Organisational change efforts have a very poor track record as more than 70% fail. And yet, many organisations and companies seem to enter their change efforts fully expecting success.
That is why we run a change-ability check before initiating our “Change Design Works” approach. In this check there is a first item about whether your organisation’s vision and long-term goals inspire (mostly) clarity or confusion, a second item about the engagement and drive within your organisation and whether this is best summarised by passion or by apathy, and a third item about a commonly understood and shared strategy.
A fourth item and fifth item concerns the resource base of your company consisting of resources – what you have – and capabilities – what you can do with what you have.
Resources, or lack there-of, is either a cause for liberation or a cause for frustration. Inspired and motivated people with a clear strategy, but without the necessary resources are left frustrated. They want to get moving, but they lack the means to do so. A strategy without resources is, frankly, no strategy.
What you can do with your resources – the level of capabilities within your company – lead to either confidence or to anxiety. If people lack the capabilities to act they are rendered anxious and soon will loose trust, motivation and inspiration.
Instead, companies successful in change design strategies include the necessary resource base. And, if a company lacks certain resources and capabilities this needs to be fed back to the vision in terms of creating a so-called stretch goal. If you have vision for a self-driving car you are bound to not yet have the resource base for this. However, as people rally behind this vision, and are motivated by this and the resource base development is clearly addressed in the strategy then liberation and confidence are the result.
Organisational change doesn’t have to be so hard.
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