Change fatigue, kissing frogs and eating elephants

You have to kiss a lot of frogs to find your prince (why is it never princess?). This is the same with change in a lot of organisations - you have to make a lot of changes to get to your optimal position, some will be successful and others won't. Sad really that we continually flog ourselves in our business lives to get to a position of 'optimality', but achieving this is often a meandering slog.

And worse, we're never sure when we've kissed enough frogs and found enough princes/princesses to achieve our goal - perhaps you can never have enough, perhaps we don't know what our goal is, or someone keeps moving the goalposts?

That's enough about frogs. The real point of this note is to try to write down the reasons why organisations experience perpetual change, and what can be done to minimise change if appropriate. I hope readers have their own ideas to add.

Change fatigue is experienced by most of us at points in our professional (and personal) lives. You can see it in other people when they roll their eyes, slump their shoulders, drag their feet, gossip and whinge etc upon announcement of another change - somewhat unexpectedly the small changes to things like organisational design often get the same reactions as more significant changes (shock, anger, etc). People are people - they have egos and personalities and whatever is changing around them they're looking at the following questions;

• what's in it for me?
• was I asked?
• when and how?
• how does it really affect the things I care about?
• why is it happening yet again?

Let's look at why perpetual change happens;

• because it can. Cynically it gives managers something to do. I don't really think this is common in the real world though, it is often about 'eating the elephant' - lots of changes ('bites') need to be made to enable the ultimate goal ('eating the whole elephant') to be achieved.
• Using the elephant analogy further, do we really know what the scale of the elephant is? Is there a corporate strategy that elaborates the desired end-state, and what the journey is to get there in terms of underlying operational strategies ? If this isn't clear, then there may be false starts, and false end, leading to the perception of piecemeal change and hence change fatigue.
• Will the elephant stand still? Clearly a lot of changes are foisted upon organisations by regulators, governments, local authorities, professional bodies etc, and these cannot always be planned for. Some of these changes will be planned, others will not. There are a number of other external factors that cause organisations to have to implement unscheduled change, such as competitive pressures, new products, business opportunities, M&A and the like.
• How many elephants do we have? Nursing a herd is harder than just one, particularly when the want to move at different rates, go off on diversions, sleep and eat at different times.... The elephants will always need a different degree of nursing too - how much management time does each project require, and can they be managed collectively?

I'm sure that I could continue talking about elephants further, but the point is that there are good and meaningful reasons often why there is perpetual change (sometimes there is not), and I'll list the things that can be done to minimise the change fatigue.

• Ensure that you have a strategy and a lucid desired end-state. And communicate it so that everyone knows where they are going and can learn to deal with it, and participate! If you tell a group of people that their roles are to be outsourced, then tell them everything (as far as you can), get them to meet their counterparts, understand the implications, get involved in the transaction and transition etc, as there will be a huge number of things that have to happen before the final transfer happens. It is in everyone's best interest that the change is a success.
• Have detailed operational plans and strategies that map into corporate level strategy. Makes sure that the managers responsible stick to agreed plans.
• Manage all change in one place - you should aim to get one view of all change across your organisation, and manage it as a cohesive whole at a macro-level. If anyone wants to change their plans, make an announcement or accelerate/decelerate, there is then a means of governance and ensuring that the implications of any adjustment are considered. This is a programme management or change director role.
• Ensure that there is clarity of sponsorship - knowing that there is a senior sponsor (or the Board for significant change programmes) overseeing what is happening helps calm nerves. But sponsorship must be earnest and visible, otherwise it will not help.
• Continue to communicate to all stakeholders throughout - once you've set along a path, keep coming back and telling stakeholders what is going on, and ensuring that there is two-way communication, websites, announcement plans and so on. This stops a lot of the worry, angst, gossip and wasted effort. If plans change, then communicate to people as soon as you can. If new things need to happen, communicate as soon as you can. You need to ensure that all key relationships are managed explicitly - if relationships fail, then you are more likely to fail.
• Design your plans such that there are 'islands of stability' - periods where nothing new happens, everyone has a rest, focusses on the job. This will pay dividends.

