit and sanctioning those who
do not
• Shared values – Important concerns and
goals shared by most people in the group
20. 20
Step 8: Institute New Approaches in
Culture
Norms of Group Behaviour
• Employees respond quickly to customer requests
• Managers involve lower-level employees in decision
making
• Managers work an hour past official close of business
Shared Values
• Managers care about customers
• Executives prefer long-term debt
• Employees are concerned more with quality than
quantity
Somewhat
Invisible
Extremely Hard
to Change
Invisible
Hard to
Change
21. 21
Step 8: Institute New Approaches in
Culture
How to anchor new culture:
1. Talk about improvements tied to new
practices
2. Talk about why old culture is no longer
helpful
3. Change people (retirement, hiring,
promotions, firing)
23. 23
THE PROBLEM
Departments developed siloed business applications.
Workers had to login to multiple applications to complete
one process.
THE SOLUTION
A Portal to house all business applications into a seamless
user experience (UX). Worked with multiple departments
to implement a new security model and process to enable
this UX.
• Organizational metrics take a turn for the worse
• Performance against competition
• Disengaged workforce
ISSUES
24. 24
THE PROBLEM
Company was still using paper records.
THE SOLUTION
Transitioned the company from paper records to 100% by
rolling out a Document Imaging system to all
departments.
• The changing world has left you behind
ISSUES
25. 25
THE PROBLEM
Competition was taking away business. Available market to
insure was dwindling. We needed to look at other avenues
of revenue.
THE SOLUTION
Implemented new subsidiaries, changes to departments
and systems to handle new avenues of revenue, including
support of additional states and an overhaul of the
company websites.
• Performance against the competition
ISSUES
26. 26
THE PROBLEM
No change management process for tracking and
prioritizing IT/systems issues across departments.
THE SOLUTION
Implemented a change management system and
process for tracking and prioritizing IT issues across all
departments. Introduced agile methodologies, including
scrum and monthly planning to prioritize and complete
change requests.
• Performance against the competition
• Identified and missed opportunities
ISSUES
27. 27
THE PROBLEM
Customers are dissatisfied new features and issues are
not being addressed in a timely manner, and looking at
the competition. Employees lose faith in the company's
products and turnover is extremely high.
THE SOLUTION
The entire change leadership process from top to bottom.
Where to start? With implementing a customer
prioritization and roadmap planning process among
Professional Services and the Product Engineering Teams.
• Lack of leadership
• Disengaged workforce
ISSUES
29. 29
ISSUES
Vision
•A desirable
future
•Sense of
purpose
•Easy to
communicate
Skills
•What skills
need to be
strengthened
with staff and
leadership to
bring about
change?
Incentives
•What
incentives and
measurements
need to be in
place to
achieve each
goal?
Resources
•What resources
are missing?
•How can
additional
resources be
raised or
earned
sustainably?
Action Plan
•Does the
strategic plan
give you a clear
roadmap for
the next 3-5
years?
Success
Dr. Lippitt’s Complex Change Model
30. 30
ISSUES
Vision
• Current
processes
translated
to a digital
system
Skills
• Require-
ments
Gathering
• Various
job roles
• Knowledge
of new
system
and how it
can be
configured
Incentives
• Annual
Goals
• Per-
formance
Reviews
tied to
Goals
• Shared
Success
stories
Resources
• New PM
role to
manage
• Promotion
s made for
employees
demon-
strating
new skills,
roles
• Employees
were
awarded
Co-worker
of the Year
Action Plan
• Strategic
Plan gave
a clear
roadmap
• New
change
manage-
ment
processes
•Success
Case Study: Paper to Digital (Success)
31. 31
ISSUES
Vision
• Comm-
unicated
to all
depart-
ments and
divisions
Skills
• Various
job roles
• Open
Single-Sign
On
Training
• Business
Process/W
orkflow
Training
Incentives
• No
incentives
Resources
• New
Business
Analyst/
PM role to
manage
• Manage-
ment
oversight
of
resources
changed
Action Plan
• Strategic
Plan
gave a
clear
roadmap
• New
Process
rolled
out
•GradualChange
Case Study: Siloed Applications to Single
User Experience (Gradual Change)
32. 32
ISSUES
Vision
• Unclear
• Not
comm-
unicated
to
everyone
Skills
• Roles
and
respons-
ibilities
not
defined
• Lack of
leader-
ship
Incentives
• No
incentives
Resources
• Losing
resources
• Resources
from
depart-
ments not
working
together
Action Plan
• No clear
action
plan
•Failure
Case Study: Losing to Competition &
Employee Turnover (Failure)
34. 34
Want more?
