http://nlp-experts.org/ Change Management - What works in company and organisation change management. en Thu, 09 Sep 2010 16:26:08 GMT vBulletin 60 http://nlp-experts.org/images/misc/rss.png http://nlp-experts.org/ http://nlp-experts.org/change-management/302-resistance-futile.html Wed, 12 Aug 2009 15:33:20 GMT Thoughts from Bloomstorm's Mike Bird

Resistance is Futile

Most approaches to change rely on a false assumption. It is this: most people are resistant to change and hence the job of the change agent is to overcome this resistance.

Nonsense.

The job of the change agent is not to 'overcome' this resistance. It is to make such resistance irrelevant.

We can see this most clearly when we consider changes that are unpleasant, such as headcount reduction or enforced relocation or the imposition of security standards for IT. After such changes, typically, people are worse off: they have more work to do or they have fewer resources to do it or their existing work is disrupted. Organisations only embark on such changes because they are necessary. Whether people resist or not, the change must happen. So what are the key things that we should do to make sure that such changes succeed?

Don't sell the change: People are not stupid. Contriving spurious personal benefits to answer the question "What's in it for me?" is largely a waste of time because such 'benefits' are usually not credible. In addition to diverting often quite large amounts of effort unnecessarily, selling such benefits damages your change implementation in two ways. First, it corrodes the trust people may have in the programme and whatever you say about the change. Second, we already know that bad things are likely to happen. If people aren't prepared for these, then the impact of the change on the people concerned will be even worse.


Make new way of working as easy as possible: It is shocking how many organisations introduce changes without making the slightest effort to ensure that the new ways of working are easy. Think of the last time new procedures (for anything!) were introduced to your organisation and you'll most likely see what I mean. If we are asking people to work differently in unhappy circumstances then the very least we should do is make sure that the new ways of working are as easy as possible: more convenient, simpler to operate, clearer and unambiguous. Work on oiling the wheels of change, rather than finding and selling spurious 'benefits,' and your change will be implemented faster and more effectively.


Make the old ways of working more difficult: When people are under stress, they revert to where they are most comfortable. In the change environment, this is typically their old ways of working. If you make the old ways harder, then the new way of working becomes preferable under stress. What do we mean, 'harder?' In simple terms, it means making it less convenient, or more demanding, or entailing more work. Extra forms to fill in, additional screen pages to work through, phone numbers being harder to find - these are some of the ways that organisations have found to make the old ways harder.

Remember, however, that there is little point in doing this unless you have put as much effort as possible into making the new way of working easier. Carrots work better than sticks.


Pay attention to what you want: Organisations implement unpleasant change through necessity. If it is important that people work differently, then the organisation's management need to pay attention to how people are doing it. Such attention is the primary and most effective way for an organisation to demonstrate and communicate priorities. So if an organisation introduces an important change but its managers don't pay attention over time to how the change is operating, then we should not be surprised if the people in the business stop paying attention too.

So, for critical change, it is crucial that managers pay attention - and continue to pay attention - to whether people are working differently and how well they are doing so.


Listen to your people: An adage of the British army states that "no plan survives contact with the enemy." By the same token, no matter how well planned and tested your change, the reality of its implementation will reveal numerous flaws and opportunities for improvement. It will reveal these things to the people who are living with it daily. Expect this. Seek out their views and enable the change to be adjusted quickly in response to what you hear. Especially with an unpleasant change, the more you can help people take control of the change, the faster the adoption. Remember also that in this case, "your people" should very often include your customers...
Of course, while these ideas are driven by the need to implement unpleasant change, the same principles apply to any change, even nice ones.

Good luck, and let us know how you get on. ]]> Change Management Mike Bird http://nlp-experts.org/change-management/302-resistance-futile.html http://nlp-experts.org/change-management/300-downsizing-while-maintaining-motivation.html Sun, 02 Aug 2009 09:50:34 GMT Ray Jardine, CEO of the Quad group talks to NLP trainer Michael Beale about managing downsizing while maintaining and building on morale and... Ray Jardine, CEO of the Quad group talks to NLP trainer Michael Beale about managing downsizing while maintaining and building on morale and motivation.



http://www.nlp-expert.co.uk/change_management/ray.mp3

(Please allow up to 2 minutes for the MP3 file to download if you want to listen to the discussion) ]]> Change Management michaelbeale@ppimk.com http://nlp-experts.org/change-management/300-downsizing-while-maintaining-motivation.html http://nlp-experts.org/change-management/299-change-local-government.html Fri, 24 Jul 2009 09:28:39 GMT Lana Holman talks to NLP Trainer Michael Beale about change and getting stakeholder agreement in Local Government. Lana works as the HR Strategy and... Lana Holman talks to NLP Trainer Michael Beale about change and getting stakeholder agreement in Local Government. Lana works as the HR Strategy and Policy Manager for West Oxfordshire District Council.



