Change Communications

Well, I’m back.

Stimulated by a discussion with a good friend and colleague, I have just been reading up on the two levels of change put forward by Gregory Bateson and Paul Watzlawick and I thought I’d summarise briefly:

First-order change:

• Change within a given system.
• The system itself remains unchanged while elements or parts undergo some kind of change.
• Problems are approached mechanically, the same problem solving strategies can be used over and over again.
• Example: a father dealing with his son’s chronic misbehaviour by applying more punishment. The structure of interactions between father and son remain constant.

Second-order change:

• Change to the system itself.
• The system is transformed structurally and/or communicationally.
• Problems are solved by trying something radically different or unexpected.
• Example: encouraging the son to misbehave under certain conditions.

That’s fine. But what about our projects and clients in all this?

Well, an awareness of these two levels of change can help when working on a change project. It is important to realise that two people can experience the same event as either a first-order change or a second-order change. For example, a boss may insist that his/her project does not change the whole system or framework but just the rules of working within this framework, “we are just asking the team to come in a half hour earlier”.

However, certain employees may feel that the framework has radically changed, the environment has changed, new points of reference must be adopted. For example, “My whole family life needs to be re-organised to get there on time. It’s not fair. Why can’t we just continue the old way…”

Understanding and taking into account the modifications to the environment and it’s impact on the emotional human fabric of the population undergoing change are the keys to developing actions for successful change initiatives.

Implementing change of the fist-order would mean accepting the need to change but within the framework of the old situation. This is likely to produce little effect and in some cases may reinforce current difficulties. A second-order change would mean stepping back, looking at the system differently and adopting new points of reference. The change can the take place in a new environment and framework.

The paradoxical theory of change and communication
Extracts from Paradoxical Psychotherapy: Theory and Practice With Individuals, Families and Couples
By Gerald R. Weeks, Luciano L’Abate

Melcrum, a leading research, publishing and training company specialised in the field of internal communication, has just published an in-depth report on delivering successful change communications. I feel very privileged to have been asked to contribute to this research.

If this is something you are interested in, you can order a copy
of the full report on-line: Delivering Successful Change Communication or download the Executive Summary.

Also, keep a look out for the June-July 2007 edition of Strategic Communication Management which will be dedicated to the topic of Change Communication. I have written a four page feature.

Liam FitzPatrick, from Competent Communicators and the Black Belt Dojo blog, offered this in a comment and it made me chuckle so much that I thought it would be best as post in its own right. Unfortunately I see many of these every day… ouch!

1. Regard any new idea from below with suspicion - because it is new and because it is from below.
2. Insist that people who need your approval to act first go through several other layers of management to get their signatures.
3. Ask departments or individuals to challenge and criticise each other’s proposals.
4. Treat problems as a sign of failure.
5. Express your criticisms freely and withhold your praise (that keeps people on their toes). Let them know they can be fired at any time.
6. Control everything carefully. Count anything that can be counted, frequently.
7. Make sure that any request for information is fully justified and that it isn’t distributed too freely (you don’t want data to fall into the wrong hands).
8. Make decisions to reorganise or change policies in secret and spring them on people unexpectedly (that also keeps people on their toes)
9. Assign to lower-level managers, in the name of delegation and participation, responsibility for figuring out how to cut back, lay off or move people around.
10. Never forget that you, the higher-ups, already know everything important about this business.

Source: Rosabeth Moss Kanter via an interview with the BBC.

Harvard Business School Professor, John Kotter, is considered the number one leadership guru in the United States. In his books, he offers eight steps for successful change:

1. create a sense of urgency;
2. build guiding teams;
3. get the vision right;
4. communicate for buy-in;
5. empower action;
6. produce short-term wins;
7. never let up;
8. and make change stick.

In a recent interview with Management Consulting News, Kotter highlights the need to pay “more attention [...] to the front end of the change process.” For me, this interview provides two very interesting points that got me thinking about what can be done in practice.

Lack of urgency

Firstly, Kotter states that many organisations vastly underestimate building sufficient urgency when preparing change programmes. Managers often say to him, “Our people understand how important it is to solve this problem. We’re beyond that.” They are keen to move on to communicating about the team or, more likely, they want to talk about communicating the vision for the future.

So what can we do to build urgency? Here are a few ideas from my past experiences. What has worked for you?

