Preparing for Change
02 Jan 2011 | Category: uncategorized | Author: admin
People need to know why they are being asked to change, and the earlier they
understand the reason, the more time they have to get prepared. In most
organizations we "Braille the culture," as one professional trend spotter, Faith
Popcorn, put it. We run our fingertips along trend bumps as they speed by and try to
"read" where we're going. One of the most vital roles of leadership is to anticipate
the corporation's future and its place in the global arena, and then to formulate
strategies for surmounting challenges that have not yet manifested.
But leaders can't succeed alone. Employees, too, should be scanning the business
environment. Everyone in the organization should have a realistic appreciation of
the precursors of organizational transformation - the impact of globalization,
market fluctuations, technological innovations, societal and demographic changes in
the customer base, new offerings by competitors, new government and regulatory
decisions.
Here are some ways that organizations are "setting the stage" for change:
1) Direct experience
More and more leaders are recognizing the need to design a workplace event that
enables people to experience for themselves the need for change. When
Rubbermaid held a product fair in its headquarters town, it displayed storage bins,
kitchen items and other plastic housewares, each with a label that detailed what it
cost to make and what it sold for. Sounds like a run-of-the-mill corporate event
except for two things: the fair was open only to Rubbermaid employees and the
products were not Rubbermaid's, but its competitors'. Rubbermaid wanted its
workers to see for themselves what they were competing against.
2) Outside expertise
The commercial organizations of Bayer used an "IMS year in review" presentation to
in order to show Bayer's position/wins/challenges in perspective with the industry.
(IMS is a company that tracks information on the Pharmaceutical industry and then
sells it back to companies.) This gave employees an opportunity to see how they
stacked up against the competition - and to ask questions from an unbiased
external source.
3) Business literacy
When Jack Stack arrived at International Harvester's factory in Springfield,
Missouri, the engine remanufacturing plant was losing $2 million dollars a year on
revenues of $26 million. Stack and the 119 employees of the now independent
Springfield Remanufacturing Corporation initiated an amazing turnaround. Ten
years after he bought the company, SRC had sales of $73 million and the firm hired
almost 600 additional workers. How did he do that? By increasing all employees'
business literacy. Stack created a system called "The Great Game of Business," which
was designed to teach every employee about the entire business -- including the
finances of the company. From the "Root Learning Maps" used by Sears and Pepsi,
etc. to courses offered by financial services consultants, business literacy is a tool
many organizations use to prepare people for change.
4) Customer feedback
Few strategies are as valid a stimulus for change as responding to customer
feedback. At Ritz-Carlton Hotels, employees continually create change in order to
solve customers' problems. Here's how it works: if a particular hotel has, as its
primary customer complaint, a problem with room service taking too long, the
manager would inform employees in that department and ask for volunteers to form
a committee to find the root of the problem in the room service system and to
change or create a different process that solves the problem. By the same token, if
two different departments have a conflict -- say waiters are dissatisfied with
dishwashers because the banquet service isn't ready on time -- then members of
both departments form a cross-functional team (as internal customer and supplier)
to find the process problem and solve it.
5) Shared background information
To prepare the organization to position itself for the future, Planned Parenthood
started out by commissioning a research project. Consultants interviewed experts in
all of the different fields that PP had an interest in -- everything from reproductive
healthcare to gender and population issues to politics. And they used this research
to provide background information for everybody throughout the organization who
requested it. In this way, participants were prepared by the time they got together
for their first big meeting to discuss the need for a new vision.
6) Future scenario planning
Rather than protecting people from outside threats, leaders need to expose workers
to the complaints and changing needs of customers, the new products of
international competitors, and the financial reality of costs and profits. Instead of
stifling conflicting opinions, leaders must encourage employees to join a constant
questioning of the prevailing business assumptions -- and to be ready to act upon
new opportunities early in the game to maintain a competitive advantage. A few
questions to get you started:
o What would happen if our current forms of distribution were inaccessible to us?
o What government regulations could "change the rules" of the industry?
o What new demands/needs could cause our customers to stop buying our product
or service?
o What kinds of technological innovation would most drastically affect our product
or service?
o What changes (in pricing, services, process, etc.) could the competition introduce
that would cause us to rethink the way we do business?
o What companies that aren't our competitors now could become competitors in the
future?
o What current competitors could become partners in the future?
o What are the global trends that could most affect our market - both positively and
negatively?
o What changes would we have to make to take advantage of these possible
challenges?
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