To listen to the discussion please allow for 3 minutes for the MP3 file to download:

http://nlp-expert.co.uk/change_management/lana.mp3 ]]> Change Management michaelbeale@ppimk.com http://nlp-experts.org/change-management/299-change-local-government.html http://nlp-experts.org/change-management/258-change-management-john_ws-blog.html Thu, 02 Jul 2009 12:06:07 GMT John's thoughts on change management issues and approaches. ]]> Change Management John_W http://nlp-experts.org/change-management/258-change-management-john_ws-blog.html http://nlp-experts.org/change-management/61-change-management-performance-newsletter.html Fri, 04 Apr 2008 14:30:20 GMT Change management newsletter

I'm delighted that Phil Jones, managing director of strategic performance management specialists, Excitant, has agreed to post his monthly change management newsletter on the forum.

Its one of the few of such newsletters that I regularly read. In addition Phil runs the Cambridge NLP practice group.

http://nlp-experts.org/change-manage...interview.html ]]> Change Management michaelbeale@ppimk.com http://nlp-experts.org/change-management/61-change-management-performance-newsletter.html http://nlp-experts.org/change-management/21-john-whitworth-interview.html Tue, 29 Jan 2008 17:37:59 GMT *NLP Change Management - John Whitworth* Change Management - Discussion between Michael Beale and John Whitworth, September 2007. ... NLP Change Management - John Whitworth

Change Management - Discussion between Michael Beale and John Whitworth, September 2007.

http://nlp-expert.co.uk/change_management/john.mp3

MICHAEL: Firstly thank you for taking part in this interview. Would you give a brief synopsis of who you are and what you do?

JOHN: Good morning, Mike. I'm John Whitworth. I am the Chief Operating Officer for N3, which is one of the major health (£1B+) programmes inside BT. In my career I've worked both within organisations and outside of organisations helping with change.

MICHAEL: Adding to what you've said, would you build on the experience that you have as a change agent?

JOHN: Yes, I've worked in the investment banking area which is a fast moving and has constantly reinvented technology, business processes, and people's behaviour. In addition I've worked as a change management consultant, leading change projects for major clients. I've had a key change role within a leading insurance company. And now currently in BT I've done three or four major roles at general management level, which have all had transformation as part of their job description.

MICHAEL: What would you say makes a change project transformational?

JOHN: I think it has to be a long way away from business as usual. It has to be revolutionary. Even though it is evolutionary in a way we get to it, the results should be revolutionary.

MICHAEL: Moving on from that, if you were advising the sponsor of a large project about how to maximise the project's chances of success, what sort of things would you ask the sponsor to consider?

JOHN: I think the first and the most important thing is to ensure that he gets people committed for the change and the first way of doing that is to have their involvement in understanding what the end result would be. It's much better to have a shared vision of where you need to be before you start , rather than try and have a single vision and try and get everybody align to it.

MICHAEL: So you get buy-in and a shared vision. Is there anything else that you would get them to consider very carefully upfront?

JOHN: Yes, I think you need to treat it as any other project and I think that's often forgotten. So for example, you don't need everybody to be at the same level of support for the change. You need to ensure that you have a core group who are going to drive the change, who are the vision.

But then the other people working on that project, if they're not where you need them to be in a behavioural sense, you have to move them there. And clearly if you want everybody to be a major-change facilitator it'd be a heck of a job.

A lot of change programmes get into trouble because they try and make everybody the champion of the change. Don't do that. I want these people to be champions of parts of the change, I want these people to be helpers, I want these people just to do these little bits, because that then gives you the jigsaw for success at the end.

MICHAEL: Looking back at your own experience, what do you think are the biggest reasons that change projects fail or don't succeed is that people don't consider the risks and the issues and have clear stepping stones and milestones within them. They effectively change the project as they go forward.

Also if you don't have that buy in with people as a whole, individuals will view the project from the side and secretly modify where you're trying to get to with unpredictable results!
So I guess it's like the old adage you know, you should plan it and plan it very well, measure twice and cut once in a change project. Don't end up keep chopping away at it and changing it around.

MICHAEL: Are there any other experiences you've had where change projects haven't gone right for any reason?

JOHN: I think it's this buy in and communication with the wider community. I don't think you can over-communicate in change. I think one of the biggest blockers that absolutely kill change projects is fear.

I think if you do it right you get people's understanding of what's going on, so you take out that fear factor. You have to be clear as to what's in it for those individuals involved in the change, from their perspectives. It's very easy to think the organisational change is going to do this and they'll be benefits. Not enough.

You have to understand every key player within the change and what's the benefit to them? And if you don't take that into consideration, then I'm afraid again, failure is looming because people's fear of what's going to happen to them personally will mean that the change project will suffer.

MICHAEL: What do you think the value and characteristics are of a good change agent? That's somebody who facilitates a change, rather than owns it.

JOHN: I think it's someone who has effectively got the war scars of what works and what doesn't. I think as I've said before, communication is very important. And I think the communication needs to be done on different levels, so you need to communicate to people in their own terms as part of the change project. Again it's not just the case of one story fits all, so a good change facilitator will understand how to talk to and how to motivate different people within the change project. And it'll be a number of different ways, and what works for one person and group won't work for another and that needs to be clearly understood.

MICHAEL: What sort of difference do you think a good change agent makes to a project?

JOHN: I think a change project will slow down, without a good change agent facilitating the change. I think a number of them could possibly lose their way, which has happened in a number of occasions.

