Change Communications

TOP FIVE TIPS: Helping employees adapt to change

The role of leaders during change is to create meaning, focus anddirection by explaining the company’s actions. The challenge for themis to help employees move past the psychological stages of shock,delusion, anger and depression to the stages where they let go oftheir old ties and explore the possibilities of the new situation.Business psychologist Marie Mosely outlines five possible tactics tofacilitate this:

1. Use storytelling to create links: Stories help to create meaning ina chaotic world. People need some sense of predictability andstability, particularly when they’re going through restructures andtransitions. Stories help staff to understand links between the past,present and future. They are universal and understood in alllanguages and by all cultures. They engage people and, if told well,create a positive anticipation for the future.

2. Build scenarios for the future: Get people thinking about how theywould like the story to end. Scenario building helps people tounderstand the challenges ahead. It creates relevance and meaning andlinks the past with the possible futures. It cuts through theday-to-day beliefs and assumptions that can blinker an organizationand its people, and it creates a positive self-belief that, whateverhappens, they can cope. It also helps people focus on how they mightbest use their time, effort, talents and skills.

3. Use internal communication effectively: Make sure that internalcommunication systems are as effective as they can be. Spending a lotof time and money on external communications is a waste if employeesare demotivated and don’t know what’s happening or where theorganization is going. They will either clam up or communicate inrumors.

4. Create discomfort: In order to move from our current state, weneed to create discomfort. Comfort creates acceptance and inaction.People change the way they are doing things for two reasons:inspiration or desperation. Leaders need to encourage staff to bemotivated by both.

5. Challenge successful models: Successful models are hard tochallenge but people often maintain the status quo with processes andprocedures that work now, when they should be thinking about what’s onthe horizon and how it will affect the business in the future.

This is an abstract from an article that first appeared in StrategicCommunication Management, Vol 7, Issue 4 (June/July 2003). To purchase a copy, visit: http://www.melcrum.com/cgi-bin/melcrum/eu_content.pl?docurl=pub%20scm%20home