Transformation efforts often fail or fall short. We believe this is largely because the lion’s share of programs focus on the strategy and operational aspects of change, short-changing the people and cultural components. But even integrated transformation programs—those that include the traditional full suite of change management elements—need more.
In the era of always-on transformation, leadership is not only about having a vision and setting a strategy; it is about creating alignment and putting in place the right conditions for change. Employees face increased pressure due to flatter organizations, agile operating models, and the more intense focus on the customer, so leaders need to serve as role models by embodying the organizational values and desired behaviours. They can no longer delegate change to mid-level project managers and direct from behind the scenes; they must inspire and engage the enterprise.
Technological change is accelerating, which means customers and shareholders expect more and expect it faster, which means that speed is at the core of value creation from change programs today. But to achieve it, organizations must simplify structures, processes, activities, and decision making.
Like customers, employees expect more today: they crave transparency and collaboration, want their voices to be heard, and want to be engaged the what, why and how of any significant change. And they want to know that their contributions have impact. A recent CEB study showed that when employees actively participated in planning a change initiative the effort was three times as effective, and implementation planning 10 times as effective, as initiatives developed solely by leaders.
Change, by definition, requires new behaviours. Indeed, according to a 2011 Economist Intelligence Unit study, senior executives consider behaviour change the single most important success factor in a change program. Yet many change efforts neglect to align the organizational context (through elements such as leadership and performance management practices) to elicit the right behaviours. Moreover, the digital world calls for new ways of working—agile approaches that emphasize iteration and customer feedback, cross-functional collaboration, and a greater use of digital and social-media tools. New behaviours cannot be instilled by dictate—or through yesterday’s work methods. To activate and embed behaviour change, companies need to tap the very tools and methods that are triggering their transformations, being mindful of the viral power of digital interactions.
A more adaptive change management process places a premium on effective communications from all the executives participating. The change journey model we describe, for example, involves meeting for two to four hours every week or two to discuss change topics and requires each executive taking part to flag issues and lead the discussion about them.
In such an environment, time spent looking for better, more innovative ways to communicate progress is rarely wasted. This requires discipline, as well as also may require building new skills; indeed, developing messages that can break through the clutter is becoming a required skill for the modern change leader.
Executives hoping to become better change leaders should look for opportunities to innovate in their communication of information and data, while prodding their organizations to institutionalize such capabilities.
As the change becomes more of a real-time journey, it’s important to figure out ways to support discussions with data that is engaging and easy to manipulate. To the extent possible, executives need to be able to push on data and its implications “in the moment,” instead of raising questions and then waiting two weeks for someone to come back with answers. Ideally, in fact, anyone in a room could drill into thoughtfully visualized data with the flick of a finger on a tablet computer. We can support you with new software tools that help make data and analytics more visual and interactive to facilitate quicker, more dynamic, data-driven, and action-oriented dialogue.