Change Whisperer on ProjectManagement.com

What competencies should leaders and agents excel at to be successful at change?

Are you building a Change Management Community of Practice or Centre of Excellence?  What’s on your list?

Below is my top-ten list for change agents?with a bonus for change targets. A previous post provided my top ten list for change leaders (http://gailseverini.com/2012/08/30/top-10-competencies-for-change-leaders/).

Some might ask why there is no mention of methodologies or tools here—to which I would like to quote my friend Tamara Moore "A fool with a tool is still a fool". Perhaps the two single most critical success factors in executing change are the quality of the sponsor and the agent. So what makes for "quality"?

Change Agents

1. Trustworthiness—As change agents, we need to earn the respect of leaders quickly so they will seriously consider our advice and factor it into their decisions. This is the foundation of a relationship of partnering that recognizes the value each brings to the relationship. It begins with being trustworthy and demonstrating this every day, in every way?from being on time (i.e., reliable) to being insightful (i.e., adding value). More in “10 Tips for Becoming a Trusted Advisor in Change Management” (http://gailseverini.com/2012/04/13/10-tips-for-becoming-a-trusted-advisor-in-change-management/).
2. Resilience—Think of the old TIMEX slogan “takes a licking and keeps on ticking”. “Resilience is the ability to absorb high levels of disruptive change while displaying minimal dysfunctional behavior. Resilient people sidestep the dysfunctions of future shock because they are pliable and have a high capacity to rebound.” (“Human Resilience During Change”, Conner Partners White Paper). All individuals in the change benefit from developing resilience. Because change agents are in the fray, I believe they benefit most from this.
3. Conflict management—Stress often leads to dysfunction that, at its most extreme, expresses itself in conflict. The ability to remain calm and objective and to help others work out their differences in constructive and healing ways is important. Rick Mauer has an insightful summary in his work on resistance: “level one—I don’t get it; level two—I don’t like it; level three—I don’t like you”. Change agents must develop the ability to understand when behaviors expressed as “I don’t like you” (anyone in the vicinity, but particularly change agents) are actually resistance to the change.
4. Coaching—Few resources (leaders, agents, or targets) in the change process have all the competencies necessary to transition. Great coaching helps resources understand and develop in specific areas. Change agents need to be able to earn the trust of others and confront the difficult conversations through coaching with respect and candor.
5. Facilitation—Change is about moving people’s thinking. Often this happens in meetings. The role of the facilitator is to objectively structure and run events such that energy is focused on the topic and all relevant participants are heard.  Information and perspectives are shared.  Analysis is generated and decisions are made.  Individuals enter the room with their own isolated starting position and leave with a fuller understanding of the group’s perspectives. Agreement is not necessarily required, but engagement informs the participant’s decision regarding his or her own level of commitment.
6. Advanced communication skills—Not broadcasting, but rather two-way engaging dialogue, listening and talking. The ability to surface resistance and help individuals talk through it is essential.  Sometimes people don’t want to commit to the change. Getting them to the point that they will make a decision is difficult, and essential (even, perhaps especially, when the answer is “I will not commit to this change”).
7. Emotional Intelligence—“The ability to manage oneself—to have self-awareness and self-regulation—is the very basis of managing others, in many ways.”  (“Daniel Goleman on Leadership and The Power of Emotional Intelligence”, Forbes, Sept 15 2011 http://www.forbes.com/sites/danschawbel/2011/09/15/daniel-goleman-on-leadership-and-the-power-of-emotional-intelligence/). If EQ is important to “managing others” imagine how important it is to helping others transition change.
8. Tolerance for ambiguity and the ability to manage polarities—One of the distinguishing features of transformational change is that the change is constantly changing. The phrase “we are building the bridge as we walk on it” comes to mind. The varying high levels and dynamic nature of ambiguity and constant changes in direction wears on people. It wears on leaders, agents, and targets. Beginning with a high awareness of the nature of transformational change and resilience helps.
9. Service mindset—Change agents act in service of the organization, specifically the sponsor. They must develop analysis, advocate for recommendation, and support decisions.
10. Love of learning—The fields of strategy execution and change management are so broad and so deep that the path to mastery can be both fulfilling and long.