1. Honest and factual communication between management and staff about the current situation. Facts, figures and industry comparisons can help to explain the thinking behind the change of strategy.
2. Workshops based on a co-development model help teams to get to grips with the issues, understand and feel the need for change themselves.
3. Listening and take the temperature regularly: don’t just assume that everyone understands and agrees with the need to change. A short survey, poll or a conversation over coffee can shed a lot of light.
4. A clear switch or cut-off point. I have heard of IT system changes where the management are reluctant to switch off the old system and the possibility of maintaining parrallel systems is actively considered. This is crazy. You can’t build urgency around something that itself is not clear.
5. Lastly, something a bit more fun: a clock that counts down to the change can help make the urgency visible. You would be surpised by the reaction and discussion something this simple can generate.

Fear and a lack of credibility

At the heart of any change is, of course, fear. However, the problem is that words, images, arguments and promises on their own cannot alay fear.

As Kotter says, “The ultimate way to help people believe in what you are doing is not words, but deeds. Every time you do something well, fear goes down because credibility goes up.”

Effective change communication can support a competent team in building this credibility. It can provide a reliable source of information and serve to build trust around the team and initiative.

And this is where I have a problem with the idea of “marketing” change internally. By making un-attainable promises or appearing to “over-sell” the change, fearful staff will often smell a rat. If messages don’t correspond with everyday reality, if the promises made are hard to believe, then your credibility goes down and fear is increased.

If communication serves to reinforce daily reality or illustrate something has gone right, then trust can be progressively built. As Kotter says, people start to think “Maybe there’s a chance that they can pull this off and I’m not going to be pushed off a cliff after all.”

Here are a few tips for change communications that can inspire credibility:

• Provide impartial and balanced reporting of the facts.
• Communicate regularly and always at the date/time promised.
• Proof-read thoroughly to remove any spelling or grammar mistakes.
• Provide information in a professional format adapted to the context.
• Illustrate and explain the achievements, small or large, that constitute milestones to the change.
• Reply promptly to all feedback.
• Don’t be afraid to state that change is difficult.

This last point is frequently problematic on IT system changes where the first month following a major implementation is usually the hardest. By preparing users for this reality, explaining that it will be hard at first but that team is here to help, you create a message that can be believed. Promising full benefits or return on investment right from the outset is delusional. Of course promising support when the team cannot follow through would be equally catastrophic!

Read also: Kotter’s 8 reasons why change fails

Nicholas Ranken

A recent comment on the following post, “A definition of change communication“, got me thinking about what content we should be providing in this factual, fast and frequent manner?

Projects, and IT projects in particular, are usually run on a tight budget. Time, money and resources are often short. What I see happening is that any old information to hand is packaged and sent out to future users. The information I am thinking about is often extracted from progress reports, the sort of information that team managers give to hierarchy in PowerPoint files to track their progress.

However, successful change communication needs much more than this. It needs to be passed through a filter, a communicator, who will ensure messages are structured for a defined target audience. This should be someone that will digest the information into the following key points (a useful pense-bête):

• What is happening?
• Why is it happening?
• What does it mean (for me)?
• What are the next steps?

And there isn’t just one wise communicator in an ivory tower that can prepare this. It will require regular contact (surveys, conference calls, cups of coffee…) with the stakeholder groups being targeted, or at least a representative. In my experience, key users are invaluable change communication allies.

A simple, factual change message that goes straight to these points is more likely to be taken on-board; especially when it is competing amongst the hundreds of messages that we are “assaulted” with everyday via e-mail, press, radio, TV, intranets, websites, blogs, meetings, conference calls, workshops…

Maybe this sounds like common sense to some, but it surprises me that communications are rarely prepared in this way.

Nicholas

Still on the subject of consulting, I recently came across Schein’s description of three primary models for organizational facilitation.

1. Purchase models: refer to the purchase of expert information and advice
2. Doctor-patient models: refer to the purchase of diagnostic and prescriptive services
3. Process consultation models: refer to collaborative client-consultant relationships in which consultants function as facilitators and help client learn to improve their internal problem-solving processes.

These short descriptions give a good sense of perspective for those involved in change management and coaching with clients, activities which correspond to the process consultation model.

Source: Schein 1988

A recent question posted to the Melcrum Communicators Network, raised the issue of using logos to brand internal projects. Some say too many logos can create confusion.

Below is my reply. I believe that there are cases when a new image and identity can be a very useful tool, in particular when communicating on a major, strategic corporate change programme.

I would say it greatly depends on the context. I worked on a major change project for a multi-national company where the company identity and colours were very consistently used in their internal communications.

Our project followed a previous attempt that had been a very costly failure. So we intentionally wanted to create a very different and clearly identifiable image and logo. The project was also of considerable strategic importance so we wanted it to stand apart from other projects going on at the same time.