We all know of well known change projects and transformational projects that have failed. The overall benefit is that people come out the other end feeling that it's been a worthwhile journey, if you can make everybody achieve that at the end, then I think the change agent's done his job.

MICHAEL: Excellent. Now before I ask you for your contact details, are there any final thoughts or recommendations you would give to anyone looking at a big change project?
JOHN: I think the main thing is the vision. Be really clear why you're doing it. Think it through, not only where you want to get to but consider other options. People very often have one vision and that's the one we've got to get to.

So make it a joint vision with people and don't be frightened of looking at two or three and seeing the why of doing it? The why is just as important and as the how and the where are you trying to get to. Understand that question: why are we doing this? What are the options to get there? How else can I get there? And you may find an easier path to achieve more.

MICHAEL: And your contact details?

JOHN: Yes, anyone who wants to contact me, please contact me at John.Whitworth@bt.com.

MICHAEL: Thank you very much indeed. ]]> Change Management michaelbeale@ppimk.com http://nlp-experts.org/change-management/21-john-whitworth-interview.html http://nlp-experts.org/change-management/20-phil-jones-interview.html Tue, 29 Jan 2008 13:00:28 GMT *NLP Change Management - Phil Jones* Change Management - Discussion between Michael Beale and Phil Jones of Excitant Ltd, October 2007. Image:... NLP Change Management - Phil Jones

Change Management - Discussion between Michael Beale and Phil Jones of Excitant Ltd, October 2007.



Phil Jones is a management consultant and he's been doing that for about 15 - 18 years in various forms. He specialize in business strategy and performance management, particularly around the balanced score card.

http://nlp-expert.co.uk/change_management/phil_2.mp3

Michael : I'm really pleased to have this chance to talk to you about your thoughts on change management, but maybe for our listeners you could introduce yourself and tell us a little bit about what you do.

Phil : Ok, My name is Phil Jones my company is Excitant, and I help management teams in the area of strategy and performance management. Some people would called that balance score cards, some people would call it making strategy happen, I call it helping management teams get their heads together and their acts together so they can make things happen.

Michael : And what would you call a change project, and what would you call a transformational change project?

Phil : That's an interesting one. I think your question is hinting at the difference between - Something that's more of an incremental change and something that's transformational, in the sense that it's a significant step change. I'd like to get rid of the word change in this conversation. If we framed it as an improvement project, I think it would be quite different, because people have different contexts about the word change versus improvement. And I'm puzzled by, why in the lexicon of management conversations we talk about change projects when we really mean projects to improve things.

Michael : Let me rephrase the question then. What sort of difference is there between a large, but basically, ongoing improvement project or an improvement project that literally does change the way in which the majority of people work, and act and behave?

Phil : I think there's possibly three categories here. There's a new chief executive who arrives and goes this is no longer good enough, we have to be different. Which is the classic transformational, re-engineering project.

If you're working in a part of an organisation, quite often a director or a senior director doing incremental improvements all of the time. There's another one which I think is quite interesting, which is creating a culture of change, culture of improvement, where people are actively seeking to bring about change and improvements themselves, rather than it being directed from the outside. And I think that's an important emphasis.

Michael : If you were advising the CEO and you can choose whatever one of those scenarios that you've talked about. What sort of things would you suggest that he kept his eyes on? What are the key aspects that from your point of few, that you would advise him to think about, in the planning stage?

Phil : I'd like to start with am error here Mike and there's this awful phrase that goes around that people don't like change. I think it's complete and utter baloney and I'm being polite at this point as you may have noticed.

I've never met anyone who doesn't change their underpants, change their shirt, eats something different, occasionally change their car, talk to different people and do other things. People do change, they like variety.

If you stuck someone in a immersion tank so they are sensually deprived and pumped white noise into their ears, that would be called torture.

People don't like change when it's outside their control, they're not involved in it, and it's imposed on them. People do like to be involved in change, when they understand why it's going about, it's going on, and can influence it and feel a part of it. And I think this whole thing about people do not like change is an excuse used by people who fail to understand how a change works to blame those who have been changed instead of the change agents themselves.

I'm being controversial here, but I think that it's a deliberate attempt to push the blame onto someone else where as a matter of fact there are a lot of people out there who are really good at helping organisations change, and improve, and to say that people just don't like change is just an excuse. So that would be my first thing.

I think the second point to the sponsor is to be explicit about the mechanisms of change you are using. This was as bit of an eye opener for me, as several years ago I was working on a performance management project which morphed itself into a help us form our strategy project which morphed into a the chief exec said to me can you sort my management team out please. And it was very much about joining up the organisation. It was extremely successful while I was there, and the chief executive wrote at the end and went: you have done an absolutely brilliant job for us, this is entirely up to us to make sure that this is successful now.

Two years later, it wasn't, and they'd reverted. And I kicked myself immensely over this and one of the realisations that I came to was that the mechanisms of change they were using were implicit in the process rather than explicit.

Therefore, be absolutely clear about what mechanisms of change you're trying to use because then you can pass them across to other people. In this particular circumstance, somebody else came in, the chief executive had taken their eye off the ball, but understood that everything was going on, and this other person changed everything, and threw away everything that we'd done in the past.

