CHANGE IMPLEMENTATION

WEEK # 09

Dr. Tazeem Ali Shah

 Introduction
• Potter and Schlesinger provide a practical, tested way to think about managing that change.

“It must be considered that there is nothing more difficult to carry out, nor more
doubtful of success, nor more dangerous to handle, than to initiate a new order of
things.”
• Few organizational change efforts tend to be complete failures, but few tend to be entirely
successful either.
• Most efforts encounter problems; they often take longer than expected and desired, they
sometimes kill morale, and they often cost a great deal in terms of managerial time or
emotional upheaval.
• More than a few organizations have not even tried to initiate needed changes because the
managers involved were afraid that they were simply incapable of successfully
implementing them.
 Conti…
• The multi-million dollar question is:

• ”How do you make change successful”?

• The best way is to see what successful companies do. Companies that survive and
thrive on radical change tend to follow a familiar pattern:
• First of all, everyone involved understands that change happens and things need to change.
• Secondly, there is someone clearly leading and driving the strategy. Everyone buys into the
change and understands the critical reasons it needs to happen. The company is actually
capable of change; the capability and ability to change, learn and innovate over time.
• And finally and most importantly, it does not happen overnight. There is no such thing as
‘instant change.’
• Successful change management is stubborn, persistent and consistent.
 Dealing with Resistance
• Many managers underestimate not only the variety of ways people can
react to organizational change, but also the ways they can positively
influence specific individuals and groups during a change.
• And, again because of past experiences, managers sometimes do not
have an accurate understanding of the advantages and disadvantages of
the methods with which they are familiar.
Many managers underestimate the variety of
reactions to change and their power to influence
those responses.
Conti….
Conti….
• The most common mistake managers make is to use only one approach or a
limited set of them regardless of the situation. A surprisingly large number of
managers have this problem.
• This would include the hard-boiled boss who often coerces people, the people-
oriented manager who constantly tries to involve and support his people, the
cynical boss who always manipulates and co-opts others, the intellectual manager
who relies heavily on education and communication, and the lawyerlike manager
who usually tries to negotiate.
• A second common mistake that managers make is to approach change in a
disjointed and incremental way that is not a part of a clearly considered strategy.
 Choice of Strategy
• Strategic choice refers to the decision which determines the future strategy of
firm. It addresses the question “Where shall we go”.
• A SWOT analysis is conducted to examine the strengths and weakness of the firm
and opportunities that can be exploited are also determined.
• Based on the analysis the firm selects a path among various other alternatives that
will successfully achieves the firm’s objectives.
• Strategic choice is therefore, the decision to select form among the grand strategy
considered, the strategy which will best meet the enterprise objectives.
 Conti…
• In approaching an organizational change situation, managers explicitly or implicitly make
strategic choices regarding the speed of the effort, the amount of preplanning, the
involvement of others, and the relative emphasis they will give to different approaches.
• Successful change efforts seem to be those where these choices both are internally
consistent and fit some key situational variables.
• The strategic options available to managers can be usefully thought of as existing on a
continuum (see Next Slide).
• At one end of the continuum, the change strategy calls for a very rapid implementation, a
clear plan of action, and little involvement of others. This type of strategy mows over any
resistance and, at the extreme, would result in a fait accompli.
• At the other end of the continuum, the strategy would call for a much slower change
process, a less clear plan, and involvement on the part of many people other than the
change initiators. This type of strategy is designed to reduce resistance to a minimum.
Conti…
 Situational factors
Exactly where a change effort should be strategically positioned on the continuum in
above slide depends on four factors:
1. The amount and kind of resistance that is anticipated. 
• All other factors being equal, the greater the anticipated resistance, the more
difficult it will be simply to overwhelm it, and the more a manager will need to
move toward the right a the continuum to find ways to reduce some of it.
2. The position of the initiator vis-à-vis the resisters, especially with regard to power.
• The less power the initiator has with respect to others, the more the initiating
manager must move to the right on the continuum. Conversely, the stronger
the initiator’s position, the more he or she can move to the left.
Conti…
3. The person who has the relevant data for designing the change and the energy
for implementing it. 
• The more the initiators anticipate that they will need information and
commitment from others to help design and implement the change, the
more they must move to the right. Gaining useful information and
commitment requires time and the involvement of others.
4. The stakes involved. 
• The greater the short-run potential for risks to organizational
performance and survival if the present situation is not changed, the
more one must move to the left.
Conti…
• Organizational change efforts that ignore these factors inevitably run into
problems.
• A common mistake some managers make, for example, is to move too quickly and
involve too few people despite the fact that they do not have all the information
they really need to design the change correctly.
• Insofar as these factors still leave a manager with some choice of where to operate
on the continuum, it is probably best to select a point as far to the right as possible
for both economic and social reasons.
• Forcing change on people can have just too many negative side effects over both
the short and the long term. Change efforts using the strategies on the right of the
continuum can often help develop an organization and its people in useful ways.
Conti…
• In some cases, however, knowing the four factors may not give a manager a
comfortable and obvious choice.
• Consider a situation where a manager has a weak position vis-à-vis the people
whom he thinks need a change and yet is faced with serious consequences if the
change is not implemented immediately.
• Such a manager is clearly in a bind. If he somehow is not able to increase his power
in the situation, he will be forced to choose some compromise strategy and to live
through difficult times.
 Considerations When Approaching Change
• By now, you’ve probably realized that change is not one-size-fits-all.
• Every organization, based on its culture, maturity, and market conditions will need
to address change in a different way to ensure that the desired results are
achieved.
• The type of change can be analyzed by considering three different factors:
• Speed: How important is speed to accomplishing the objectives of the change effort? Is
the pace determined by the markets, the competition or the customers?
• Conformance: How closely must we follow the specific processes or outcome to achieve
our goals? Is there regulatory pressure to conform, or would it stifle innovation?
• Commitment: How important is it to ensure that everyone in the negotiation
understands the need for change and is prepared to do what it takes?
 Four Change Strategies
• If you then consider the relative importance of each of these three factors together,
you identify the most appropriate change strategy. There are four strategies:
• Clarion call: 
• This strategy requires that the change is driven by senior management leadership who
show a strong commitment to the change. This is because the need and speed for change
are not apparent further down the organization.
• Burning platform: 
• Everyone already recognizes the need for change. Therefore, a clear message about what
is required in order to implement change is needed.
• The risk is that the actions from different parts of the organization (in their panic) are
uncoordinated and inconsistent.
 Conti….
• Concerted action: 
• This requires delegation of the change so that it can be applied autonomously
throughout the organization.
• Yet it still requires the changes to fit within the overall business strategy.

