Always change a winning team
As the end of 2015 is near, many of us make plans what they would like to change during the next coming year. Changes in personal and in professional life, changes big or small. Many businesses and organizations too plan for change when a new calendar (or fiscal) year is coming. But why should you change at all? Well, most likely because you want to improve something, right? Or make your organization stronger and better resistant to changes that are having influence on your company outside of your control.
It Is Not the Strongest of the Species that Survives But the Most Adaptable - Charles Darwin
We all know that change is inevitable; it’s a simple fact of evolution. And actually we should embrace change because resisting it will not be a successful approach in the long run. The saying goes, “never change a winning team” but is that really the best possible advice? I beg the difference and argue; always change a winning team. Let’s first take a look at some of the key components how to manage change.
Strategy: As with most things, it all starts with your strategy. Where are you as a person or company now, what would you like to achieve and why, what are your goals and how do you want to get there. Consequently the approach connected to your envisioned change starts with your strategy as well.
Organize: How will you organize this change? If this envisioned change is just for yourself alone, what do you need to do, to achieve to make this happen? How will you organize yourself to make it possible? The very same is true for organizations that are planning change. Who should be involved in the early days of the strategy related to the change, how will this change platform be structured, what kind of planning and tools are needed, when will the people that are involved be informed about the upcoming changes, what different stages will have to take place, how will these different steps be managed, who is the project owner and leader of these changes, etc.
Motivate: When you plan your change and start rolling out your activities associated to these changes, you will encounter different individuals and various steps these people will go through during the change process. Initially you may come across the so called saboteurs during their “unaware” and “aware” phase within the change process. Next you will have to deal with the “fence sitters” who understand the change and the need for that change. And lastly you will be facing those who are fully committed and who believe and act in line with the planned and projected changes. During all these phases activities correlated to motivate people involved is absolutely key. Motivation starts with sharing ideas, communication about goals and objectives, explaining the different steps involved and especially provide information what’s in it for the people involved. After all, from the get-go all individuals will think what these changes will mean for them (WIIFM: “what’s in it for me”). In some cases incentives can help making the changes happen.
Teamwork: Together we achieve more. Through combined effort, with as many people on board of the change process the intended changes have better chance of being successful. Therefore set up a taskforce managing the changes within your organization. Have a combined action plan, revisit this action plan and the progress frequently and double check if your target group is indeed aligned, understanding the changes and that they are ready to execute following these changes.
Improve: In the true spirit of continuous improvement and Kaizen philosophy; improve, improve and improve. Plan, do, check and act. Through all the various phases, monitor actual progress, monitor where you are and make changes where needed as improvement is one of the cornerstones of your change process.
Measure: And lastly, again with continuous improvement and Kaizen in our mind, measure results. Create certain KPI’s that will show you if you are on track, where to focus on when you are not on track and what to do to countermeasure to get yourself back on track. Create dashboards to offer rudimentary snapshots and if you like, construct 2nd level overviews to provide the possibility to zoom in further to explore more detailed levels of information.
The only thing harder than making it to the top is staying there. In order to stay at the top even winning teams ask for change. Therefore successful sport teams like FC Barcelona, Bayern Munich, LA Lakers, Chicago Bulls, New York Yankees or the New Zealand All Blacks buy or select new starting and substitute players to keep the team hungry for success, to be better prepared for external influences. All in order to continuously improve themselves and stay at the top. If your organization is not at the top yet, most likely the need for change is even higher. When you plan for change, I trust the following steps described will be useful. Now and in the upcoming new year. Merry Christmas and an amazingly successful and happy New Year !