Knowledge Base

• Nature of change—While this is only one bullet, the content behind it is huge. Understanding different magnitudes of change, and how humans respond to it, is a deep science. 
• How organizations work(organization design)—and how they really work (politics and other human dynamics)
• Consulting Skills
• Project Management
• Business Analysis 

Bonus List—Change Targets

• Nature of Change—Change is first an individual journey. An understanding of the nature of change empowers people to take more control in their own lives and in their careers.
• Resilience(as noted above)
• Personal responsibility—Employees who take responsibility for themselves make informed choices and they accept responsibility for their actions, and non-actions. They figure out whether they will participate in the change and are self-aware enough to avoid victimization.  

If you still want information on methodologies and tools please have a look at the Strategy Execution Methodologies series.

Note: Many organizations promote a paternalistic culture that perpetuates the notion of “corporate loyalty” (i.e., “If you do a good job the company will provide you with a job for life” [exaggerated for effect]). This was perhaps a well-intentioned but never sustainable premise. If your organization has remnants of this culture, it should be addressed.

A special thanks to partner-in-change T.J. Rzeszotarski for his thoughts on this subject.

Reference Material

1. “Identifying and Developing Change Agents” with “Change Agent Selection Form”, Change Thinking Blog, Daryl Conner (http://www.connerpartners.com/blog-posts-containing-downloadable-tools/identifying-and-developing-change-agents)
2. “Becoming a “Mindful” Practitioner”, Change Thinking Blog, Daryl Conner (http://www.connerpartners.com/practicing-our-craft/becoming-a-mindful-practitioner)
3. “Change Practitioner Competency Model”, Change Management Institute (CMI) (http://www.connerpartners.com/practicing-our-craft/becoming-a-mindful-practitioner)

I meet a lot more people these days who are interested in authenticity and making a difference.  I view this trend as a move in Maslow’s hierarchy of needs closer to self-actualization (i.e., money and status are surpassed as satisfactory rewards). This won’t resonate with everyone?you Gordon Gekkos (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gordon_Gekko) of the world just won’t get this so you can stop reading right now.  However, for those interested in making a difference, we are on a mission aren’t we?

The unintended consequences of vacations

Maybe this post is a result of vacation.  Vacations are always a time of personal renewal and reflection, re-setting for the year to come.  This post was supposed to be about “the role of generosity in change management” but it morphed into this. As I untangled a mess of ideas around why generosity is so important in practicing change management (as in ‘generosity of spirit’ such as empathy, compassion, tolerance, patience) I started to think about why I got into this work in the first place.

Why do change management?

Last year, at the inaugural global conference of The Association of Change Management Practitioners, Daryl Conner used his keynote to present “The Why Behind What We Do” (http://www.connerpartners.com/thought-leadership/video-archive).  In it, he asked us to think about why each of us is drawn to change management. Yes, he acknowledged that making a healthy living is certainly a legitimate justification.  In my experience, and in conversations with other practitioners, this is not what keeps us going in the dark moments (sometimes days and weeks) of change initiatives when it seems like sponsors don’t value the depth of work we believe is essential or when resistance is particularly emotionally draining.  Something else drives us.

Daryl notes that change management is unusual in the world of management: it offers extraordinary potential to change lives; the mere awareness of the nature of change opens peoples’ eyes and has application in both their business and personal lives. Furthermore, the development of this awareness and associated capabilities has an aggregating impact for businesses and communities. He goes on to ask two additional questions: “Do we make a difference?” and “Are we living up to our responsibilities?”Both are daunting questions, but let’s stay with “Why do we do what we do?” for a couple of minutes.

What are your answers?

