Some of you may have heard the lyrics of the song Pompeii by Bastille:
This resonates very well with most peoples experiences of large organisations and change. The more you try to change things, the more you run into obstacles. These obstacles might be structural, in that the rules don't permit the change needed, or they might be soft people issues. The structural issues (rules) are generally easier to deal with as most organisation have defined protocol for the review of internal regulation. The soft people issues are another matter entirely.
People resist change, and especially management imposed change, for a number of reasons. Most of these reasons devolve down to a fear of the ramifications of change - What if I don't understand the changes? What if the changes take away my (real or perceived) power? Or worse what if it empowers me and makes me RESPONSIBLE?
Of course there is also the ostrich response of ignoring the change - I will keep doing it the old way and eventually the enthusiasm of the change champions will wear away and I will be left alone.
So as the leader how will you deal with these responses? How do you take the fear away and drive the team so that after the "change" has taken place you don't only notice how much the new is the same as the old.
Well, for starters, you need people to understand and be privy to the process. When they understand the need to the change something, be it a rule or a process, it makes ignoring it or being fearful of the consequences harder to to justify to themselves. Allied with that you need to be prepared to make the hard decision of pruning the branches that refuse to realign with the changes. This is a challenge, as many times the people who want to ignore the change are the stalwarts of the organisation, those people without whom you simple cannot cope, or at least that's what they would like to believe. And yet if they are keeping you from moving for the benefit of the organisation you have little choice but to act or else abandon the change.
So next time you plan to change something in your organisation, be it from the bottom up or the top down make sure you are willing to carry it through - or anticipate a sense of Deja Vu.
"But if you close your eyes, does it almost feel like nothing changed at all?
But if you close your eyes, does it almost feel like you've been here before?
How am I gonna be an optimist about this?
This resonates very well with most peoples experiences of large organisations and change. The more you try to change things, the more you run into obstacles. These obstacles might be structural, in that the rules don't permit the change needed, or they might be soft people issues. The structural issues (rules) are generally easier to deal with as most organisation have defined protocol for the review of internal regulation. The soft people issues are another matter entirely.
People resist change, and especially management imposed change, for a number of reasons. Most of these reasons devolve down to a fear of the ramifications of change - What if I don't understand the changes? What if the changes take away my (real or perceived) power? Or worse what if it empowers me and makes me RESPONSIBLE?
Of course there is also the ostrich response of ignoring the change - I will keep doing it the old way and eventually the enthusiasm of the change champions will wear away and I will be left alone.
So as the leader how will you deal with these responses? How do you take the fear away and drive the team so that after the "change" has taken place you don't only notice how much the new is the same as the old.
Well, for starters, you need people to understand and be privy to the process. When they understand the need to the change something, be it a rule or a process, it makes ignoring it or being fearful of the consequences harder to to justify to themselves. Allied with that you need to be prepared to make the hard decision of pruning the branches that refuse to realign with the changes. This is a challenge, as many times the people who want to ignore the change are the stalwarts of the organisation, those people without whom you simple cannot cope, or at least that's what they would like to believe. And yet if they are keeping you from moving for the benefit of the organisation you have little choice but to act or else abandon the change.
So next time you plan to change something in your organisation, be it from the bottom up or the top down make sure you are willing to carry it through - or anticipate a sense of Deja Vu.
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