PowerPoint presentation

Hierarchy of change:

The need for attention from senior management increases as the contemplated change moves from lower left to upper right in the diagram below:

Kotter defines eight stages for the implementation of successful change:

• establish a sense of urgency
• create a guiding coalition
• develop a vision and strategy
• communicate the change vision
• empower employees
• generate short term wins
• consolidate gains for more change
• anchor new approaches

with eight complementary errors which prove to be barriers to the effective implementation of change:

• too much complacency
• under-powered coalition
• under-estimating power of vision
• seriously under-communicating vision
• permitting obstacles to block change
• failing to generate short term wins
• declaring victory too soon
• not anchoring changes in the culture

and five consequences arising from the eight errors:

• new strategies not implemented well
• gains do not achieve expected synergies
• long time-scales and high costs
• down-sizing does not control costs
• anticipated results not realised

In response to the question "How do you manage change ?",Fred Nickols (12 September 2004) replied
"The honest answer is that you manage it pretty much the same way you'd manage anything else of a turbulent, messy, chaotic nature…"

1. The first thing you do is jump in.
• You can't do anything about it from the outside.
2. A clear sense of mission or purpose is essential.
• The simpler the mission statement the better.
• “Kick ass in the marketplace” is a whole lot more meaningful than “Respond to market needs with a range of products and services that have been carefully designed and developed to compare so favourably in our customers’ eyes with the products and services offered by our competitors that the majority of buying decisions will be made in our favour.”
3. Build a team.
• "Lone wolves" have their uses, but managing change isn't one of them.
• On the other hand, the right kind of lone wolf makes an excellent temporary team leader.
4. Maintain a flat organizational team structure and rely on minimal and informal reporting requirements.
5. Pick people with relevant skills and high energy levels.
• You'll need both.
6. Toss out the rule book.
• Change, by definition, calls for a configured response, not adherence to prefigured routines.
7. Shift to an action-feedback model.
• Plan and act in short intervals. Do your analysis on the fly. No lengthy up-front studies. Remember the hare and the tortoise.
8. Set flexible priorities.
• You must have the ability to drop what you're doing and tend to something more important.
9. Treat everything as a temporary measure.
• Don’t “lock in” until the last minute, and then insist on the right to change your mind.
10. Ask for volunteers.
• You’ll be surprised at who shows up.
• You’ll be pleasantly surprised by what they can do.
11. Find a good “straw boss” or team leader and stay out of his or her way.
12. Give the team members whatever they ask for — except authority.
• They’ll generally ask only for what they really need in the way of resources.
• If they start asking for authority, that’s a signal they’re headed toward some kind of power-based confrontation and that spells trouble. Nip it in the bud!
13. Concentrate dispersed knowledge.
• Start and maintain an issues logbook.
• Let anyone go anywhere and talk to anyone about anything.
• Keep the communications barriers low, widely spaced, and easily hurdled.
• Initially, if things look chaotic, relax — they are

Remember, the task of change management is to bring order to a messy situation, not pretend that it’s already well organized and disciplined.

Recommended reading

• JP Kotter, Leading Change, Harvard Business School Press, Boston MA, 1996.  ISBN 0-87584-747-1.  PU CSH Library.

URLs for change management (checked as live on 27 February 2005):

• Original thinking with Janus Global
• Fred Nickols: Change Management - A Primer
• Richard M DiGeorgio & Associates: Managing Change
• Change Management Resource Library
• Welcome to the Change Management Toolbook
• Change Management - the Columbo theory