Transformation | Insights
Michelle Brown , Strategy Partner, Retirement
16 Jun, 2021 · 5 -minute read

As human beings, it’s in our nature to be resistant to change – even if, deep down, we know it’s a good idea.

What if I fail? What if it hurts? What if it’s a success (and I can’t handle it)? What if other people don’t like it? What if, what if, what if…

The truth is, we tend to let our ‘inner saboteur’ take over when notions of leaving our comfort zones enter the building – and it’s no different when it comes to organisational change in our place of work.

Change is one of the four trends we explored in our State of the Sector report this year – and for good reason.

It’s an area in which organisations repeatedly struggle, yet one that virtually all businesses repeatedly go through too – in fact, only 5% of those surveyed said they had no change programmes planned this year (who are these people?!).

New priorities

When you consider the events of the past 15 months, organisations all over the world have had no choice but to make change a key business priority – meaning communication teams are never short of things to do.

And because most people are naturally resistant to change at work, effective change communication is essential when it comes to taking your employees from passive observers to proactive advocates.

Which is why we decided to look at where organisations fail when it comes to communicating change.

It’s hardly surprising that success tends to lie in the creation of the relatively ‘easy’ stuff that’s fundamental to good change communications: distinct visual identity (61%), long-term vision (48%), compelling narrative (48%).

All of these are, of course, critical starting points in this often difficult process. But the hard work really begins in the next phase: determining where you want to embed the change – because once you’ve delivered the high-level narrative to set out your stall, you need to bring it down to what it really means to your people.

And that’s where most organisations start to struggle.

Taking the lead

Because of this, a critical part of managing change is making sure your leaders are ready to embed the process in their part of the organisation – and then translate it for their teams. Yet, in spite of this, we found that just 43% of State of the Sector respondents feel that those tasked with running the show share a consistent message and act as role models.

And when it comes to clarity in understanding the impact of the change on different audiences, less than 40% thought they were doing this well; which suggests that organisations struggle to transition from top-line edicts to tailored messaging for different audiences.

This isn’t good enough.

When it comes to taking employees on the change journey, you have to start by NOT thinking of your people as a single entity. If you take the time to segment your internal audiences, gather intelligence and use line managers who really know their direct reports, your change journey will be a lot smoother.

Obstacles to change

It’s often said that if we are not changing then we are going backwards. But when it comes to embedding change, there are three clear areas that seem to get in the way of the forward motion we need – and a third of State of the Sector respondents rated their organisation as ‘poor’ when it comes to implementing these.

1 Gaining insight into employees’ understanding of the change

We know that change can only succeed if you have real-time insights into what people listen to, engage with and act upon. This is about understanding the mindset, experience and expectations of your audience (all of them).

2 Creating a process for identifying best practice

Change can only succeed if people stop waiting to be spoon-fed everything. But you need to start small – identifying the teams who ‘own’ the process, have started proactively making changes and are happy to share their innovation with the wider business.

3 Building a network of advocates for change

To have an impact, communicators need to find business-wide support. There’s a lot of debate around how you either nominate or identify people who have a natural influence over their peers – but, whichever way you decide to go, be sure to factor this into your approach.

Michelle Brown

If you take the time to segment your internal audiences, to gather intelligence, to use line managers who really know their people, your change journey will be a lot smoother.

Michelle Brown

Senior Principal Consultant

Getting engaged

Implementing change is never an easy job – and that’s why it’s so important to clearly differentiate between transformation (the big stuff that rocks an organisation) and a more regular, improvement-type of change.

This mobile phone analogy sums the difference up perfectly:

Transformation is a bit like changing from Apple to Android. If you’ve ever done this you know how difficult it is. You hate it, you struggle to do the most basic of tasks and you wish you could go back to your trusty old iPhone.

The regular, improvement-type of change is similar to an iOS update (on that trusty old iPhone!) – you roll your eyes at first, then you’re intrigued, then you play with it for a bit, then you love it.

So, the question is: how can we make transformation feel more like an iOS update? How can we implement more regular micro changes, as opposed to an overwhelmingly distracting amount of changes in one go, without disrupting your employees to the point of ‘who cares’?

Because that’s the real challenge – the engagement factor. And because of the way that different people react to change, adjustments to strategy need to be made.

Intelligent thinking

Communicating change as a consequence of an operational shift is different to other communication initiatives – it can’t simply be relayed via a programme or a campaign.

We’re talking about true engagement and dialogue here. It has to enable the organisation to connect regularly and appropriately; and it must feel like a component part of a suite of much wider activities that represent a true cultural shift.

There are many change methodologies that will have you believe that there’s a magical formula to driving effective change, and you’ll probably find one that works for you; but it’s important to remember that change is far from linear.

People’s individual circumstances, experiences and expectations all influence how they react to and accept change. And this is why you should never skimp on the intelligence gathering part of your process.

After all, change doesn’t happen in isolation. Change communication has to be centred around your people, it has to be delivered with consistency, and it has to happen in real time.