Leading change to deliver performance

The five stages of successful change management. By Simon Court, chief executive of consultancy, Value Partnership.

Picture caption: Simon Court

Change is an everyday event in corporate life. What a cliche! Why then do the vast majority of organisational changes still fail to deliver some or all of their objectives? Following the steps in these five stages will significantly increase your chances of success.

Scoping the challenge

Have a sense of the difference you want to make and what you want to achieve.
 
To do this, you should:

• Find a primary sponsor, perhaps the chief executive or a fellow manager, who can act as a mentor for the process. Change leaders do not want to be on their own. The sponsor can monitor your progress and provide advice and, if necessary, funding. There needs to be a contract between the sponsor and the change leader – a clear understanding about what the goals are and what needs to happen to achieve them.
• Agree with your sponsor on what success would look like. Test this against the business plan. 
• Be aware of the impact of your change on other parts of the business. If one business unit is trying to improve productivity by reducing the cost of sales while another is trying to increase revenues, you might have a conflict. 
• Explore the time frames and resources required for the change. Managers are often remarkably unrealistic about the scale, the timing and the cost of the challenge. Will this take five months or five years?
• Be clear about your role as a change leader and the role of the sponsor. You must be realistic about how much of your time, energy and skill must go in to make it a success. 
   

Getting organised

Decide how you are going to work on the change: do you need a steering group or a project team? Don’t be too rigid in your approach at this point.

• Talk to stakeholders early on. How do they view the proposed changes? What’s in it for them? Open up the debate: are you taking the right approach? This should influence your approach to the change.
• Consider how much commitment you need, and from whom. Do you need the chief executive on board (if he or she isn’t already your sponsor)? Is it enough to get a few opinion leaders or do you need the majority? Your answers will influence the next stage of your work.
• Unearth stumbling blocks to implementation. For example, year-end may be coming up when nobody has time to get involved.
• Demonstrate personal leadership. Show how committed you are to making change happen. You might have to change your own organisation first to show others how serious you are about improving performance. The first signs of success or failure usually emerge at this stage.

Creating a road map

If stage two goes well, you will be able to draw up a plan of action. This will show at a high level the routes and destination. At this stage:

• Refine a shared view of success with your team. This view should map out your approach and the activities required to achieve the change.
• Build-in enough dialogue and communication. Without this, failure is likely. Keep the stakeholders informed through the whole process - not every microscopic change, but those that will fundamentally affect the way the business is managed. 
• Decide who needs to do what. For example, if you are launching a programme to develop senior finance managers into business partners, who will manage it? What processes (for example, recruitment) will need to be re-evaluated as a result of the changing roles?
• Review your leadership skills and consider who else you can bring in to complement your strengths. 
• When tracking your progress, keep your picture of success in mind. For example, in transforming a finance function, you might want to monitor how many finance directors in the company are building business partner relationships.
• Connect your timetable for activities and implementation with the wider business plan and the resources required. 
• Go back to the primary sponsor, get their support for the road map, and agree what they need to contribute. 
   

Managing action

Underneath your high-level objectives you will have specific work streams, including a communication plan. Those responsible for various aspects of the change programme need to compile their own work stream plans. There should also be an agreement about how the quality of the work will be judged. You should:

• Ensure that people see results. If you can demonstrate progress early on, you’ll generate momentum for the change. For example, pilot the change in a particular business unit. If successfully implemented, this will provide momentum to the whole company.
• Meet regularly with the change team and offer support. You also need to challenge them. It is important to get the right balance of challenge and support.
• Carry out regular reviews based on feedback from stakeholders and advice from senior colleagues. It is sometimes hard for the members of the change team to see what’s really happening so it is helpful to talk to colleagues. It is also useful to have a sounding board, someone who is not your sponsor.

Completion and review

Most organisations are poor at this final stage, particularly the celebration and recognition of achievements. But it is vital to sustained performance improvement.

• Start to embed changes in the organisation. The work of the change team is finished and it is now about transferring ownership to the rest of the business.
• Evaluate the success of the change by involving the stakeholders. For example, in transforming the finance function, you could survey the finance directors around the company.
• Learn lessons for the next change. If you’re interested in being a good change leader‚ you’ll be keen to get feedback on how well you are leading.
• It’s essential to say well done and thank you to those involved. It sustains commitment and highlights those prepared to go the extra mile.

February 2006