• Long march: 
• A long-term initiative which has a strong identity and clear sponsorship from the
top so that there is continued commitment to the change.
• No-one loses sight of the end goal. It also requires clear metrics to show that the
changes are working.
• Each strategy has its own attributes, but all of them require a consistent communication of
what is required both down and across the organization. Clearly, the urgency and tone of
that communication varies.
The diagram below shows how you decide on the best strategy for your client
 FACILITATING CHANGE
• There is an old adage that states “organizations don’t change; people change and then
they change the organization.”
• Facilitation is the key to ensuring people understand the change, participate successfully
to create the desired future and accept that the real change requires changes in their
own thoughts, attitudes and behaviors. 
• Facilitation is the key because it is based on the power of the question. And the power of
the question is what makes things happen. People can handle change, even if it is thrust
upon them if they can answer fundamental and meaningful questions for themselves: 
• “What’s it all about?” – What is the nature of the change; why do we need to change?
• “What’s in it for me?” – How will this affect me; what do you need me to do; what risk do I face
and what are the benefits?
• “How will you help me?” – What do I need to know; how can I get help; how can I be successful?
 Conti…
• Below are some essential components of facilitating change management that I have found
extremely helpful to the process: 

• Visioning Session with senior leaders to clearly identify both the “things” that need to
happen – typically the source of the change, and the potential impact on people in the
organization; the visioning session results in a clearly articulated description of the
change.

• Education and Development Sessions – facilitating small group education sessions to

ensure people understand the nature of the change; this begins the process of gaining
their buy-in through their understanding of their ability and willingness to move
successfully through change.