I give that as an example of where things have gone wrong, because I think that it's an interesting one that one of the mechanisms of change there was in creating a compelling understanding of strategy in peoples head, that was visual, kinestetic, auditory, logical it wasn't just about power, it was about logic, and it was about social norms changing. And we probably weren't explicit about it, even though those were the methods we were using.

Michael : Can you just give an example of what being more explicit would have meant?

Phil : Ok, let me take an example. The classic way that change often happens is that somebody comes along with a big stick and says you're going to make this happen otherwise I'll sack you. And that works for a while, but when a person who is threatening the sacking goes away, it bounces back. And the other mechanism is, and I'm using a fairly simple model here, I think illustrates it logic. If you show people what the future will be like, and what could happen if things stay the same, there's a compelling logic in there that says surely this is better, therefore I really ought to do it. And if necessary, we will set fire to your platform so you have to jump. The other metaphor that goes along there is are you on the bus? it's a similar sort of thing - The bus is leaving, are you joining us?

The third thing is about a social norm. And I suspect that in this particular example that one of the things in creating a joined up organisation, so we weren't trying to reorganise, we were trying to connect up all the parts of the organisation together who serve individual customers so from the customers perspective it was more complete as opposed to being in silos, the classic situation.

When they first did this at a directors level, it was a bit of a shock to them. Because they'd always worked in silos, and done their own piece, as opposed to taking joint responsibility in this. When we did it at the next level down, we found a collection of middle managers who'd never spoken to each other.

They used different language, they used different cultural norms, they lived in different buildings, they behaved differently, they had different attitudes towards the customers. It was quite dramatic. And initially this caused all sorts of problems. Pulling plastic political correctness cards out in some case. Actually that was the key. It was a city council. The people who were cleaning the street were having as much influence on things as those who were working in drug rehabilitation teams, as those who were planning the environment, designing it, or giving planning permissions and changing it.

It was about the whole picture working together, and they were quite different departments so we were establishing a set of cultural norms where they together took joint responsibility for things.

Michael : Yes definitely. Carrying on with that what other reasons do you think that improvement projects don't bring in the results that people hope for?

Phil : There's a number of things here. There's often more than one reason why they fail. I think it's about being explicit. it's very easy when you've disappeared as a management team into a huddle for six months or whatever, to go Right! Now it's all logical! Just do it. And a friend of mine I once worked with said you know it's very easy to end up half way up the pitch with the ball in rugby but none of your team-mates are there the opposition are. At the point you get murdered and loose the ball. And some management teams get in that position. They go through the logic, and they don't allow the rest of the organisation to pace the same change, and I come back to the management behaviours as well. If you don't go for the underlying cultural norms, behaviours, practices, values, but treat it at the superficial level you'll never get anywhere.

I was chatting to a guy who was doing business process re-engineering for document flow, and I thought great! It will be much more effective in the use of the document. But frankly, if people don't believe in it, and don't care about it, then it won't happen.

You contrast that with a call centre I came across where the chief executive. They were handing off all over the place. Their objective was to just get of the phone and give the problem to somebody else. And the chief executive made it absolutely clear, he said - Look! I want you to imagine that your grandmother is on the end of that phone. Now, I want you to resolve it, for her, as if she was there. If you've overstepped the mark, we'll sort that out afterwards. But the key is you take the responsibility, and you have the authority to do it and make it happen and nobody will jump on you for making a judgement that's wrong.
That's called learning.

And I thought that was a massively significant example of changing a set of cultural norms. You have to back it up with a lot of other things as well. Like, making sure you didn't jump on people when they overstepped it, and finding lots of examples where things have gone well.

So they went down in their numbers of staff by about 30%, and quality improved in terms of hand-offs and everything massively and customer satisfaction doubled if not further.
So they used less people, they did it more efficiently, they were a lower cost, and higher quality, and the quality of customer satisfaction. Simply because they were give free reign to use their intelligence.

Another example somebody was saying that the classic call centre thing is lets outsource it and find the cheapest people who can do it. Where as I've worked on call centre design for people where we've used graduates, and the reason we're using graduates is because they are much more intelligent, flexible - give them authority, give them responsibility and they'll be three times as productive as someone of half the salary.

So you're gaining by 50%. And I think that these sort of things, if they get missed in a change project, if the behavioural pieces aren't reinforced by the management team explicitly backing up what they mean, then it can all go awry. You're just looking at half the problem. At most.

Michael : What do you think the role is of a good agent or consultant that you put in there to help with a project over the time it's running? What do you think they can add, and where do you think they're responsibilities start and end?

Phil : I'm going to split change leader from change agent. Change leader to my mind is the chief executive that says you're going to do it this way and I'm going to give you the space to do it. The change agent should stay out of the way. It's an interesting one, because I have a view in consultancy, I will never present my client strategy in dealing with their own people, it's for them to do that, it's not my strategy it's their's.