Fill in the blanks here:

 _________________________________________________________________

 _________________________________________________________________

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Everyone will have different answers.  This is a good thing.  We each add value because we all bring different aspirations, experiences, competencies, and perspectives to the table.

Real life

I was speaking with a friend early in July (who also attended this event) and she mentioned it to me again.  These were profound considerations for her also.  She shared that she had come to the realization that her current engagement was not fulfilling because it was misaligned with her “whys”. 

Not only was the work incredibly challenging, it was also frustrating: the sponsors were unwilling to make uncomfortable and challenging investments in the change and the team was paying lip service to the work. Despite her best efforts over several months, she was unable to have as much impact on this situation as she required for her personal satisfaction. It is worth noting that her employer was actually happy to motor along with minimal intervention (i.e., they were satisfied, even if uncomfortable with her regular prodding; she was not). She expressed concern on least two levels: 1) that they would not generate the results they required, and 2) that she was not really being effective. She made the very difficult decision to resign, even without another job to go to. This struck me as an incredibly powerful and honorable testament to her authenticity. 

I share this example because it is a story I have heard many times, with many variations.  You probably have also. 

“Meet them where they are”

This is a powerful phrase that we learn early in our change management development. It basically means we should understand the situation (strategy and culture), the current state and desired state, and the gaps. The notion is that one works from the current state (there are other schools of thought and exercises to challenge this, by the way, which tend to yield and surface interesting realizations).  

It is a generous notion?it accepts the current state?even while it is a bit like Stockholm syndrome.  There is a risk that, as we learn the current state, we become invested, committed to helping the group. 

It is also a seductive phrase?there is an implicit assumption that it is possible to get from the current state to the desired state, and within the time permitted. 

The reality is that not all groups, not all individuals, can make the transition. We serve the client best by retaining our objectivity, by being the voice of reality, by having the difficult conversations. This sets up a state of almost constant tension?how much can we push/pull the client? Will it be enough? When do you step away?

This is difficult work.  So why do we do it?

My answers

I offer these only to share.  I appreciate that each of you will think about this differently and I respect your answers. 

Most of my 23-year career, of which half has been spent inside organizations and half as an external consultant, I have struggled with helping organizations implement change. Even, and sometimes especially, when the team thought this initiative was the most awesome opportunity for the organization, we fell short and sometimes were called off. Post-Implementation Reviews recorded various logistical problems, but really, looking back, many of the root causes related to governance (sponsorship) and resistance/adoption (both within the project team and the organization, especially resistance across silos). The number of project re-starts continues to astound me. I have spent, and continue to spend, a lot of time looking for better ways. 

Although change management has apparently been around for almost 40 years, depending on what you ‘count’, it was not available in my various worlds(sure—it was on position descriptions, but no one talked about it, and we had no real process or interest) until about 2003. 

We were at the tipping point of a multi-million-dollar, enterprise-wide, centralization/innovation initiative when our Learning and Development Department presented something on change management. I wish I could remember anything about that hour?the impact was at a more visceral level.  The presenter, with whom I have a great relationship still today, gave us a taste. She provided an overview, I’m sure, but there were so many “ah-has” related to what we were shallowly calling “stakeholder management” that it changed the trajectory of my career.

The initiative actually imploded. In hindsight, we had so many change management issues that I am amazed it took so long. However, that organization today has a world-class change management accreditation program and has integrated change management in its delivery framework. It is a testament to the long serving, hard work of the senior director of Learning and Development.

At my core, I am obstinate. In my work, that manifests as “I am not a quitter”. I will fail at a thousand solutions and still have to be dragged away from a dying project. Yes, this is both strength and a weakness, and I manage it. It makes the “wins” all the sweeter. 

