5 Tips to make Organisational Change Easier

Making organizational change easier will result in improved change velocity and efficacy. In this context velocity is not the same as speed; it is about alignment and complimentary actions, the multiplier effect. Efficacy is, according to the Oxford Language Dictionary (accessed 30/7/23), the ability to produce a desired or intended result.

Think about the organisational change you are currently working. How much of your professional energy goes into minimising organisational change efforts not aligned with the current agreed change plan, resolving conflicting deliverables, ensuring commitments are kept and when change work is stated as complete it is 100% and not “near/good enough”?

Fairly recently I was at a meeting where progress was being discussed using a RAG (Red, Amber, Green) status. There was a heated discussion when one senior individual started to talk about shades of Red to avoid reality-based reporting - this individual did not want to admit commitments were not completed.

Here is a Top Tip: beware of "watermelons" in your delivery of velocity and efficacy focused change management. Watermelons have the potential to appear in front-end loading, every plan and iteration, process application, and every interaction within change delivery. Watermelon is a metaphor for a lack of authenticity and transparency.

Building on the RAG/Traffic Light example above, watermelons are green on the outside and red on the inside!  Change Management practitioners should be extremely vigilant as to the emergence and acceptance of “watermelons” in all the constituent parts of change delivery.

What follows are some areas that over years as a change management practitioner, have proven to facilitate, make easier, the delivery of effective change across cultures, organisation types and challenging situations.

When examining your organisation's history and culture, a key area to focus on is its ability and willingness to change.

This is where barriers, filters, and challenges in delivering effective change can emerge. Worryingly, this is where these influencing factors are often ignored and/or denied due to the “honeymoon effect” or unfounded optimism that this time it will be different.

There is potential for significant denial from Board members and consequently their reporting lines as to the organisational history and culture. This stated view is almost always more positive than fact-based reality.

As an example, working with an organisation in 2021 that was about to re-introduce SCRUM to improve project delivery. I was in conversation with a senior manager who happened to say that 6 years earlier he had made a presentation to the Board regarding implementing SCRUM. This implementation failed. I asked how many of the previous conditions contributing to the failed adoption of SCRUM existed now, 6 years later. His answer: all of them! He was not hopeful for success this time.

How often does the Good Ship Change set off without an authentic and transparent plan supported by appropriate supplies? Embarking on organisational change does not mean that everything required is in-place or necessarily will be, due to an evolving delivery environment. What it should mean is an objective assessment of the situation as it exists at the point of decision is clearly understood and accepted by the Board and/or Steering Committee. A robust, reality-based business case including a PESTEL (Political, Environmental, Social, Technical, Economic, Legal) analysis should be employed here. These should provide the decision-making basis for go/no go regarding the change programme.

This analysis must include an authentic and transparent Risk and Issue Assessment with the associated process for a rigorous approach to risk and issue management. (No watermelons!)   

TOP TIP: as a change manager it is a useful strategy throughout change delivery not to assume everyone involved has the same understanding of the terms used e.g., what is the accepted definitions for Risk and Issue within the organisation you are now working? Are ITIL or the Praxis Framework definitions the good practice glossary of terms complimenting the Effective Change Management Handbook content?

This is an adaption from the established Banking principle where the assumption is made by Banks that not all depositors will require their deposits returned in full and at the same time. This is where the “fraction” applies. What fraction of deposits should be expected to be withdrawn when and the decision, what does the bank do with the “fraction” of deposits it expects to remain? Both the mystery and magic of Banking!

An output from the change Business Case, PESTEL, and Risk and Issue Assessment, a resource requirement is likely to be identified. Almost certainly, there will be a gap between the resource requirement and available resources.

This is where fractional resourcing comes into play and potentially increases the difficulty and challenge of delivering change. There is likely to be an organisational tension between resourcing business as usual and resourcing the change programme. This is where “fractions” of the same person are allocated to multiple tasks often with different managers. I realise that this is moving towards matrix management which is a perfectly sound organisational approach if done effectively. Unfortunately, most organisations say they operate matrix management but on closer inspection, have not established the required management structure and supporting process to make the productivity gains expected and factored into the change delivery plan.

Associated with fractional resourcing is the absolute necessity for a maturity assessment of available internal resource and what resource, numbers, and skills, may be required to be hired, contracted, or partnered to the change project for change and value delivery.

This resource profile is not only about numbers. Rather the skills profile required to effectively deliver the plan. Both resource numbers and skills are required. The criteria of capability, competency, and capacity related to the detailed task requirements coming from the change plan should prove useful here to establish a robust resource requirement profile over the change delivery. It also provides an opportunity to establish resource-based risks and issues with mitigation actions as required. The commitment from all levels, Board to department line managers, to supporting the change resource requirement is a critical challenge and potential major difficulty for change delivery.  

Most organisations have a planning process, varying in frequency, method, and complexity.

The potential to increase difficulty in change management delivery due to the existing planning process being used for organisational change management without a reality-based, rigorous process review is significant.

Business As Usual activities will use existing processes. Any change management activity is not BAU. It follows that existing planning and other processes should be reviewed as part of change management front-end loading regarding being fit for purpose supporting BAU and CM.

This proposition is often too much for many organisations. This creates a “force fit” of the change programme into existing planning and management processes. This approach may prove neither efficient nor effective. 

Any decision should be made consciously rather than a habit-driven choice.

A further consideration necessary for mitigation of difficulties and challenges is creating or at least considering how fixed or rigid the planning process requires to be. This relates to the inherent dynamics in most organisations’ operating environments. If a plan can be accepted as a useful and necessary tool, based on our best guess at a point in time. It follows that the plan and its associated elements should be reviewed, updated, and communicated as the change plan assumptions change, based on PESTEL and organisational dynamics.

This could be part of an AGILE approach to organisational change management with a clear focus on minimising work in progress, delivering valuable work with velocity.  

TOP TIP: related to a reality-based, evolving change plan delivering stakeholder expectation, when was the last time stakeholder engagement with any evolving expectations was undertaken. This engagement should document any changed, transitioning, or deleted expectations mapped to existing requirements and downstream implications.

The change plan should be updated with any deliverable/resource implications communicated to the entire stakeholder population potentially reducing the opportunity for “I didn’t know” coming into play with associated “watermelons”.

Here’s a thought: not everybody needs to know everything for stuff to get done! Let me add some qualification to the remark.

Depending on the culture of the organisation, status may be associated with knowing stuff. This status may restrict the free flow of information with consequent effect on valuable work getting done with velocity.

As a change management professional, front-end loading and ongoing change management process review should include the efficacy of the overall and individual parts of the change management communication process.

TOP TIP: do the people who need to know get what they need to know on time with the accuracy required for them to be their best professional selves regardless of place in the hierarchy?

TOP TIP 2: if you were to ask the people in your organisation what the change programme was about and how the changes affected them…. would they know, could they repeat key messages and had anyone asked them about the change programme other than you as the change professional?