Of course, the list above is just a list of things to do for well-managed change initiatives, but that is what makes them well-managed and what helps prevent change fatigue. It is people that stop change, so if you don't deal with the people aspects of change there is the real risk that your change programme will fail.

The perils of not dealing wth the soft stuff - an IT perspective

John-Paul Kamath writing for Computer Weekly has laid down various opinions on the importance in managing stakeholders from an IT viewpoint.


I've blogged on this before, but the bottom line in the article is that if you fail to get people behind your development it will fail. There isn't a huge amount of further insight that anyone can give.

Neglecting to manage change..a poignant article

Dr Andrew M Jones of Lancaster University has published an interesting article in this month's Consulting Times entitled 'Neglect cultural issues at your peril'. Paraphrasing hugely, the article talks about the need to map cultural change aspects to changes in strategy, and indeed that shareholder value is often destroyed where people issues are not dealt with up front.

It surprises me somewhat that there is a need for this type of article in the professional press, and that the enlightenment is still only drifting through amongst leaders of large organisations (see previous posts). Dr Jones quotes Merck's CEO, Dick Clark

“The fact is culture eats strategy for lunch. You can have a good strategy in place, but if you don’t have the culture and enabling systems that allow you to successfully implement that strategy, the culture of theorganisation will defeat the strategy,”

I summarise this a 'people stop change'. You can have a great strategy, all the technology and cash that you could ever wish for, but if you don't manage your stakeholders you are setting yourself up to fail.

Let's think about a mythical organisation that has a new strategy for world domination. What could go wrong? Here's a short list;

• top managers don't understand the strategy, or indeed buy into it - they carry on working as before;
• clerical people didn't understand the previous strategy (any of them?), and don't understand this one or care - they carry on working as before;
• middle managers (the 'nougat' layer) don't worry about strategy, they just need to maintain their bonuses by turning out widgets - they carry on working as before;
• and so on.

People stop change - you cannot avoid addressing these people issues as a fundamental part of whatever your strategic change is - otherwise there is a real risk that nothing will change, or if it does it won't endure. Culture is a difficult thing to change overnight of course, and a huge amount of planning and execution effort needs to be applied, starting at the same point that the consultants come in to help you map out your change plans.

What isn't change management?

There's loads of confusion out there about what change management is (or isn't), so here's a summary;

It is;

- doing whatever needs to be done to make an event/change happen, with focus on getting all of the practical aspects and people aspects aligned. One needs to ensure that the change happens and sticks - it is people that stop change, not technology. Change management in this sense applies to cultural change, organisational design, behavioural change etc.

It is not;

- Change management in an ITIL, IT, project sense - this is better labelled change control and/or configuration management whereby the control is ensuring that all aspects of a change (to an IT component, a form, process etc) happens, rather than whether people buy into the change and it actually endures.

Rant over.

Networking to deliver change

There is a lot of fuss around on the on-line networking sites at the moment that is basically asking 'what's the the point of networking'. Here's the response I gave to a LinkedIn question on this subject...

"...The point of networking in my view is to build trusted relationships, providing a support and 'friendship' infrastructure - you have to give, give, give and occasionally you get to 'take'. Building these relationships might lead to sales, but it may not be direct sales, rather leads and referrals from folks that trust you to deliver. "

If we apply this to managing change, answering the question of 'what's the point of networking in managing change', I wouldn't change my answer much...

"The point of networking IN MANAGING CHANGE in my view is to build trusted relationships, providing a support and 'friendship' infrastructure - you have to give, give, give INFORMATION and occasionally you get to 'take' THE DESIRED (BEHAVIOURAL) CHANGES. Building these relationships might lead to CHANGE, but it may not be direct, rather STEPS ALONG THE PATH from folks that trust you to deliver. "

The point is that we need to build relationships with people, and build a network of colleagues, suppliers, partners etc that can help us achieve the ultimate goals of our projects - the enduring change that creates the value required. When I worked for a major corporate it was clear that my network helped me deliver, and working on a shorter-term assignments still requires these relationships to be built-up, only more quickly.

