Dealing with troubled change and how the letter "C" can help!

I housekeeping some old hard drives the other day I came across a PowerPoint deck I used for an evening seminar. It still seems relevant so I thought I would reprise it here.

By way of background, the Managing Director of a consultancy I knew and respected had watched me struggle with a programme that was hit from all sides; assumptions (made by others) were failing, harsh constraints being imposed and all in an immature organisation. She saw my endeavours as I had engaged her and two colleagues to assist on part of the programme. I was flattered that she thought I had enough to interest industry peers.

As I said it was an evening event so I went a little light hearted with a passing acknowledgement to Sesame Street. For those that are too young or for any other reason do not know Sesame Street it was a ground breaking puppet-based educational kids programme. Each week they used a different letter of the alphabet to link the contents engage their audience.

I took the same approach and used the letter "C" and the strap line how to cope with change, constraint and confusion, by combining challenge, communication and compassion to create clarity confidence and continuity.

As I looked through it many of the messages/lessons from that time are still very relevant. I will happily share the slide pack or reprise the seminar for anyone that is interested, but I don't want to bloat this blog - just mail me at ian@ianjsutherland.com if you are interested.

I will however summarise some of the points

1. Change happens to any significant change programme so be prepared. Make sure that the model, benefits, financial plan, etc are built so they can flex from the start; having to redo all the model when you are in the middle of tackling a crisis is a horrible place to be.
2. The process by which people deal with change is predictable to a large extent so understand it and use it.
3. Every programme has constraints around cost, time, quality and scope. Once you find you have max'ed your tolerances around cost and time and minimised the quality and scope there is nowhere else to go. You have to go and ask for help!
4. Watch the frequency of business cycle and respond to it. In crisis the review and decision cycles shorten so you need to make sure your delivery plan synchronises the best you can.
5. Vacuums fill naturally and this is true of information vacuums. In the absence of information speculation, most often negative speculation, thrives. As the change agent you need to grasp and manage the information flows, preventing vacuums.
6. Watch out for catastrophic events, ie times when just undoing what happened will not take you back to where you were. These are times when new rules apply and you need to assimilate these quickly and make appropriate adjustments
7. Accept the challenges of others and address them. Denial is usually futile and often terminal. The challenges develop for a reason, even if you cannot see it at the start.
8. Make your communication to stakeholders honest, quick, frequent and simple.
9. Have compassion with those affected by the crisis and your response. Bulldozing a response may appear attractive, but often backfires.
10. Keep checking what people understand and perceive. Their perspective may be different from yours and you need to understand that and redress where necessary.

There were of course many other "C"s I could have used and incase you find it useful I have included them below.

My closing comment of the evening was a saying my father had on his office wall and one I think it pays to keep a tight hold on as it can help you focus your effort most effectively.

As I said I am happy to share more if wanted. It all seems very relevant even now, nearly ten years on.