Creating Change in the Workplace
“If you want to truly understand something, try to change it.” – Kurt Lewin
(1) Create a sense of urgency around the change
Leaders in organisations must get buy in to initiate change. This means appealing to your teams’ feelings and not just their thoughts. Leaders can create a sense of urgency by selling the value of the future state of the organisation (financial and current market statistics) and making the status quo a “dangerous” place to remain. Creating urgency is crucial because change cannot occur without the cooperation of your team.
(2) Create clear leadership guidelines
Strong leadership that has a clear direction and vision is critical. This may mean that you reach out for support from other people, internal and external to your organisation to guide this process. You should make sure that you are being supported by all the important areas and departments in your organisation.
(3) Create a vision for change
Leaders should create a vision specifically for how they see this change impacting the team and wider organisation. This a crucial step for helping to direct, align and inspire employees. The vision should be a clear, compelling statement that captures what they see as the future of the organisation. Leaders should implement a strategy to support this vision.
(4) Communicate the vision
Simply stating the vision and hoping your team will live it isn’t enough. “Walking the talk” is vital to achieving buy in from your team and cementing those behaviours. Leaders should be communicating this vision frequently and thinking of creative ways to implement the vision throughout the organisation.
(5) Remove barriers to change
Some of the common barriers to change are (1) individual resistance, (2) lack of communication, (3) lack of strategic direction, (4) lack of consistency, (5) cultural barriers, and (6) lack of perceived leadership buy-in. Leaders must be aware of these barriers and implement systems and processes in place to mitigate them. It might mean that leaders must organise clearer forms of communication or are more consistent in the way they communicate their ideas.
(6) Create short term successes
Building momentum (from an organisational change perspective) can be achieved through creating short term successes (or “mini-goals”) for the team. People like to see tangible benefits between six and 18 months of beginning a project, so leaders should create short-term milestones that are celebrated during the period of organisational change.
(7) Build on the change
Reflect on each win. Find out what worked and what didn’t, why it did/didn’t work and how this could impact decisions going into the future. It’s important to keep focusing on continually improving your processes and adapting to change.