I deliberately left the term 'stakeholders' off of my list above - depending upon what you need to achieve, the stakeholder groups that are most affected by the change are probably those where your networking skills will be most valued. You need to nurse those affected by the change, whether as the sponsoring community (who might get fired if it fails!) or those directly impacted through the new systsem, company acquisition, outsource or whatever. It is ultimately 'people that stop change', so you need to ensure that you understand their fears, worries, crises and how you might steer them in the direction of accepting and embracing the change.

There are of course a lot of techniques to help you do this, but that is for another day!!

Project Management and Change Management

There is a debate going on in another forum about the use of structured project management methodologies (eg; Prince 2) versus the management of change. We need to be clear that project management is not the same as change management - managing the project is part of managing the change, but it is a relatively mechanistic process, providing the assurance of technical delivery and to some extent the delivery of the benefits. Change management is about delivering the behavioural change that ensures that the benefits endure, that the technical changes are accepted, and that the expected outcomes are achieved.

Another way of looking at this is that there are many more people involved in delivering the change (the sponsor, Board, managers etc), whereas the project processes can be delivered by the Project Manager (who, if they are enlightened/experienced will be focussed on delivering the change as well as the technical delivery).

One thing that annoys me is where some third party suppliers/partners (in IT particularly) tend to come along after winning a contract and expect that they can simply implement their bit of technology and it will work and be accepted - they often get a shock and then cost overruns etc, and consequently relationships start to fail between supplier and customer....the real world is difficult!

Here's a link to a basic project/change role comparison from the change management learning center if you're interested.

Big business - talking about the importance of people

Well, well, well. On today's BBC 'Working Lunch' programme (I do not spend all day watching television, honest), Ben Verwaayen CEO of BT spoke about the importance of people in this FTSE 100 company - watch the video. Mr Verwaayen was excellent, and tied BT's business strategies into the 100000 people globally who have to deliver them. He clearly has a grip on what makes companies tick, and the need to get BT's people behind him. What amazed me, was that it is rare that you hear a big-company CEO talking like this (and the interviewer's preamble outlines Mr Verwaayen's credentials from a people point of view).

Excellent interview if you're interested in change in the real world!

The whole point is to deliver value

I'm an accountant - but I'm not boring! I've admitted it, owned up to it. Done.

This admission is important - the reason that we implement projects and programmes is to deliver value......isn't it? So you would expect me to say nothing matters other than the financial impacts of the change activity. What will implementation expenses be, when and how are benefits realised, how can costs be capitalised, who has got the budget etc...

OK I would say all of those things - in the business world we have to deliver value to all our stakeholders, but we also have to think that there may not only be a financial business case that we need worry about, but all of the other impacts of our projects. Take the petrochemicals sector for instance - a project that develops relatively environmentally-friendly biofuels (see the UK Chancellor of the Exchequer's comments on this in yesterday's pre-budget report) deliver value in other ways, not just financial. This is important - selling the change on the basis of environmental benefit may be more relevant to some stakeholders than 'we save £xm over 10 years'. We need to determine all of the benefits and make sure that they're sufficiently developed to get people to accept the change. It may be possible to tweak a programme of work to (cheaply) gain additional benefits that make the change more palatable. Whichever way, it is critical that the benefits case is worked up in detail at the beginning of the project rather than the end!

Accelerating change

I had an email today about a global company that needed someone to help the finish a programme that had been running for two years - it sounded as if it had faltered and they need change consulting effort to move it to its conclusion.

Two years into the programme and they start worrying about the people impacts!! This reminded me of a great book I've read a couple of times - 'Five frogs on a log' by Mark L Feldman and Michael F Spratt. The book is about acceleration of change, particularly in an post-mergers and acquisitions situation. The title comes from the story about five frogs sitting on a log, one says 'shall we jump', and all agree that they should - of course they don't actually jump because saying you'll do something is differrent to actually doing it.