So the good agent facilitates the leader getting their message across. And I think the trick here is that the leader has to be both an exempler and a set direction, but also give people permission to let them change for themselves because the potential is that they can find something far far better. And the agents of change are there to help that happen, and in this case I'm using agents of change in sort as sort of facilitators on the side, I think there is a better role, which is having every middle-manager as an agent of change than having peers as agents of change.

If you pick of five or six people, in lets take, the call centre situation, find the five or six real influencers, Ravens as they get called in the tipping point, give those agents a chance to advocate and they'll say - Well actually I've tried this, and boy, doesn't it half work! Lets try and have a go. That sort of thing makes a big difference.

Michael : I very much like the idea - if there is an external change agent, his job is to coach people, but not to do the stuff himself.

Phil : Yes I think that's fairly important. There's this whole thing about, do you as a consultant do things for client, or do you help your client do things better?

And my view is that you should help your client do things better. Otherwise you end up going back there again and again and doing the same thing for them and that's unethical is not the right word but it's not good consultancy and it's not good for the client.

What you're doing is you're not building their underlying capability to bring about change. And that's the way I feel a good agent of change, both internally and externally should work.

Michael : Ok, before I get you to give your contact details is there anything else that you'd like to add about what you think is important about improvement projects?

Phil : I would say do research. As a result of that little moment of light that I had, I started researching models of change, and I thought, I came across maybe four, five six, and I got to twelve and I thought Wow! There are a lot of these! When I reached thirty seven, I stopped, and I think that in itself is interesting, that there are a large number of models of change that go on out there.

Some of them are models of how change from the outside appears to have happened. And some of them are about things that have caused change to come about. And people confuse them.

I mean, your classic one is, unfreeze/refreeze. Or unfreeze-change-refreeze. The question is, what's causing them to unfreeze? What's causing them to change? And would you actually want them to refreeze? And wouldn't you like them to be more like putty? Or mercury? You look at the models, and looks at the metaphors in there and in many ways they're useful, but in many ways they're misleading.

So my advise to anyone in this area doing stuff is to be explicit about their change models, which is what I said at the start. But also to have a really deep understanding of the different types of change models out there because some of them are actually metaphorical and some of them are superficial.

Many of them are about the underlying pieces that go on it in there but be aware that you are dealing with people and that the underlying assumption is that people do like change. If you start on that premise, if you're seeing them not like it it's you're problem not theirs. Because you're not putting it across properly. And I think that positions things very, very differently.
Michael : you've talked about you've looked at lots of models of change, now I know it's all context-dependant, but do you have any favourites or anyone's that you definitely think it's worth people looking at?

Phil : Well if anyone wants to contact me afterwards, I do have a paper on this. I mean I actually wrote up, I can't remember how many it is now, thirty seven or something models of change. I think a useful one is just to think about: are you using power? Are you using logic? Or are you using social peer pressure? and it's quite an old one, but it's an important influence.

Another one I find very valuable indeed is framing. As we've done in this conversation, you've talked about transformational change, and I've talked about helping to create teams that are willing to try and improve for themselves. And we've done that through a series of framing statements. And I think framing a problem is really, really powerful.

I think one final thing is that you can paint a vision until the cows come home. But - and I've got two thoughts that I just need to clarify here sometimes you need to let people vent. Because there's a reason why it's like it is and giving time for venting and letting the frustrations out is all so important, and if you fail to acknowledge that you'll have a problem.

Let me just give you one last story. I've done the triathlon, and I've been to the world championships, done ironman and all these sorts of things and people go wow, that's fantastic and I go no it's not because I only had to persuade myself that those were ridiculous things that I could achieve.

If you believe that you can accomplish anything that you believe, then the issue becomes, how ridiculous a thing can you convince yourself to believe in? So if you said to yourself Oh, I'd love to double my salary and make half a million pounds or whatever next year. Are you limiting yourself by only actually thinking of half a million could it be ten million? So if you don't believe that you could make ten million, then there's no point in even considering it. So it's about belief in ambition but that's the analogy from sport, but in a way it falls down because the management challenge is actually to convince other people that this ridiculous thing is actually achievable.

So to me it's a two-step thing, this vision-piece. Can I get people to think of ambition that is beyond where they're thinking at the moment to help them realise that that is achievable? And then how ridiculous a vision can we collectively convince them of? And that I think is the interesting piece.

Michael : Ok, before I ask for your contact details is there any final point that you would like to make on the topic?

Phil : I think it is about framing. I think the more people that people realise that it's about how they're behaving it's a feedback thing.

Michael : Ok, excellent. And you contact details?

Phil : Phil Jones, I can be contacted on email is phil@excitant.co.uk, my office number is 08704207978 and my mobile number is 07711711123 and If anyone wants to chat with me or have a look on my website they're very welcome to www.excitant.co.uk there's a book coming out at the beginning or next year called - Communicating Strategy - whith is specifically about change as well, and that's a good read.

Michael : Excellent. Thank you very much.

Phil : Pleasure Mike. Cheers. ]]> Change Management michaelbeale@ppimk.com http://nlp-experts.org/change-management/20-phil-jones-interview.html http://nlp-experts.org/change-management/13-derek-bishop-interview.html Sat, 19 Jan 2008 12:45:14 GMT *NLP Change Management - Derek Bishop* Change Management - Discussion between Michael Beale and Derek Bishop of Abeo Consulting, October 2007. ... NLP Change Management - Derek Bishop

Change Management - Discussion between Michael Beale and Derek Bishop of Abeo Consulting, October 2007.