Given that the corporate colours at the time were dark blue and grey, which we felt were quite conservative and understated, we chose bright, bold colours (orange with dark blue text as a link back to the corporate colours) and a dynamic pattern to reflect the modern, innovative nature of our project.

That said, as a consumer of internal communications myself (in a different company), I am definitely sensitive to the notion of too many competing logos and colours. If there is logo and project name overload, I feel this can really detract from the overall message.

Nicholas

EDIT 9/11/2006: Two further points surfaced in the course of the discussion and are interesting to note.

• It is important to ensure any project identity and logo does not contradict corporate branding policies. We followed the guidelines in place and ran all our proposals by the corporate communication director for his approval.
• Be very careful about who has access to the project identity and logo. On one occasion I discovered the logo had been re-used for a different purpose with the main colour altered. We put a stop to this immediately. But it does prove that once a logo is out there it can take on a life of its own. Like a sharp knife it can be a very effective tool, but out of control it can be quite dangerous.

Ever wondered why opportunities for change seem to fall into the laps of some people and not others? Ever tried really hard to change someone or something and not manage? Well, what if you took that energy to concentrate on being more yourself? Maybe then, change might just come to you….

This story I found might sound a little twee, but it illustrates this point well. After all, don’t clichés contain a grain of truth?

In the Chinese folklore, there is the story of an ambitious young man who, on his twentieth birthday, became consumed with the desire to change the world. He spent the next 20 years trying to do that but couldn’t.

At age 40, he settled for trying to change China. He spent the next 20 years trying to do that but couldn’t.

At age 60, he settled for trying to change his village. For the next 20 years he strived to do that but failed.

At age 80, he decided to focus on changing his family. He spent the next 20 years trying to do that but couldn’t.

At age 100, he decided to focus on changing himself.

But the next day, he died.

The lesson? If you want to change the world, you better start with yourself.

So the question to ask ourselves is: In what ways can I become the change I seek to see happening around me?

(c) 2006 F. Basili, President, HumaNext. From the workshop on change and transformation. All rights reserved.

Another post on this subject…

You can’t expect staff morale to be high during change if you have not connected to all the different elements of your employees’ existence. You have to connect with them on three levels:

Their heads - share with them the facts, why is it needed for theorganisation to change, what is the desired outcome for the change etc.

Their hands - share with them what their role will be in the neworganisation, what behaviours will be expected from them, how will thechange effect their daily lives etc.

Their hearts - remember that people share their knowledge and creativity in a trusted environment; they need to feel that they are valued, that they belong, and that they have joined the right company. Connect withthem through emotive messages, which instil pride and provide recognition.

In a recent Melcrum survey, nearly 90 percent of the communication professionals who responded rated “shaping corporate culture” as important or very important. A clear indication that it’s a subject on the minds of many practitioners. Given that corporate culture is something that involves many business functions, this still begs the question of what exactly is communication’s role in shaping it.

When it comes to culture change, the communicator’s dilemma is a thorny one. Organizational communication is first and foremost a reflection of culture. But without communication, there’s no hope of culture change. To get the process in motion, Roger D’Aprix and Cheryl Fields Tyler suggest communicators start by teaching their organizations to communicate more effectively. Here, they share four crucial areas to focus on.

1. Explain why change is necessary
   The driving force of culture change is the marketplace. Its urgencies represent the only compelling rationale for organizational change. Leaders may want to discuss what actions they’ve decided on, but employees want to know why the change is necessary in the first place.
2. Create a clear and compelling plot line
   A clear, simple and compelling “plot line” for the change story is the second essential ingredient to successful culture change. What is the business strategy and how will it make us a winner in the marketplace? How will we need to change to execute this strategy successfully? What will we need to change in the way we do business?
3. Understand those involved in the process
   Creating a successful communication strategy to change culture starts with understanding who needs to be communicating with one another and the current mindset, experience and expectations of these individuals and audiences. For example, front-line managers, caught between the anxiety of middle management and the fear and frustration of employees, ride the rumor mill roller coaster and wonder why no one is telling them what the future holds.
4. Aim to engage
   By this we don’t mean high scores on the annual survey tool, nor a permanent state of employee satisfaction and motivation. The simple truth is that most companies that have cause for major culture transformation are on the negative end of the engagement continuum. Communication strategy that supports engagement in this context must be understood as a sophisticated process that creates the situations and understandings that lead people to literally choose to engage with one another, and through that engagement, to change their behavior.

Source: Strategic Communication Management Volume 10, Issue 3 April/May 2006.