Back to the point, Feldman and Spratt use a great analogy for change - they liken it to removal of a sticking plaster; remove the plaster slowly and the pain lasts longer than pulling it off quickly - 'rip, sting, gone'.

Not all projects can be completed quickly, but you need to move those affected to an 'acceptance' position as quickly as possible. This is a measured process - in some situations you may not be able to talk to people as soon as you would like (eg; redundancy) - but that doesn't prevent detailed analysis and planning.

What normally happens in a change programme?

People talk to me about what I expect will happen in their change programme...the short answer is 'who knows?', but that isn't terribly professional or practical!

As it is people that stop change, make change happen, embrace change it is not very easy to say that one person, cadre of people, team etc will hold a specific view and will take a particular position. But if nothing is done to get people to support a change then, unremarkably, there is a real chance that nothing will happen. How many times in our professional careers have we seen that an IT system enhancement is delivered, but all the users do is carry on working in the 'old way'? How long did it take some colleagues to use email, rather than secretary-typed memos!

People have egos, issues, personal crises, work ethics, social, political and religious viewpoints, hangovers....they all need nurturing to work through a change. They will go through various stages dependent on their starting point (based on Elisabeth Kubler-Ross' work );

• denial ('this can't be happening');
• anger ('why me - I won't let it happen');
• bargaining ('if I do this, what will it mean for me')
• depression ('Ok, I suppose that we have to do this')
• acceptance ('Let's just get on with it')

We can talk about whether these are actually the stages another day, but the principles are appropriate.

The challenges do not stop with an understanding of where individuals are with respect to working through the stages - because teams, unions, 'coffee-machine cliques' all have different views, as do managers, boards, shareholders, customers - every individual stakeholder and stakeholder group will need to be managed through the change - and working out which individual or group can really prevent or delay or change and then dealing with it is really what makes managing change interesting. For some individuals or groups a simple website with a feedback mechanism might be sufficient, others might need weekly briefings and monthly reports, others might reasonably be totally ignored - it is the structured approach to this, with regular monitoring via a 'heatmap' or similar that will help ensure that your change is successful. Alongside all of this, you have to ensure that the practical aspects of the change on a time/cost/quality basis is delivered successfully too!

Managing people, not technology - People stop change

I've just read a great article by David Ollerhead published in this week's Computer Weekly. In 'Manage People, Not Technology' he talks about how IT departments need to support an organisiation through change and indeed might be the catalyst for change (paraphrasing hugely). He also writes about the importance of gaining stakeholder support and ensuring that people support the change. It might be getting boring, but those who know me will have heard me say 'People Stop Change' about a billion times.

I have worked with IT departments to deliver real change to either themselves in terms of significant processes or to their user communities, and a perennial challenge is getting focus away from the technologies and onto the impacts of those technologies for users and the business at large. Overcoming resistance to change can be hugely challenging (and interesting!), and working out where the resistance is emanating from can be difficult.

I'm in the process of putting together a training event with the working title of 'Change for Techies' to bridge the gap in understanding and promote the need to ensure that the benefits of the technology are delivered. More on that another day no doubt.

Why change fails...People Stop Change

I thought (I know it is dangerous) that I would let you have a version of the article that I have published in the Association of Project Managers Yearbook. I figure that if this blog is going to be helpful to us all, I need to make it a bit of a magnum opus of change stuff, without the pithy slogans and ra-ra. This is real world stuff, that affects the professional and personal lives of real people. Anyway, enjoy...

Our business lives have become more pressured over recent years – computing and telecommunications have a lot to answer for in that the mobile phone has led to instantaneous communications wherever you are in the world, and email has lead to more interpersonal communications than ever. Computing power and complex software has lead to more questions being asked that would never have either mattered before or have been capable of being answered. A little test;

Rank the following 5 statements in the order that they apply to you;

1. I need more emails
2. I always have my mobile phone switched on
3. I prefer to send emails rather than pick up the phone
4. I’m being asked for ever more complex analyses
5. I work longer than ever hours

Depending on your role, 2-4 will be in the middle in any order, 5 will be at the top and 1 at the bottom. No empirical data of course, but we all know the realities. Whether this is right or wrong is the subject of a whole different essay!