At the end of the day, the power of this work, for me, lies in:

• The opportunity to make meaningful differences for our organizations and thereby our communities and our economies:  I have a core belief that healthy economies contribute to the stability and quality of life of our communities. Any small contribution I can make to that is meaningful to me. 
• Any insights or processes that I can bring to ease the pain of change for individuals:It is important to my own value system. And, to the extent that an understanding of change and how we, as humans, transition helps those individuals in their personal lives, as it has helped me, it is both an honor and an obligation. 

 Wow, that’s heavy stuff.  This is probably why I only have capacity to think about it during vacation. 

Enough of a difference

These are the questions that haunt me:

• “Am I making enough of a difference?” and
• “How can I/we do better?”   

Part of the answer lies in deepening competencies and, for some, in working with mentors. This led me to develop my own list of competencies of change agents (next week’s post). 

Part of the answer lies in following developments in our profession and related professions and in innovating how we do what we do. 

We are NOT there yet

I have the strong and persistent notion that there is still much opportunity for us to do better. 

The research presented in “The Strategy Execution series” and, in particular, “What’s missing” (http://gailseverini.com/2012/08/23/whats-missing-from-strategy-execution-post-5/) convinces me that there is still much more to be done. 

What competencies do leaders and agents need to excel at in order to be successful? Are you building a Community of Practice or Centre of Excellence? What’s on your list?

Below is my top-ten list for change leaders. In two weeks, the post will list my top-ten competencies for change agents—and a bonus list for change targets.

Notes:

• The lists are only loosely prioritized because, given that every application (organization/initiative) is different, competencies may be more or less relevant in that context.
• Some of these items might not fit the full technical definition of a “competency”. Some are mindsets. All can be developed.
• Behind each of these items is a mountain of research and more resources. Reference material is provided at the end and subsequent posts will provide some training sources.

Change Leaders

1. Determination and discipline— The leader …“Has a profound resolve toward the specific shifts the organization has identified as essential for its future success, and not just a generic interest in change.” (Assessing Leaders for Change Roles, Change Thinking Blog, Daryl Conner). And, has the personal discipline to adhere to the path and take difficult and challenging actions.
2. Self-Knowledge and mindfulness—The ability to be calm in the midst of high-stress, dynamic change comes from being centered as a person. Knowing and accepting oneself, even while continuously striving to be better, is part of it. The ability to concentrate and be attentive to other people and concepts, to think deeply and calmly, is another part. These are intricately connected.
3. Realistic optimism—“Type-O people view life as a set of constantly shifting, interacting parts that can produce a rising number of combinations. Each day, Type-O people assume that a new set of opportunities will emerge that will produce even more demanding challenges.” (Human Resilience During Change, Conner Partners White Paper).
4. Strategic thinking—Create a vision and the path to navigate to it. While this might sound like classic white-collar, MBA-stuff, I mean it in the grisly, School of Hard Knocks sense—complete with battle scars.
5. Stewardship—There are as many ways to lead an organization, and change, as there are leaders. I admit to a strong bias, that I hazard a guess that many share, to follow leaders who see their role as “the willingness to be accountable for the well-being of the larger organization by operating in service, rather than in control of those around us.” (1).
6. Integrative thinking—Once we accept that transformational change presents enormous ambiguity it becomes obvious that the ability “to hold two conflicting ideas in constructive tension”. “The Opposable Mind: How Successful Leaders Win Through Integrative Thinking” (2) is an essential competency.
7. Culture awareness—An understanding of organizational culture generally, this organization’s current and desired cultures specifically, as well as plans for making the shift.
8. Influences others—Once a leader is personally committed to the change, the next challenge is to garner the same deep level of commitment from others. This begins with the leader’s ability to influence others. In “Change The Way You Lead Change”, (3) authors Herold and Fedor have a fantastic section on “Drawing On Our Buckets of Influence”.
9. Good judgment—The ability to make great decisions is actually rare, and extraordinarily valuable. “Good judgment comes from experience. Experience comes from bad judgment.” (Bob Packwood).
10. Make meaning—Making the change relevant to every resource who has to make the transition is key. It is an unusual capability to put yourself in someone else’s shoes, to understand how the change affects them and then to help them understand it and navigate their way through it. Making sense of the change for individuals is the first step and a continuous process.

