Changes are an essential part of every organization if they want to evolve and remain competitive in the market. The sad part is, it can be immensely disruptive to the employees and executives. And that is if you do not have effective change management strategies.
According to Torben Rick, most efforts toward organizational change fail due to a lot of reasons, including:
- Failure to meet the target impact
- Management behavior doesn’t support change
- Employees are resistant to change
- Lack of sufficient funds
Clearly, developing strategies for change management can be critical. It is not a one-size-fits-all approach. Meaning, what works for you might not work for the business across the street. While you’re in an attempt to make changes for the organization, you need to make sure that you’re implementing the change management strategies that are custom-built for your organization.
10 Change Management Strategies That Will Make Your Initiative Successful
These 10 change management strategies will surely help you implement the changes in your organization. Use this as a guide when implementing your custom-built strategies.
1. Before planning your strategies for change management, you must first identify the change characteristics.
The departments involved need to identify the characteristics of the organizational change. Like, how big is it, who will be affected, and does it compete with other initiatives?
To understand the characteristics of the change, you must be able to answer the following:
- Scope of the change
- Who will be impacted
- The time frame of the change
- What is/are being changed (processes, job roles, systems)
2. Start at the top of the hierarchy.
Successful change management initiatives always start at the top. This means that the group of executives must be committed and well-aligned. Additionally, you need to make sure that the initiative is strongly supported by the CEO. Keep in mind that this need not be taken for granted. Rather, this must be done in advance to ensure that everyone is on the same page about the case for the change.
3. Always lead with the culture.
Oftentimes, we overlook the importance of culture to the success of change management. Perhaps it’s because change management designers see culture as the image of the past that they’re trying to change. Or perhaps, they focus more on structural details (like reporting lines and formal processes) that they forget that those with strong connections to the culture will be affected by such changes.
Whatever the reason is, you need to ensure that you make the most out of your company’s culture instead of changing it. As a leader, you must look for the parts of the existing culture that are relevant to the change, emphasize it, and attract those who will be affected by the change.
4. Ask for feedback from the very start.
According to a survey by Katzenback Center, 38% of employees are not in favor of the change that the company is undergoing. You need to consider the opinion of that 38% because they are the ones directly affected by the change. From the very beginning, it’s more efficient to ask for their feedback so that you can streamline the change and set it up for success. Don’t make the mistake of excluding your employees from the agreement and only considering the opinion of the high-level executives.
5. Simplify the process.
Changes — while necessary — can be pretty overwhelming. This is especially true when the change is sudden and without any consideration for the regular employees. The best strategy for change management here is to keep it simple. Don’t try to do too much at the same time. As much as possible, you can lengthen the implementation time, so everyone can prepare for the changes. Don’t forget to stick to a goal and define it as simple as possible.
6. Try this experimental change management strategy.
Do you still remember your science experiments from high school? If so, I bet you’ve heard of the treatment and control groups. Use this method when introducing changes to the company.
Start by presenting change into a section of the company. They will act as the “treatment group” or the experimental group. The unchanged portion of the company will serve as the “control group.” Then, try to observe the differences in productivity, morale, finances, and other statistics. This will help you determine whether the change is successful or if it needs more improvement.
7. Strengthen informal solutions.
More often than not, we neglect the importance of the cultural and informal aspects of the company. However, you must know that formal and informal solutions should always work together. Informal changes can be as simple as changing your motto that governed frontline decision making.
8. Implement this change management strategy: employee recognition programs.
Employee recognition should always be one of the top priorities of every company, especially in times of changeover. You can implement rewards for employees who are helping with the changes. By doing this, you are teaching your employees how to model their behavior toward what the upper management is looking for in times of challenges. Also, it shows that you care and appreciate your employees even during what can be a hard time for many of them.
9. Always value communication.
It is never enough to communicate the change and then expect that all of your employees can catch up. You must constantly look for feedback and use it to adjust and realign your change management strategies as necessary. Surveys, meetings, and company-wide webcasts — these can assist your employees to stay on the same boat in this time of transition.
10. Shift the weight of change.
Yes, people are often too quick to disapprove of change, but that doesn’t mean they are not quick to adapt to new environments. Companies should take advantage of this adaptability to create a new system. If there’s a perfect time to complete new processes, workflows, and values, it would be now.
This change management strategy works best for situations that involve transformative changes. Instead of constraining your employees to accept such inevitable initiative, shift the burden of change to workers who may or may not be gradually coping up with the new organization.
No matter how big or small organizational changes are, it can be stressful for employees at every level of the company. That’s why you need effective strategies for change management more than ever. I hope these strategies could help you with the changes you’re about to make for your company. And I also hope that the transition would be good just like your intentions are.
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