Derek Bishop is a consultant with Abeo Consulting Ltd, where he specialises in helping medium to large companies significantly improve customer service levels, without requiring a huge investment. He also advises on how to get best value from 'outsourcing' investments.

(Please allow 2 minutes for the MP3 file to download if you wish to listen to the discussion)

http://www.nlp-expert.co.uk/change-management/derek.mp3


Derek : My name is Derek Bishop from Abeo consulting, and I specialise in two main areas; firstly around enabling organisations to significantly improve their customer service and hence increase customer loyalty so that they're not losing so many customers and therefore becoming more profitable.

And the second area is around helping organisation leverage the full value from the outsourcing that they have put in place, including their processing or help-desk services, either improving what they've already got, or helping them put into place effective arrangements to leverage the full value of what they're doing.

Michael : That sounds two very useful things. What sort of sized companies do you deal with?

Derek : They tend to be medium to large multi-national, global organisations, I guess the key is that they've got a sizable enough service operation that we could deliver significant improvements.

Michael : What experience have you had that's enabled you to do this? What's your background?

Derek : Well up until three years ago I was in the corporate financial services industry and I held senior positions within financial services, all around customer services and operational outsourcing - funnily enough.

I recognised that whilst I was in a large corporate I never took on a role that was stagnant, what I became was an internal change agent, and so typically I was asked to either turn around an existing department or division that was not performing that well, and dramatically improved the performance, or actually to start up new operations, so if we're taking a new proposition to market and we had to design a customer service or an operational area to take that new proposition to market then I would design it from scratch and implement it.

But once we improved the performance of the existing team, or when we set it up and got the new proposition running, I would then go on to move onto my next internal assignment.
So I became a bit of an internal improvement person, all around the customer service and outsourcing area.

Michael : Now I want to particularly talk to you today about managing change, which is obviously a part of what you do in those two areas but I'm curious how would you describe a change project? And how would you describe a transformational change project, if those labels mean something to you.

Derek : A change project for me is around bringing about some business change which improves the way the organisation performs, but fundamentally it has to deliver some improvement and some real benefits.

Now for me those benefits could be in any number of areas, because you've got a range of stake-holders, they could be for the customer, they could be for the shareholders of the business, the employees, or perhaps the actual community as well. So for me it revolves around improving some sort of performance, and typically it involves things around people, process and technology.

Now often when people hear about process and technology they just think oh they'll just fix that side of it, but when you're changing process and technology, people come into the equation as well.

So I guess that's what I view as change. In terms of transformational change, it's the scale of the change for me, and this is where I'd be looking at making a significant shift or a paradigm shift of the way that an organisation operates. And it will typically involve some significant cultural changes well, there may be perhaps a change of vision or strategy for the organisation or perhaps a fundamental change to the core proposition.

Michael : So if you're advising a key sponsor, the actual final owner of the change at the beginning of the project what sort of things would you advice him or her before they actually started?

Derek : I would kick off initially by thinking about the sustainment of the change. Think about, not just implementing the change but how it's going to be sustained in the long term, because I've seen so many projects that focus on implementation, but then you go back six or nine months down the line and actually the improvement hasn't been sustained and so they're not really delivering the real benefit, that they were aiming to achieve. So I think about that sustainment right at the beginning.

So in the next level down, in terms of the change project itself, I have an analogy whenever I'm looking at a project, which is: first of all, to understand the game, and that is, what it is we're trying to achieve and the boundaries in which we're trying to achieve it understand the rules of the game in terms of constraints that the sponsor is going to be under, in terms of the real parameters and then the standard of players, and the players in terms of this project is really about stakeholders knowing who the stake holders are, knowing how to manage them, because delivering a change project is not something a sponsor can do in their own right.

It has to be all the stakeholders onboard to really deliver the programme, it's not something that a sponsor can do on their own.

Michael : That leads on very well to the next question. Why do you think it is that a lot of change projects don't succeed? What do you think the main reasons are?*

Derek : For me, just thinking about the stakeholders you get a lack of executive support or input into the project. Or lack of user input. If you think about your stakeholders, you've got senior management within an organisation, you've got the end users of the system, the new process's and often you see a lack of input from those areas.

Then you've got some areas around not having clear objectives or expectations around what the project is going to deliver, not capturing the right business requirements or not defining what it was you really needed.

I guess the third area for me is around communication the success of a project can be significantly improved by the level of communication that takes place both within the project add within the organisation within which the project is going to be implemented.

Michael : So we've got stakeholder, and knowing their needs and involvement,
it's having clear objectives, and it's communicate, communicate, communicate.

Derek : Yes

Michael : Is there anything to add to those?

Derek : I think what you see is once the project kicks off, there's quite a lot of momentum. If it's a large project, you tend to find that some of those areas like the communication, start to break down as things go on, so for me keeping the momentum going is one of the thing that makes a difference between success and failure.