School of Hard Knocks and Sherpas

There is no greater teacher than experience. Whether you are a leader or an agent, every experience will teach you more than any training, and arm you more than any tool or methodology. Find ways to work with more experienced practitioners and, if possible, find a mentor. Mentors can be like sherpas—they have travelled the journey many times before and can act as interpreters and guides.

Reference Material

1. “Assessing Leaders for Change Roles” (http://www.connerpartners.com/frameworks-and-processes/assessing-leaders-for-change-roles), Change Thinking Blog, Daryl Conner
2. “Becoming a ‘Mindful’ Practitioner”(http://www.connerpartners.com/practicing-our-craft/becoming-a-mindful-practitioner), Change Thinking Blog, Daryl Conner

Footnotes:

1. "Stewardship: Choosing Service over Self-Interest", Peter Block, Berret-Koehler Publishers, San Francisco, 1996

2. “The Opposable Mind: How Successful Leaders Win Through Integrative Thinking”, Roger Martin, 2009.

3. “Change The Way You Lead Change”, David Herold and Donald Fedor, Stanford University Press, Stanford, California 2008.

It’s a seductive reality: strategic change may be the most exciting endeavour of an executive’s career.It compares with climbing Mount Everest?not everybody makes it on the first attempt, some don’t survive, but those who succeed are considered heroes.

The difference is that for most organizations committed to a strategic change, it is a business imperative. There is no backing down - re-tries have additional risks.   

We are not talking here about linear, progressive change, but rather 90- degree turns or even 180s?we are talking about the kinds of strategy that makes or breaks the organization’s future. This is the kind of change that is rocket fuel to start-ups like Facebook and LinkedIn; the elusive Fountain of Youth for dinosaurs like Kodak, Nokia, Canadian Pacific and JC Penney; and Buckley's Cough Syrup for every organization in between.  

Because strategic change is so complex and dynamic it takes years to develop successful, comprehensive approaches. Early attempts, such as Project Management, were linear. Change Management added another dimension. Anecdotal information suggests that these have improved effectiveness and yet still there are gaps.

The legendary “70% failure rate” and the real rate

Since 1993, when Hammer and Champy famously quoted the following 70% failure rate, it has been burned into our collective conscious: “Sadly, we must report that despite the success stories described in previous chapters, many companies that begin reengineering don’t succeed at it…Our unscientific estimate is that as many as 50 percent to 70 percent of the organizations that undertake a reengineering effort do not achieve the dramatic results they intended.” [1] 

This has been reiterated in subsequent studies (for example “Success Rates for Different Types of Organizational Change” [2] and repeated ad nauseum by every consultant selling a solution (a challenge from our chairman here http://connerpartners.com/how-challenging-is-the-change/the-dirty-little-secret-behind-the-70-failure-rate-of-change-projects).

Notwithstanding all the sales pressure, it has resonated with leaders and managers alike precisely because it reflects our common frustrations. 

The real rate is unknown. However, the only real rate that matters is the organization’s rate of success/failure. This can be examined and improved.

Breaking it down—and building it back up

As with most complex problems, it has taken time to break down change management into discrete and treatable elements. Project Management has been elevated to address delivering on-time, on-budget and on-scope at the Program and Portfolio levels as well. Change Management emerged to increase commitment and adoption. 

Yet, even after closing these gaps, there were still shortfalls. Even in projects where strong project management and change management are effective there are still places where teams have to “muscle through”. 

End-to-end, top-to-bottom

“We moved past change management 10 years ago,” our chairman, Daryl Conner, said. We were talking about Strategy Execution with a client and there was an obvious moment of reflection in the group. “Yeah,” I thought. 

Conner Partners (formerly ODR) is most well-known for advancing theory and practice of change management. And yes, while our methodology includes change management, this is only one part of our Strategy Execution approach. 

