133. Jim Clawson’s Model of Change
Concept
We began this module by asking you to make a diagram of your personal model of change. If you did this, you had to stop and think about your VABEs, about what change is, and how the change process works. The premise there, and I believe it is very important, is that people learn better and deeper when they plumb their own understanding, bring that to Level One (paper or voice) and then discuss it. I always asked my students/participants to come to class having formed opinions about the issues, analyses, and action plans for every case. I noted recently from reading a biography of Winston Churchill33 that he used that principle to educate himself: Churchill’s practice “... was not to read any particular debate ‘until I have recorded my own opinion of the subject on paper, having regard only to general principles. After reading I reconsider and finally write’, setting out in pencil, on small pieces of paper, his own views on each subject, which he then pasted into the volumes.” I have asked you to do the same throughout this volume. It’s too easy to listen to someone else’s views and then conclude, “I knew that.” When in fact, if asked a priori to state your views, the vast majority of people could not have said that.
Then, we outlined a double handful of change models active in the world today. That double handful was just a sampling. There are many, many more models out there. In the ones we introduced, you noticed many overlaps, an indication of the triangulation on a commonly observed phenomenon.
So, lastly, I will share my model with you. First, I think people live in their comfort zones, their accumulated set of habitual behavior, thinking, and VABEs. Second, so long as people continue to receive or perceive confirming feedback data, they will persist in their behavior. We can call that behavior their baseline behavior. People consider deviating from their baseline for one or both of two reasons: they get bored or they get disconfirming data—which hurts.
When people get disconfirming data, they can do one of four things: ignore it, deny it, distort it, discount it, or ignore it altogether, in which case they will continue doing what they have always been doing. If the pain of the disconfirming data is strong enough, they may begin to search for other ways of doing things.
People who get bored with their lives will begin to search for alternatives but with some enthusiasm or hope instead of pain. The search for alternatives may be difficult. Some won’t know how to search. They simply know they don’t like the status quo. If they have a bit of built-in confidence, they may know to read, to ask, to invite, to explore, to search for different ways of doing things.
The search for alternative ways of doing and being leads to some experiments. Experiments by their nature involve breaking old habits. Eat less? Exercise more? Stop smoking? Change our recruiting process? Change our reward system? Change the way we design work? Change our business model? Change the reason we are in business? Change our VABEs about how to organize and manage?
These experiments, like the baseline behavior, will return some results. If the experiments fail, if the data coming back are negative, SNAP, we go back to our original baseline behavior. Often we deep down don’t really want to change and we set up the experiments to fail.
If the experiment works, yay, we will continue doing it. Maybe. The payoff of a successful experiment might be good reinforcement for the new behavioral alternative, but if the payoffs aren’t strong enough to overcome our baseline tension, then, snap, back we go again to yesterday. If the payoffs are strong enough and our determination is strong enough, we may form a new baseline that includes the new, alternative behavior.
Each of the elements or states listed above represent opportunities for leaders to influence the change process. These opportunities are shown as red “L’s” in the diagram below.
Example
Some people actively seek new ways of doing things. They probably have a semi-conscious VABE “There’s always a better way.” Some people just do the same thing over and over again, day after day, week after week, year after year. And are happy. No problem. Until and unless they get fired or their spouse comes and says, “Goodbye.” Same for companies. They do the same thing and go bankrupt. As outlined above over and over again, the value of being a “learning being or a learning organization.”
Companies with declining numbers (or growing cost ratios), search for alternatives. Often they rely on consulting firms to help them if management doesn’t know what to do. They try the new thing and if it works, they continue. If not, they go back to what they were doing. Many management teams will pay a lot of money for a consulting report and then it lies fallow on the credenza. Their VABEs are dominating their ability to try something new.
Daimler buys Chrysler thinking to use it to gain a larger foothold in America. Chrysler was losing money and not very healthy and needed a capital infusion, so they were happy about this investment. Later, Daimler divests Chrysler when the expected results didn’t materialize. Culture eats strategy for breakfast. This is not a rare phenomenon. The vast majority of mergers and acquisitions fail.34
Motorola reinvents itself over and over again and survives today.35
Diagram
1. How often are you looking for a new and different way of doing things?
2. How do you respond to disconfirming data?
3. How good are you at creating different alternatives?
4. How many experiments did you run last year? What new things did you do? What did you learn? Which of those have become a part of a new baseline?
33 Gilbert, M. 2014. Churchill: A Life. Rosetta Books.
34 http://lakeletcapital.com/blog/2017/3/15/success-and-fail-rate-of-acquisitions
35 http://bgr.com/2011/11/11/rebirth-of-an-icon-motorola-reinvents-the-razr/