Michael : What do you think that the value of a good change leader agent is? And what do you think they are actually responsible for?

Derek : For me, a project has to have a good change leader, and that will make the difference between a projects success, a projects failure or something in the middle which is a challenge project, a project that does quite deliver all of the benefits or goes over budget.

And for me a change project will only be successful if it has the right change leader at the top. And the change leader is not just about delivering the tasks in the project plan, it's about delivering the end result that is needed within the organisation. So a change agent should think about the real reasons for doing this, and what organisational change needs to happen, not about getting the individual tasks done within the project.

So in terms of responsibilities, for me there are three key areas in terms of change agents responsibilities, one is appropriate stakeholder engagement and support, and I've mentioned stakeholders a few times now, and for me that is a fundamental point.

The second one is around insuring that a business is ready for the implementation of the project is geared up, it's not just implemented and done to people, the organisation is ready to roll.

And also being accountable for the achieved benefits. You need to make sure that people are responsible for the results and benefits that you're looking to achieve through the project.

Michael : Is it actually the change agent that's responsible for achieving them?

Derek : It's not but the change agent has a significant influence in the organisational achievements and benefits someone needs to be flying the flag for that change, to be really strong about the fact that we can achieve these things, and bringing about the influence within the organisation, so that the stakeholders are actually committed to it, as much as the change agent, but you've got to have a fore-runner in my view, and that's the change agent.

Michael : Before I ask for your contact details, is there anything else involved in running a change project that you feel is important that you feel we haven't covered?

Derek : We started earlier on talking about needing to think about sustainment. The other point that I've been working with organisations is often they do not consider the full impact, or opportunity that a change project has.

So either this leads to a project not achieving it's full success, or that it doesn't actually leverage the full value that it could out of the project, and so it's a bit of a missed opportunity, I'd really challenge an organisation to understand the full range of opportunities that a change project has.*

Michael : Could you give and example of that?

Derek : For example, in some of the customer service programmes that I've worked within an organisation has looked to improve processes, in terms of getting more efficiency so they can maybe reduce the cost of servicing their customers, but what they haven't done is look at it in the light of - Actually to change the process in this way, it will save us money, but if we did this bit slightly different we could actually improve the customer service and have a direct link with improvements in customer loyalty.

So they've gone very much with their improve efficiency when actually if they looked slightly broader they could have improved efficiency and also improved customer loyalty which lead to improved profitability. And it's just thinking slightly broader and looking at the true opportunity.

Michael : I totally understand that Ok, Would you give your contact details?

Derek : People can contact me through email, and my email address is Derekbishop@abeoconsulting.co.uk or they can phone me, and the easiest number to phone me on is my mobile which is 07814038017

Michael : Thank you very much Derek.

Derek : You're welcome Michael. ]]> Change Management michaelbeale@ppimk.com http://nlp-experts.org/change-management/13-derek-bishop-interview.html http://nlp-experts.org/change-management/4-nick-bush-interview.html Sat, 12 Jan 2008 19:51:00 GMT *NLP Change Management - Nick Bush* Change Management - Discussion between Michael Beale and Nick Bush of Open Chord Ltd, October 2007. ... NLP Change Management - Nick Bush

Change Management - Discussion between Michael Beale and Nick Bush of Open Chord Ltd, October 2007.





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http://www.nlp-expert.co.uk/change_management/nick.mp3



Nick - Thanks Michael, my name is Nick Bush and I'm an independent consultant and I help organisations clarify and organise their strategies and their business transformation.

Michael - What experience do you have that gives you credibility as a change agent?

Nick - I spent around about ten years in working in the area of change management - business reengineering, transforming IT departments, and various other functions - as a consultant, and then for the last nine years I've been putting into practice those techniques, whilst working for a large UK telecoms provider.

Michael - With that experience, what do you define a change project as, and how you would define a transformation change project?

Nick - I think that's a very interesting distinction to make. I think we can define a change project as a project in which you're changing an aspect of your business or organisation over time, and like any project it's got a start and an end date, and some measures of success. But the distinction between that and a transformational change project is that a transformational change project is one where you're changing your organisation so it is completely different from the one that you set out with.

So, if for example, you're a large telecoms company and you have a legacy of working primarily as a telephone services provider, and then over the years you make the transition to the world of internet and broadband, and then ultimately to IT and home entertainment services. As we can observe in the UK market today.

Michael - If you're advising a key sponsor at the beginning of a change or transformational change project about how to maximise the projects success, what tips would you give them right at the beginning?

Nick - I think that before you look at that, a really frank conversation is needed with the sponsor, to really understand if he or she is really up for this. If it's a transformational change project then it's immensely easy - and I'm just as guilty of this as anybody else - to underestimate the scale of the effort and investment required to make a major or radical change.

And also, for the sponsors themselves, they're very likely to have to go through a rather profound personal transformation because if you're seeking a really radical way of changing the way that an organisation works, then it's very likely that whatever's brought them to this leadership and success that they have today, is probably inappropriate and insufficient to bring them into the new challenges that they'll soon be facing.

Michael - Would you talk bit more about that?