Online Resources:
• Great leadership comes down to
only two rules by Peter Anderton,
TEDx Talks
• Kotter Inc 8 Steps for Leading
Change
• Six keys to leading positive change
by Rosabeth Moss Kanter, TEDx
Talks
• 6 signs your organization may
need a culture transformation
• Change management models
Books:
• Leading Change by
John Kotter
• ADKAR by Jeff Hiatt
• Leading Cultural
Change by David W.
Potter & James
McCalman
• Good to Great by
Jim C. Collins
Notes de l'éditeur
What is the goal of this presentation?
The main objective is: To encourage openness to change in the workplace
Help you understand what are the steps to leading successful cultural change
Go over some use cases/case studies (examples) of successful, semi-successful, and unsuccessful change within organizations
Organization Metrics – For example, customer service stats, quality standards, financial performance, safety incidents, or other measurements significant to your organization
Performance against competition – Competition that is doing very well is a strong indicator that it’s time to step back and determine how your culture needs to change to remain competitive.
Disengaged workforce – Increased turnover rates, lackluster performance, difficulty recruiting high-quality talent, negative employee surveys, lack of innovative ideas, you may have a culture of disengagement
Sub-optimal leaders – When organizations grow rapidly, leadership development often lags behind. Leaders at all levels may lack the skills to model and coach, and don’t know how to unleash potential of their employees.
Identified and Missed Opportunities – your organization’s workforce is missing opportunities to improve processes, eliminate waste, increase productivity or make the move to digital. Your culture is no longer supporting, encouraging, or enabling employees to act on these opportunities.
The changing world has left you behind - Change such as social media use, technological improvements, changing workplace demographics, or environmental issues – is a sign that the changing world has left you behind.
8 stages to leading change:
1. Establish sense of urgency
2. Create guiding coalition
3. Develop vision and strategy
4. Communicate change vision
5. Empower broad-based action
6. Generate short-term wins
7. Consolidate gains & make more change
8. Anchor new approaches in culture
Why is urgency important to a change effort? Urgency is important because meaningful organizational change cannot occur without the cooperation of the affected stakeholders. This is why creating a sense of urgency for a needed change is the first step leaders must take to gain the cooperation of management and employees.
How to Create a Sense of Urgency With Your Team
There are several steps leaders can take to create a sense of urgency and gain the commitment of managers, employees, and other stakeholders. They include:
Showing the seriousness of leadership commitment to the coming change by eliminating obvious waste;
Sharing bad news with the organization;
Requiring managers and employees to talk directly regularly with unhappy suppliers, customers, and other stakeholders to understand their concerns;
Sharing data throughout the organization that supports the claim that change is necessary; and
Ensuring organizational decisions and management actions are in agreement with change communications (walk the talk).
This is the group that is going to direct the change effort.
Two types of people should be avoided at all costs. No snakes, no egos.
The size of an effective coalition seems to be related to the size of the organization. Change often starts with two to three people. The group in successful transformations grows to a half a dozen in smaller companies to 20-50 people in larger companies.
Trust must be present with this group and a common goal.
Managers should provide 80% Leadership (vision, strategies) and the rest Management (plans, budgets).
Visions should be feasible.
Communicating the change vision and initiatives are essential to the change management process.
No jargon, technobabble.
A verbal picture is worth a thousand words.
Big meetings, small meetings, memos, formal and informal interaction – all are effective for spreading the word.
At one company, I did a big roadshow, presentations to each department. For months people kept saying “Hi, Mary!” in the elevator. I had no clue who they were. This organization had an IT department of 5,000 people. That was just the IT department.
Ideas only sink in after being heard many times.
Behaviour from important people that is inconsistent with the vision overwhelms other forms of communication.
Unaddressed inconsistencies undermine the credibility of all communication. Nip that in the bud. Explain it. Fix it.
Two-way communication is more powerful than one-way communication. Go to people’s department meetings and let them ask you anything. Tell them they can message or email you anytime with any questions or concerns. Go to lunch with people.
It’s not about you –
It’s about the people
Start Video at 8:11 min, Stop Video at 9:52 min
It's not about you - it's about the people
"A great leader inspires people to have confidence in themselves." - Eleanor Roosevelt
They create more leaders. The ideas of the hero flying in to save the day, to solve all the problems, just doesn't make sense."
It’s not about you –
It’s about the people
Video 8:11 - It's not about you - it's about the people - "A great leader inspires people to have confidence in themselves." - Eleanor Roosevelt
They create more leaders. The ideas of the hero flying in to save the day, to solve all the problems, just doesn't make sense."
