The Imperative of Change
Continual change is an inherent feature of modern business that demands alternatives to the traditional ‘ways of working’ but without compromising quality. Unfortunately, not everyone accepts this despite the necessity to continually improve through innovation and exploitation of agile and lean practices. Companies know all too well that to remain competitive in today’s global marketplace, it is imperative change is continually embraced in order to deliver innovative and quality products that differentiate them from the competition, as soon as possible and at low cost.
However, there is a crucial difference between acknowledging change and actively embracing change. Companies embracing change are usually successful. Those that don’t are often reactive, the consequences of which can sometimes be disastrous.
The future prospects for a company’s employees, suppliers, distributors and even local communities are often dependent on how a company responds to change and the decisions they take. One bad decision can have critical consequences where the impact on employees can be devastating. Many could suffer loss of employment, loss of livelihoods or even loss of pensions. Furthermore, remedial action to correct a bad decision is invariably painful and costly.
So how can we identify companies which are failing to manage change apart from analysing the balance sheet and other financial indicators?
Destructive attitudes!
Take the 'not invented here' syndrome that is manifested by a reluctance to accept outside advice or guidance on introducing alternative ‘ways of working’ to proactively manage and deliver change. It is the rejection of anything but their own creation and reveals itself in a variety of ways, outright opposition, negative attitudes or subtle undermining.
Bureaucracy is another destructive attitude. As employee numbers increase, successive layers of management are put in place between those whose task it is to define policy and direction, and those whose task it is to implement policy. For those managers who shy away from making decisions, central jurisdiction is a valuable gift as it provides them with self-perpetuating work. Procrastination and compromise become the norm that erodes efficiency and improvement. Once a decision becomes bureaucratic everything slows to a snail's pace. The consequence is that the employees, who energetically try to push through constructive plans and projects, end up being severely demotivated and disillusioned.
There are other destructive attitudes such as cynicism and complexity, the subject of a future post…
Change is about shaping the future in a positive way. It is about taking initiatives, being proactive not reactive. Managing change and innovation is predominantly about altering attitudes, motivating people through strong leadership, pushing through difficult actions and achieving results - delivering!