Nick - Yes, I've seen this quite recently in the work that I've done, the leaders of that change and the leaders of that organisation will talk a good game, if you like - but it's very hard for the other people in that organisation to really pick up that anything has fundamentally changed in the way that those organisational efforts are lead from the top.

Therefore it doesn't really filter down effectively to the people who are actually able to put into effect that change.

Michael - What do you think are the biggest reasons that change projects fail?
Nick - I think that there are about five in total - I'm sure that if I thought about it some more I could come up with a lot more! But this issue of sponsor engagement is absolutely fundamental, as I said before.

And in one project I was running, we did have the are you up for this? conversation about three months into the project. It was at the point where we had done enough analysis on the problem to articulate the degree of transformation required, and where the efforts really needed to be focused.

At that point the sponsor, because of a number of things that were happening to them elsewhere, backed a way from it and took a path that was less radical and less aggressive, and obviously didn't achieve the results that we thought that they could achieve.
So that's the key thing to get right - and then to ensure the sponsor then stays engaged all the way through the process.

The second one to get right is - it's very easy to think that it's enough to communicate in one way, with people who are effected by the change and not get and listen to their feedback, and indeed not get their ideas about how best the change can be effected within the organisation.

Another area where things can go wrong is in the area of symbolic and tangible change. People need to see a change effort take effect quickly, or some effect so that even if the overall goals of the program aren't achieved, then there will be some symbolic or tangible change in the way things are organised. So people say ah yes, we've started! This is a different era that we're now moving into.

Michael - What else is there? You've got the sponsor one, carrying the message to the stake-holders, you've got this symbolic and tangible change, what else do you think is important?

Nick - I think another area to get right is giving people enough tools to effect a change. So that's both in terms of a sensible structure of progress for putting a change program across, so that could be something as obvious as a change office that's very visible, with different referencing tools, and rules of engagement for anything else that's happening within the organisation - and when I say tools I mean the changes in procedures, and maybe the ground rules of an organisation, as in what happens, and what is acceptable behaviour.

You might have an organisation where it's not the done thing to challenge what the senior manager says - so if you want to change that culture, to make it much more participative, to make means accelerate more quickly - and I say it, though it sounds ridiculous that an organisation might actually have to do this - but you might have to demonstrate how this could be done through demonstrative role play, or whatever.

Michael - any other reasons?

Nick - And the fifth one is communication, communication, communication in case that wasn't so obvious in the last four!

Michael - What do you think the value of a good change agent is? That's not the sponsor, that's the guy that's the catalyst in the middle of it all trying to make it happen.

Nick - Well many years ago I got a degree in Chemistry, so I know all about catalysts - I'm always desperately thinking of a metaphor that's perhaps a bit more original - but it's a good one, a change agent is literally a catalyst that cause the right kind of reaction to occur. And anyone that's any good at chemistry will know that there's two types of catalysts, there's the ones that get used up during the reaction, and those that remain the same - and obviously you'll want to be a little bit of the one that gets used up, but primarily the one that remains the same, hopefully learning from the experience.

But the main thing for the agent is that when they leave there's a very strong ownership to the point where - and it's always hard to do - where you've become an irrelevant. So there are points when you're not needed anymore. There different change agent roles within the organisation - leading the change, enacting the change and then reinforcing the change as the program or project continues.

Michael - Just to expand that a little - what do you think, and obviously it changes from context to context - what do you think are the main rolls of a change agent? What's he or she actually responsible for?

Nick - I think that the best thing that a change agent can do is to, and it sounds passive to say, is to reflect back to the organisation what they're doing, and you're almost there to hold them accountable for the changes they've agreed. And also to provoke, to do the thinking ahead that an organising can't do because they're still embedded in the various ways that current way of doing things. They have to challenge both the progress of the change, and the validity of goal that they're growing towards, Again, you're being a catalyst, but one that might be uncomfortable to have around if you're doing a job properly.

Michael - What difference do you think a good change agent makes to the project?

Nick - A lot, I'd say it's accountability. I've found that as an internal change agent to an organisation it's very easy to get distracted from the goals that you set out to achieve at the beginning of the project, because there's so much going on that you feel involved and part of as a member of that organisation. And as an external member of that organisation you don't have that gravitational pull, if you like, that you're able to stand back and hold the organisation on it's course that it's going to achieve.

Michael - Before I ask for your contact details, is there anything that you'd like to add that you think is important in change?

Nick - Yes, the fundamental change that you're trying to make in any change project is to liberate the creativity and initiative capacity in people. I was looking at something by Gary Havel from London business school, who's promoting the idea of management innovation, very firmly at the moment, and I think some surveys that he's carried out say that most people would say that they only get 60% at best of people motivation, and passion of people in their day jobs.

So there's a great untapped resource out there, for people to bring in much more in terms of creativity and input into their daily work, and a good change effort will seek to raise the game of an organisation in terms of it's innovative capability.

Michael - Excellent, and how can people contact you?

Nick - My email address, it's nick@openchord.co.uk and my website is Open Chord Ltd

Michael - Excellent, thank you very much.

Nick - Thanks a lot Michael. ]]> Change Management michaelbeale@ppimk.com http://nlp-experts.org/change-management/4-nick-bush-interview.html