• Project Planning Sessions – sessions designed to build the project structure; developing
project plans to ensure tasks are completed on-time and to standard.
Conti….
• Change Management Planning Sessions – sessions designed to build the
“people structure”.  This includes:
• Identifying risks and assigning roles such as change sponsors and change agents
• Assessing the impact of the change on processes, staff, customers and stakeholders
• Assessing the culture and identifying systemic barriers to change and the strengths and
weaknesses of the culture to navigate through the change
• Developing communication plans for both formal and informal communications with
feedback mechanism
• Individual and team coaching session to continuously increase commitment by
providing feedback, developing individual change skills and provide encouragement
• Regular monitoring sessions to ensure both the project plan and the people plan are
being executed successfully
Ways to Facilitate Change
1. Create a Change Baseline
• Your own assumptions about what motivates people will determine the success
or failure of your change program. If your assumptions are incorrect, you may
miss a valuable opportunity, that of gaining stakeholder ownership of the change
process.
• “Why is this?”, you ask. People do what they do for a reason. A person’s behavior
(what we observe) is an expression of their underlying beliefs and assumptions.
To make our want to facilitate change appealing to others, we must understand
why they do what they do.
• The baseline is created by identifying the dissatisfaction, vision, first steps, and
change resistance for each stakeholder involved with your change program.
Using a spreadsheet application, make a table listing the stakeholders and each
area of investigation.
Conti….
2. Define Change Strategies
• We now have a baseline of the key issues for each stakeholder.
• The next step is to select the ones that you can realistically alter and develop
targeted strategies to alter them. People won’t change unless they feel 
safe, secure and in control over the results.
• You can’t just force people to change by management ruling. To facilitate change,
you must change their underlying assumptions with a credible plan.
• List what assumptions need to change. Include a strategy for overcoming the
resistance to change identified for each stakeholder group. The strategy should fill
the gaps.
• Increasing dissatisfaction with the status quo should improve motivation.
Increasing the vision element will ensure the program is completed. Increasing
first steps will make sure the program gets started. Lastly, decreasing resistance
will simplify the whole effort.
Conti…
• Change the Measurements
• Measurements define the culture of an organization, so it makes sense they would be a good
way to facilitate change. What you measure is what you manage, and the person that does the
measuring is the manager. In order to change the outcome, we must change what is
measured and (possibly) who or what is doing the measuring.
• Think about this a little. The person or thing measuring is receiving feedback, the result of
prior changes. This is known as a control loop, or a “feedback loop”. If the one measuring can’t
make changes or the one making changes can’t measure the results, the resulting delays
are significant wastes that cause serious troubles.
• Leaders define the performance standards, or measures. You can’t introduce new
measurements into the organization and then continue to ask for the old ones. If a leader
keeps asking for old information, people give it to him or her. If a leader seems to counter the
aims of your change program, the people being led will respond the same way.
 Conti…
4. Communicate Change Details
• One way to facilitate change is to define what needs to change in as much detail as possible.
• For example, you can’t just say, “Salespeople need to be friendlier to customers.” You have to
define “friendly”. You have to communicate the characteristics of friendly behavior, such as
“greet customers warmly”, “ask about their concerns”, or “address them by name”.
• Once you know what the behavior looks like, translate it in detail to employees and reward
them immediately for doing it.

5. Communicate Successful Changes

• Reward those who change and acknowledge their contributions.
• In order to facilitate change, you must focus your attention on people who change and ignore
those who do not.
• This will send the message to others that you value the changes made and, in turn, encourage
others to participate in the change program.
• To derive the greatest benefit, the reward — material or not — must be immediate and public.
Conti…
6. Measure Change Progress
• Make sure you have a regular method to capture where the organization stands with respect
to the change program.
• People are not mechanical systems: their behaviors are the result of internal beliefs and
assumptions. We must measure and monitor the progress being made to ensure that the
change program is having an effect on those beliefs and assumptions.

7. Ensure Change Lasts

• Increasing the values in the change formula will help facilitate change and bring about
behavior changes.
• However, it alone will not make them stick. Organizational culture is far more persistent than
many people allow for.
• Change must be an iterative, interactive, and ongoing process.
• It is definitely NOT an event. Go back to the first step and update the change baseline. 
Discover new changes that are needed. Develop new change strategies and keep up the
change.
Factors Affecting strategic choice:
• Environmental constraints
• Internal organizations and management power relationships
• Values and preferences
• Management’s attitude towards risk
• Impact of past strategy
• Time constraints -Time pressure, frame horizon, timing of decision
• Informational constraints
• Competitors reaction