Daryl went on to explain, “As we studied the patterns of winners and losers in transformational change, it became clear that there were gaps beyond change management. Our current approach addresses these.”  

Differentiating between symptoms and root causes is not easy. 

An example:It is widely accepted that the most significant critical success factor in executing change is the performance of leadership, specifically the sponsors’. Even after breaking down more specific role definitions and competencies and getting leaders to fully lean into these important activities we still found gaps – between sponsors. 

It became clear that we had assumed full commitment from all sponsors and that they would cooperate together. However, systemically, organizations are not set up this way. Most hierarchical organization charts require tasks to be parsed apart and delegated discretely. Getting tight alignment at the leadership level for cross-functional, transformational change requires specific activities and explicit contracting. Building a successful consulting offer to tackle this obstreperous challenge has not happened overnight—we do this today through a comprehensive offer we call “Managing Intent”.

The fact is that on the market today, there is no public end-to-end, top-to-bottom approach. Some come close, but ultimately those organizations (or even teams) who are determined to compete will develop their own.

What else?

What are the frontiers of strategy execution and change management?

• Formal integration of Project Management and Change Management: Rumour has it that The Project Management Institute (PMI) is releasing the next (fifth) edition of the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK) and will introduce a new practice area. Word is that it will be change management. This is likely to be a very tactical approach addressing low-level communications and training requirements. Users will have to be vigilant to ensure that they include adequate treatment for the nature of change.
• Change Management and Change Leadership: The debate as to whether these are the same or different, separate or connected continues—mostly fueled by those with self-interest in the answer they are promoting.
• Comprehensive: Imagine if the organization had a repeatable and reliable process to take strategy from cradle to rising star. Today, in most organizations, this process is patchy and clumsy, and, at times, dysfunctional and counterproductive.
• Project Change Management and manager/leader competencies: I don’t hear many conversations about this and yet I see opportunity here. “Change Management” shows up as a competency on most position descriptions today, but ask an HR manager to tell you more about what that looks like and the well runs dry quickly. They would benefit from integration.
• Organizational agility (the nimble organization): Now here is a competitive advantage. This is the richest opportunity for organizations in a position (or a corner) to invest in expediting results.

In 2010 I wrote the first version of a white paper to try to create a framework to describe the various interconnected elements as applied to innovation capability, “Call to Action: Power innovation bandwidth with the 9 pistons of the Change Management engine” (http://www.symphini.com/doc/Call%20to%20Action%20to%20Power%20Innovation%20with%20the%209%20pistons%20of%20CM%20engine%20v10.pdf). This was an unconventional and fledgling approach (business, not organizational design perspective) and it still needs work.  

However, the underlying business challenge remains unsolved (i.e., how to think efficiently about and comprehensively improve an organization’s needs for change capability).

References

[1] “Reengineering the corporation: a manifesto for business revolution”, Michael Hammer and James A Champy, Harpercollins, 1993.

[2] “Success Rates for Different Types of Organizational Change”, Martin E. Smith, PhD, Performance Improvement, Volume 41, Number 1, January 2002.   

“Business is a machine made out of people” Bill Duane.

In Post 1 of this series, we established that strategy is “just another good idea” until it is implemented and churning out results, and that there is no single turnkey methodology for executing strategy. In Posts 2 and 3, we turned our attention to the “go to” methodology—project management—and explored the two dominant project management methodologies: The Project Management Institute’s (PMI’s) approach and PRINCE2. In this post, we’re going to look at change management and how it’s deployed.

Change management addresses the human risks in strategy execution. When existing staff have to think about their jobs differently (learn new competencies, demonstrate different behaviors and mindsets), the rate at which they adopt and perform the change will dramatically impact success.

Think about the leap from order-taking to creating a competitive customer experience or from cable service operator to integrated communications provider. Maybe the market has shifted seismically due to legislation (e.g., health care reform) or a new substitute in the market (digital in the newspaper world). 

