This chapter will explore how organisations and individuals react to changing circumstances. It will outline and introduce the various strategies that are consciously or unconsciously adopted in the face of change and points towards tangible things that you can do in your capacity as a team leader. Your aim must be to drive meaningful changes of practice and behaviour and hence contribute to enhancing your customer value proposition8 and delivering increased customer benefit.
WHY IS THIS IMPORTANT?
Nothing is permanent except change. (Heraclitus, c. 500 BC)
We are in transition to a world where change is continuous; not just episodic. (Kotter, 2008)
Change is the one big certainty in our organisations. What makes us successful today is often the root of our failure tomorrow. The problem is that when organisations are faced with instability in the environment, it generates uncertainty, which in turn leads to higher levels of stress and anxiety. This, in turn, leads to the very human reaction of falling back on established and familiar patterns and solutions. Paradoxically, the very time we most need to be flexible and accepting of change tends to be the time when we are least emotionally equipped to deal with the possibility and consequences of change.
In today’s world, feeling contented with the status quo is a dangerous position to be in.
If organisations don’t change they become extinct and if people don’t change they become irrelevant or surplus to requirements as far as their organisations are concerned.
Take Kodak for example: founded in 1888 it was best known for and held a dominant position in photographic film products. As a result of the decline in sales of photographic film it began to struggle in the late 1990s, and in 2012 eventually filed for bankruptcy. Even though the company was ahead of many others in the field of digital photography it still defined itself as a film company.
THE IMPACT OF THE ISSUE
It is a sad fact that most people and most organisations don’t tend to seriously consider changing their behaviours until there is no other viable choice, and when you get to that point it is invariably too late.
Simply saying you need to be more proactive rather than reactive is not very helpful. What organisations need is people who can shine a light into the darkness and illuminate a new way forward – to be the pathfinder for others – to lead the way to new behaviours and practices. Such people tend to be called change agents; they are the people who are skilled at asking the difficult questions that challenge existing ways of thinking and working. But it is not enough just to ask difficult questions – you have to do so in a positive way that excites people about an alternative future and ignites in them a passion to be part of that future.
All organisations need change agents, but being a change agent is not a role; you don’t get appointed by HR. Being an agent for change is just something that some people can do and if you are one of those people you are a precious asset and will be quickly recognised as such.
MAKING SENSE OF IT ALL
Change happens; your external environment can change in response to any number of independent or related variables over which you generally have little or no control. Your organisation will then find itself having to adapt to continue to function in that changing environment; the actions you take may be planned and deliberate, or you may just stumble into them almost by accident.
The advent of technology has had a disruptive impact on many industries; consider what happened to the watch industry when digital watches first hit the market. Then we experienced new technology being replaced by even newer technology – consider the lifespan of the CD and DVD. The current wave of disrupters such as Uber and Airbnb do not own any assets; they are providing connectivity to a previously ‘un-tappable’ market. The future is poised to be even more profound with the possibilities that driverless cars, virtual, augmented and mixed reality, and a tactile internet among others may provide. The message is clear: change or die. Become the disrupter rather than the disrupted.
Change has always been with us; the only new thing is that our external environment may be changing more quickly than it used to, or may be prone to more violent and unanticipated swings. What has not changed much is the way that managers and leaders react to change. In broad terms, there are four types of leadership response:
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History tells us that this defensive stance leads to extinction.
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This sort of stance ensures survival and can even produce growth, but such leaders are always playing catch-up and are always under threat from someone who can learn to copy better, faster or more cheaply.
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Organisations and individuals who adopt this attitude will survive and prosper in any environment.
What we find interesting is that even companies which are, by nature, reactors or mimics still desire their managers to be pioneers. Indeed, a significant emphasis of many current leadership programmes is how to make managers more future-focused and innovative.
Consider Apple. No one knew they wanted an ‘iPod’ until it had been invented. Steve Jobs anticipated the need. His view was that there was no point in asking a customer what they wanted – they didn’t know until they saw it. His philosophy was to ‘put a dent in the universe’. He believed that the people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world are the ones who do.
