Changes all around

by Andrew Rowsell-Jones

June 12, 2006 —

The pace of change -- internal and external -- is accelerating for most enterprises. Be it inspired by a new technology, a new performance demand or a new management fad.

Yet mastery of change is a competency possessed by very few organizations. Gartner estimates that less than 10 percent of enterprises and their CIOs have attempted to institutionalize change management in even the most basic way: by training managers, by creating an enterprise program management office (PMO) or by any other means.

Given the high stakes involved and abundant natural resistance to change that already exists within most enterprises, it's not surprising that CIOs are tempted to view change management like they viewed project management in the 1980s: if it works out right, it's more by luck than judgment.

There is merit in this position. Few CIOs are equipped to address the soft issues that make organizational change so intractable. But when asked about the top barriers to change, for example in a recent Gartner survey, CIOs cited culture, priorities and politics as the biggest barriers they face. These "soft" issues, common wisdom has it, are something that's dependent on individual skills; and circumstances; but not amenable to any form of systematic methods and approaches.

The problem with this position is that it's entirely wrong-headed. Just as project management yielded to systematic approaches and skilled execution, so organization change management will too.

Change resistance follows a predictable and manageable pattern. The first step is to recognize that resistance to change -- that all too natural response to the new -- follows a predictable pattern. Pivotal to addressing it is to know who is involved and what their motivations are.

Successfully changing means building demand for change in three distinct groups of people: sponsors, agents and targets. A sponsor is the individual or entity with responsibility for a change initiative's success, and who has the necessary authority to commit required resources to the initiative. An agent is an individual or entity empowered by the sponsor to carry out specific tasks related to the change initiative. And the target is an individual or entity that will be required to change behavior and actions.

Leading change involves managing each of these groups successfully. Get them all informed, and heading in the same direction, and the job is half done. Drawing on experiences of CIOs that have done this successfully, it is best achieved by setting up an enterprise change team.

The enterprise change team has three main parts. Although it is tempting for a CIO to try to achieve change through some Herculean effort on their own, putting in place an enterprise change team with responsibility to inform, cajole and manage the process of change makes success much more likely.

This team typically draws on the skills of business process designer, technical designer and a people team comprising experts in communication and human factors. The leaders of these teams usually work together as a steering committee reporting to a project executive, such as the CIO (who in turn reports to the project sponsor).

Typically, people team members and methodology experts are sourced externally. They can be external consultants, academics or experienced change management practitioners who are hired into the organization as permanent change team leaders. The other members of the change team draw on existing skills from with the enterprise.

Communicate change struggles. Having a change team still leaves the CIO with lots to do. Successful CIO change leaders report spending up to 50 percent of their time talking to various stakeholders about change. To address the change struggles, communications must be planned ahead of time with people who have particular roles and responsibilities -- sometimes specific individuals -- in mind.

It worth remembering -- and emphasizing -- that change begins with an urgent external reason to change. The earliest messages need to make this clear: There is no alternative to change for the enterprise. The message is targeted at the entire enterprise, not individuals, using in-person presentations, management panel teleconferences (live and recorded) and media such as Web sites and newsletters.

Next comes the details. Once the external reasons for change have been communicated, CIOs should begin communicating directly with target business units, including both small groups and individuals. These internal communications are a potent weapon to overcome denial, or the belief that "no matter what happens, I won't have to change". A word to the wise: face-to-face conversations and presentations are much better than e-mail for discussions on tricky subjects. It's amazing how e-mails can be misunderstood -- and distributed -- to the benefit of the rumor mill but the detriment of the change plan.

The struggles of testing -- scepticism and disbelief -- occur as the design for change takes form. Anxiety is high during these struggles because people are learning the personal implications of change one piece at a time. Most communications at this stage are at the unit, small group and personal levels.

Communicate analysis and design issues in the change team; communicate decisions to the targets of change. In both cases emphasize feedback mechanisms, such as group forums for issue discussion, public e-mail drops or private meetings, and act on feedback quickly. In particular, make sure that those affected by change see clearly that their feedback is considered carefully, that feedback has an effect on the design for change.

The organization is ready to move on when most people have accepted the need for change and can describe why change is necessary.

The final struggles -- hope and hard work -- mark a turning point. Change is designed, and initial targets prioritized. The organization is increasingly oriented to making change work, as opposed to making it go away. Training intensifies. Signs of personal commitment to change become clear and widespread.

Public communications during these final stages are about priorities, milestones met and the results of those milestones, and what teams need to do to be ready for implementation. Private communications are about change's increasing effect on individuals.

The signs of success in these final stages are: individuals being involved throughout target areas in the change initiative, and success in learning and applying training to new processes, roles and responsibilities.

Reshape enterprise culture to sustain change benefits. Even when change is succeeding, the natural temptation is often to go back to a period of normality, back when stability was paramount. Unfortunately, this is to miss a major opportunity to make the change stick. Make only superficial changes and things will backslide rapidly.

How can this be prevented? One of the hardest things to change is values. Yet this is the most important. Values are about what people believe and consider important. The trouble with values is that they are invisible -- they live inside peoples' heads. Fortunately, they betray themselves in peoples' behaviors, and behaviors are what you can watch people doing.

It's natural enough to focus on changing behaviors when making change. But it's values that make the change stick. It's values that drive behavior, so unless values change, behavior will sooner or later revert to what it used to be.

Changes in behavior prove that values have changed. Leaders model the values and beliefs that set the tone for everyone else. What leaders do and pay attention to sends the clearest messages of all.

To change values you must first recognize what they are. One of an organization's most important values is how it defines success: as growth, profits, share price, market share, customer satisfaction, employee satisfaction, service to the community or a host of other measures. Enterprises where change sticks know how to redefine what success looks like. They encourage people to behave in a way that makes them successful, and over time workers become accustomed to the new way things are done.

Find a home for the expertise. Most enterprises that develop change management expertise do so for a single project or program, and then allow the talent to disperse once the change program has ended. This is a pity. It is far more effective if CIOs support a permanent enterprise home for change expertise -- a center of excellence (COE) for change.

The natural home for the COE is the IS program management office (PMO). Even though few existing PMO staff will have explicit change management experience, the organizational structure and mandate provide the COE with a good base and infrastructure to work from. Adding business process and change experts to the PMO to create a change COE is a logical step.

An enterprise change project is an intense shared experience. It brings together people from all over the enterprise and forces them to trust and rely on each other to achieve something of critical importance. It changes the executive team's values, beliefs and behaviors. CIOs can take advantage of that change to contribute more strongly to the executive team.

CIOs who systematically focus on team, communications and culture can dramatically improve the enterprise's ability to handle change, improving the odds of success for their enterprises and themselves.

CIO Australia