The organization must make a strategic shift but, as my friend Bill Braun (http://futurepossibilities.wordpress.com) would remind me, there really isn’t any such thing as “the organization” is there? The people must make the shift.

First, what is “Change Management”? Simple question, no?

Actually this is not a simple question. There are two emerging international associations representing change management. The Association of Change Management Professionals(ACMP) (http://www.acmp.info/) recently released this definition:

• “ACMP defines change management to be the application of knowledge, skills, abilities, methodologies, processes, tools, and techniques to transition an individual or group from a current state to a desired future state, such that the desired outcomes and/or business objectives are achieved. Change management processes, when properly applied, ensure individuals within an organization efficiently and effectively transition through change such that the organization’s goals are realized. Change management is an integral part of the overall change process and ideally begins at the onset of change. ACMP’s definition assumes that the organization has agreed upon the need for change and has identified the nature of the change.”

The Change Management Institute (CMI) does not offer a definition of change management but does offer a definition of a Change Management Practitioner and a “Competency Model” (http://www.change-management-institute.com/sites/default/files/cmi_accreditation_cmpcompetencymodel.pdf):

• “A Change Management Practitioner has mastery of the change principles, processes, behaviours, and skills necessary to effectively identify, manage, initiate, and influence change, and manage and support others through it”.

The real key here is that change management is NOT the broader, perhaps more intuitive, notion of managing change (e.g., strategy, business case, planning, budget, scope, timeline, metrics). 

Instead, change management focuses narrowly on the facilitation of people from the current state to the desired state. It deals with expediting three things: understanding, commitment, and alignment, which helps people change the way they think about their roles, leave behind current mindsets and competencies, and dive into new thinking and build new capability. Many leaders rely on a few tactics to tell their people what’s changing and expect that they will comply. In transformational change, this inevitably falls short. We humans are just not wired for change.

A word on history

The history of change management is really not well documented. (Currently, Wikipedia is remarkably weak on this.) Most histories track early thought leadership back to Kurt Lewin (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurt_Lewin)and Elisabeth Kübler-Ross (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elizabeth_K%C3%BCbler-Ross). Various LinkedIn discussions that ask members to identify books or methodologies come up with a wide array of answers. Some of the perennial thought leaders include: Dean Anderson and Linda Ackerman Anderson, William Burke, William Bridges, Daryl Conner, John Kotter, Peter Senge, and Edgar Schein.  

How is change management deployed?

Some large organizations have established roles such as “Director, Change Management” or “VP, Global Change Management”. Some have established centres of excellence and/or communities of practice to further nurture this capability. However, in many organizations today, change management is under the purview of Human Resources and Organization Development, often specifically under Organizational Effectiveness. 

“Change management” also appears as a required competency on position descriptions at all levels (even though few can describe what this means and fewer still take any specific training on it).

Increasingly, it is also deployed within initiatives, often set up as a work stream within a project, to address behaviour and mindset change. Leaders play important roles, with specific responsibilities, as sponsors. Change Management specialists, analysts or managers evaluate “readiness”, identify resistance, and design and implement interventions designed to increase speed and depth of adoption.

Strategic deployment sees change management in all of these places, tailored to the organization’s current challenges.

Change Management Methodologies

Two cautionary notes:

1. Not all “methodologies” are “equal”. There are many, many models and frameworks on change. Many have been developed out of deep PhD work. Some have come out of applied behavioural science, some from industrial psychology and some from systems thinking. All have value. A good reference for many of these is “Organization Change: Theory and Practice” by W. Warner Burke. However, these should only be deployed by the most advanced practitioners—they require deep academic knowledge to be interpreted accurately. It is a rare practitioner who has both academic muscle and pragmatic business experience.  This list is not about those. This list is about pragmatic, systemic methodologies that are more accessible to the average organization. While many of the methodologies below are built upon the important and insightful work of research, they are systematized. Some are built for new practitioners working on moderate, transitional change and others for seasoned professionals dealing with transformation.
2. Methodology is no substitute for an experienced change agent.This is high risk, complex and dynamic work. It is often messy?despite our best work it is often unpredictable and fraught with dysfunctional behavior. While methodology is an important component of change management capability it is not the only one, and perhaps not even the most important one. A seasoned change agent who can make sense of the noise using these and other tools is the most important asset.