Given all of this increasing pressure, managers are required to continuously improve productivity, grow or contract their operations, outsource or insource, new system here, manage the legacy system there, acquire and dispose. The working environment is continually changing inside organizations, and for our customers it isn’t any easier.

There isn’t always a willingness to accept the reality of change inside organizations, but since it’s a reality why do we always make it as hard as possible for ourselves. The key is that although we communicate more than ever, we aren’t good at managing the people-impacts of change. Picture the scene – you’ve been having sleepless nights since your boss asked you to install a new system. You’re no IT guru, but you know you are going to have to get new hardware, software, and train people. You’ll need consulting help to get it all done on time, select the software, implement, test, and make sure all the processes work.

Well, your sleepless nights are set to continue. Where did you think about the people affected? What do they think, feel? You recognize that you will have to train them, but have you thought about what they’ll be worrying about, how they make the current systems work with undocumented workarounds, how they’ll feel with a new flat screen monitor where their fluffy toys will fall off of the top! The people will be worrying about the ‘business case’ – new system = greater productivity = fewer jobs is the normal way these projects are justified isn’t it?

I could go on. Managers tend to think about processes, and good managers tend to think about people. There’s middle ground somewhere, but when you wonder during a sleepless night why your project is failing you’ll come to the following conclusions;

• The people are worrying about the business case, productivity has plummeted, and coffee consumption has increased.

• The people hate the new system, because the consultants you used didn’t ask them what they think (nor did you), how they use the current system and so on. Productivity has plummeted.

• The system doesn’t work – the old world has prevailed, the workarounds don’t work any more. Productivity has plummeted.

• Testing is inadequate, training is inadequate – no real consideration of the journey from current state to future state was given. Productivity has plummeted.

• Your peers are taking the opportunity to sneer and jibe – your productivity has plummeted.

• Your boss isn’t pleased…your productivity is ceasing…

Although the people think you don’t care, at least the flat screens leave more room for fluffy toys on the desk. Result!

People stop change. Systems are inanimate, buildings couldn’t care who occupies them, processes will operate if the right inputs are delivered….but people are a whole different matter. ‘Command and control’ regimes are not de rigueur and will not work in the modern business, so its no good expecting to ‘tell’ people what to do. They’ve got brains, personalities, and egos and all need nurturing.

People stop change. So what are you going to do about preventing them stopping your change programme? Talk, communicate, email – this is where we came in – use the technologies that you have available, involve people-affected in the decision processes, ask them what they think and believe.

Back to your sleepless night. If only I’d;

• Explained the business case up front. There will be job losses, but we’re going to transition people to new roles. The purpose of the system is to solve a long-standing MI problem, hence we’ll need more people doing more interesting jobs. There will be job losses, but this is what we’re doing to make it as easy as possible. If only you had explained this.

• Asked people what they do – what does and doesn’t work in the current state, what will make their working lives easier and more fulfilling in the future state.

• Been more visible – showed sponsorship and got the team behind me.

• Involved some of the key people in choosing the replacement system, building the revised processes, establishing the testing and training.

• Got my peers to buy-in and support the approach I was taking, involved them in the project, helped steer progress and maximize the benefits.

• Managed my boss better, and had them involved and visible in supporting me.

You need people to go through the whole process of shock and anger, denial, understanding, challenging and (eventually sometimes) commitment to the change, whether it’s a new system, location, process, PC or business acquisition. Getting over the questions of ‘what does the change mean to me’ or often ‘what’s in it for me?’ is often time consuming and painful, but getting it right is always worthwhile.

There’s huge debate amongst project management professionals about whether its rigorous project management practice and procedures that deliver successful projects, or whether its ‘change management’ that delivers success. People stop change, make change happen, deliver successful projects, and provide you with business results, so focusing your management effort here is likely to derive most value. It won’t always be easy.

So you want an easier life…focus on the people aspects of change – it will pay dividends in both your sanity and business results terms.