To 9:52
Organizational arrangements can undermine a vision by disempowering people.
Whenever structural barriers are not removed in a timely manner, the risk is employees will become so frustrated that they will sour on the entire transformational effort.
People are taught technical skills but not the social skills or attitudes needed to make the new arrangements work.
Don’t make getting training a disempowering experience of “shut up and do it this way”, instead “we will be delegating more, so we are providing this course to help you with your new responsibilities”. Explain why. It must be the right kind of experience.
Why are short-term wins so important?
Evidence sacrifices are worth it – Wins greatly justify the short-term costs involved
Reward change agents with a pat on the back – After a lot of hard work, positive feedback builds morale and motivation
Help fine-tune vision and strategies – Short-term wins give the guiding coalition concrete data on the viability of their ideas
Undermine cynics and self-serving resisters – Clear improvements in performance make it difficult for people to block needed change
Keep bosses on board – Provides evidence that transformation is on track
Example: People high in the hierarchy started recognizing the improvements brought by the chain and further supported it.
Build momentum – Turns neutrals into supports, reluctant supports into active helpers, etc.
Example: At one company I was at, I had people who used to be vehemently against the change, come directly to me later to actively help support it after they saw some short-term wins.
Complacency – Example – People went to an annual management meeting. The CEO praised all the executives and staff for all that they accomplished, there were awards that night at the banquet, the next morning presentations on “best practices” dissolved into more back patting, and the CEO ended the event with a congratulatory speech. What happened next? Everyone’s sense of urgency went out the window. Their mindsets changed into “Look at all we’ve accomplished. We’re in great shape. So relax and enjoy the music.” During the next year, a dozen change initiatives were put on hold or slowed down. People stopped implementing change, and swept back into traditions that caused problems in the past.
Resistance – Whenever you let up before the job is done, critical momentum can be lost and regression may follow. Until changed practices attain a new equilibrium and have been driven into the culture, they can be very fragile.
Interdependence – Later in this presentation, I’m going to go over a case study of an organization where many departments are interdependent on each other that required the change. For example, Finance, Underwriting, Claims, IT, Marketing & Sales, and Risk Management. In a system with interdependence, several or all the elements may need to be changed in order to move A. Let’s say A in that example is to implement a new source of revenue, such as insuring physicians and clinical staff in a new state like Alaska.
More change, not less – The guiding coalition uses the credibility from the short-term wins to tackle additional and bigger change projects.
More help – Additional people are brought in, promoted and developed to help with all the changes.
Leadership from senior management – Senior people focus on maintaining clarity of shared purpose for the overall effort and keeping urgency levels up.
Project management and leadership from below – Lower ranks in the hierarchy both provide specific leadership on projects and manage those projects.
Reduction of unnecessary interdependencies – To make change easier in short and long term, managers identify unnecessary interdependencies and eliminate them.
Remember these. Because they are really very important for cultural change with an organization.
You’ll see some examples of norms of behavior and shared values in the next slide.
Culture is important because it can powerfully influence human behavior, because it can be difficult to change, and because its near invisibility makes it hard to address directly.
Generally, shared values, which are less apparent but more deeply ingrained in the culture, are more difficult to change than norms of behavior.
New approaches need to be anchored firmly the organization’s group norms and values.
Culture is powerful for 3 primary reasons:
Because individuals are selected and indoctrinated so well
Because the culture exerts itself through the actions of many people (50 to 1000s depending on the size of the organization)
Because all of this happens without much conscious intent and thus is difficult to challenge or even discuss
This is why you see in growing organizations with many new employees, the new employees are able to see issues with the companies culture and may start to question it.
Culture changes only after you have successfully altered people’s actions, after the new behavior produces some group benefit for a period of time, and after people see the connection between new actions and the performance improvement.
Changing culture comes last, not first. It depends on results. It requires A LOT of talk. Without verbal instruction and support, people are often reluctant to admit the validity of new practices. This is why I meet with my people weekly, and why I always inform them what is going on in the organization, or any changes that are coming.
Changing culture may involve some turnover. Sometimes the only way to change a culture is to change key people. It makes decisions on succession critical. If promotion processes are not changed to be compatible with the new practices, the old culture will reassert itself.
Step thru what each of these components mean
Step thru what each of these components mean
Incentives:
Success stories shared to departments who had not rolled onto the system yet
Step thru what each of these components mean
Step thru what each of these components mean
Handout – 5 min – Self-Reflection
Think and talk through your own examples.