Most change management methodologies follow the same basic steps and tools:

• Assess readiness of leaders, agents, and change targets (specific to their ability to execute and adopt the change).
• Assess impacts of the change on roles, processes, and organizational capability. (This can go so far as to include workflow, organization design, position specifications, and compensation.)
• Recommend interventions to address gaps.
• Execute interventions.
• Track metrics to determine whether adoption is tracking as required. If not, design and implement new interventions. Repeat until successful.

The two methodologies that I am most familiar with, that integrate change management into execution, are:

• Change Execution Methodology (CEM v 4.1), Conner Partners (www.connerpartners.com). It is based on the research, training and consulting work of ODR Inc. going back to 1974. The foundational intellectual property is available in Daryl Conner’s book “Managing at the Speed of Change”(http://connerpartners.com/daryl-conner/books) and, as it is innovated, on his blog Change Thinking (http://connerpartners.com/daryl-conner/blog).
• Prosci’s 3-Phase Process for Managing Change (http://www.change-management.com/change-management-process.htm), Prosci Learning

There are other methodologies that you can read about, including:

• The AIM Change Management Methodology (http://www.imaworldwide.com/), Implementation Management Associates  
• The Change Management Pocket Guide (http://www.changeguidesllc.com/resources/model.html), Change Guides LLC
• Change Leader’s Roadmap (http://www.beingfirst.com/products/changetools/), Being First Inc.
• Managed Change Model and Methodology (http://www.lamarsh.com/approach/),LaMarsh Global
• People-Centred Implementation® (http://www.changefirst.com/change-management-methodology), Changefirst (UK)

Interestingly, leadership at IMA, LaMarsh, and Changefirst have all worked with Daryl Conner through ODR, either as employees, clients, or business associates.

All of these methodologies are proprietary. Access is gained by buying books, training courses, and licenses and/or by retaining consultants on projects. Of course, most consulting firms have an approach. These are rarely, if ever, offered as standalone—they are built into consulting solutions. And, of course, dozens of consultants offer their own variations on the above methodologies. Some are innovating known approaches and producing some very interesting and important advancements.

Of note, many might reference Professor John Kotter’s work, including “Leading Change”. I found the principles to be very influential early in my learning. However, in my experience, the publicly available material is not designed for initiative application. In fact, at the last ACMP conference (2012) one of the most interesting slides that Randy Ottinger, EVP, Kotter International shared was: “Guiding Principles + Change Management”. On a related note, some might also argue that “change leadership” is different from “change management”—my point of view on that is here (http://gailseverini.com/2012/02/16/change-leadership-is-not-the-silver-bullet-the-silver-bullet-series/).

So, what is missing? Why is the failure rate of transformational change still so high?

The failure rate of transformational change continues to be abominable despite a few decades of change management to effect improvement (our chairman’s point of view on this here http://connerpartners.com/how-challenging-is-the-change/the-dirty-little-secret-behind-the-70-failure-rate-of-change-projects). Seventy percent is the failure rate most commonly quoted[1]and, more recently, IBM’s research pegged the number at 59% globally (i.e., only 41% of projects fully met their objectives).[2]

Regardless of the exact number, the order of magnitude is completely unacceptable.

So far in this series, we have looked at project management and change management. So, if we put them together we have a complete Strategy Execution Methodology, right? Well, first, that’s not so easy. And second—no way?there are still gaps!

What are the gaps and what does a holistic solution look like? Subscribe (http://gailseverini.com/) to ensure you get the last post in this series.