It appears then that the most valuable management skill is not the ability to react to and manage through change, but rather the ability to anticipate movements in the market and have capacity in place to take advantage as it is happening. The ability to anticipate in this way usually comes from a process of constantly watching and looking for opportunities, rather than as a result of genius.
If you can show yourself to have a pioneering attitude towards change, you will be an invaluable asset to your organisation.
PRACTICAL ADVICE
There are no end of books that will help you understand the process of organisational change and the strategies that have proved to be successful for others. But most of them start from the assumption that you know what needs to be done and the main problem is how to make it happen successfully. Our question has a little wider focus; we recognise that your organisation needs people who can:
We have studied people who appear to be adept at leveraging these benefits for their organisations and identified a number of common characteristics that drive their actions. If you want to be seen as someone who makes change happen, we suggest that you take every opportunity to model the following behaviours.
Be someone who knows where they are going. Understand what is important for the long-term health of the business, how your business creates customer value and what you and your department can do to increase customer value in that context. What does the business model look like and where do you fit into it? What new capabilities or approaches can help transform or renew your business model? Pick one or two things that will become your focus for the next 18 months to 3 years. Make sure that your thinking is aligned with that of your boss and that you both want, and are driving towards, the same goals:
Bring the truth into the room. When you are dealing with issues that involve change, there are always at least three agendas at play: rational, personal and social. People are always comfortable about sharing their rational concerns and agenda, such as cost, resources and growth. They are less willing to share their personal and social concerns and agendas, yet you know that up to 80 per cent of their decision-making will be based on their personal and social agendas:
Utilise peer pressure. Work to create allies and advocates who will carry your message with passion and commitment:
Cultivate a predisposition towards action. All great successes are built on the back of constant experimentation and frequent failure:
Engage both hearts and minds. Communication can be directed at either the head (cognitive, supported by facts and figures) or the heart (affective, emotional, appealing to values). In his book, The Heart of Change (2002), John Kotter suggested that people don’t change just because they think it is a good idea; they change because they have made an emotional commitment.
Deal with the resistors. Not everyone can, or will, become an ally or advocate. Change always produces winners and losers and just hoping that people will come around is not a great option:
Celebrate your successes. Change is a tiring business and people need periods of rest and recuperation so that they can get ready to fight the next battle.
We have pointed to a range of things that you can try in order to become more adept at seeing and exploiting opportunities to initiate and deliver change. We are not talking about change for the sake of change or change that is superficial in nature. What we need is change that drives your business forward and delivers benefits to your customers. In order to do this, your efforts need to be focused in the right direction. We suggest that you use the questions below to help you identify where you can start to make a real contribution.
KEY QUESTIONS TO ASK YOURSELF
Your answers to the above questions should help you focus on the key areas that can deliver benefit but you need to be clear that any change you devise must be consistent with the current business model. So, your first task is to really understand how your business creates value and what ‘big assumptions’ underpin the model. Try the exercises below to help you get a clearer picture of your customer value proposition. If you are unfamiliar with the idea of the business model we suggest that you first read through the Johnson, Christensen and Kagermann article listed in the resource section.
MINI EXERCISES YOU CAN TRY IMMEDIATELY
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This short article contrasts communication that appeals to the mind with that which seeks to move people by inspiring and speaking to core values.
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In the intervening years of research after the initial statement of the eight conditions of change in his previous book, Leading Change (1995), Kotter came to realise the importance of the human aspect and the need to appeal not only to the head but also to the heart. This book is more rounded and contains more examples of his ideas at work in organisations.
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This is a retelling of the Heart of Change (2002) as a metaphor. It is simple to read and engaging, while losing none of the theoretical underpinning of his work.
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This easy to read article sets out the key elements of a business model in terms of customer value proposition, key resources, key processes and profit formula. The article contains many illustrative examples that help clarify the concept.
8 A business or marketing statement that sets out why a customer should purchase a particular good or service.
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