変更

Is any change really about change, or could it be an improvement? Is the situation afterwards any different or is it more of the same? In either way, the impact can be very high. As we can see with the inauguration of a new terminal at the Barajas airport in Madrid.

Like the destination of a journey, any change will require a goal. And therefore, the Barajas Airport serves well as a decor.

Where do we want to go to or what do we want to achieve? And “you” is in this case the organization. The Airport.

This checklist is for your organization. What does it mean to add a new terminal to an existing Airport?

If you try to define WHAT will change within the organization, you can think about the business process, specific functions or fundamental (base) requirements. In this example, the business process remains the same. So do the functions that are offered to the public. Yet some basic requirements will be enhanced; this is most of all (in the airport example) about scalability and capacity.

Once the goal is clear and the functional impact is sketched, than you should check whether the resources will be impacted. In this example they will. The changes are at the supporting level, and the new infrastructure will be integrated with an existing one. The challenge is to hide disturbance from the travelers. But during the inauguration-days that will be nearly impossible.

The environment is often a source of alterations. Many triggers come from outside the company, but in this example, the change is from within. The impact on the environment however is, again in this Airport case, very big.

In the last place, the most profound changes are those that drive the organizational behavior. The inauguration of the new terminal interfered with the normal organization and provided a lot of delays. Yet, the change as such was not really profound.

The most profound changes are those where the fundamentals of the organization are no longer valid. That was not the case in Madrid. In fact, after a few days, it is business as usual.

So any change is about (filled in for the Barajas airport):

• Functions – no change; a new terminal is more of the same
• Goals – more capacity, scalability
• Resources – That is where this change is all about
• Environment – Very high impact. Think only of suburbs that are effected.
• Principles – The main principles in the airport organization are not effected. Planes take-off as before

Whether you are dealing with an improvement or a real change depends on a combination of these five factors.

© 2006 Hans Bool

For more information about the subject, have a look at the change checklist

Hans Bool is the founder of Astor White a traditional management consulting company that offers online management advice. Astor Online solves issues in hours what normally would take days.

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This is always a brand steward’s nightmare. Boardrooms talk about the importance of innovation to keep the company vibrant and ahead of the game. Yet many companies translate this into change simply for the sake of change. Without clearly understanding the brand relationship with the customers change can be fatal to a brand.

Wendy’s is an example of how a brand lost its way with the sudden death of its founder, Dave Thomas, in 2002. The company continues to struggle to find its brand voice without Dave leading the way. This is often a problem when the owner/founder of a company is also part of the brand.

The biggest dilemma facing many brands is internal boredom. The desire to change the look and feel of a brand. The need to make it new and modern. The aspiration for brand managers to put their own mark onto the brand. Make sure the purpose for making changes to your brand is clearly understood and doesn’t attempt to change the brand’s DNA.

Pizza Hut has been struggling trying to find its brand positioning (a very costly way of understanding how the brand is connecting with its customers). Unfortunately, they keep changing the messaging and executions in the hope of connecting to their customers. They should spend more time and money on understanding their relationship with their customers than continually changing their advertising direction.

Brand line extensions are another brand folly. There are some natural and obvious line extensions and there are some ambitious attempts to get customers further embracing the brand. Virgin Group Ltd., the parent company’s to the over 200 Virgin branded company under the control of its billionaire founder, Sir Richard Branson, has shown that a relevant brand position can extend beyond many business sectors ranging from mobile telephones, to transportation, travel, financial services, leisure, music, holidays, publishing and the list goes on. If you visit the Virgin Group website they state that “Virgin stands for value for money, quality, innovation, fun and a sense of competitive challenge.” It is through these brand values that allow the Virgin brand to transcend across a multitude of businesses as a unique and distinct brand. While BIC pens brand promise didn’t allow them to extend their brand into pantyhose (what where they thinking!). They did successfully extend the BIC brand to water sports equipment (go figure!). Whoever heard of disposal surf boards?

The more unique, relevant and credible the brand promise is, the greater the chance its brand extension will be successful. That’s why Paul Newman’s food products succeed and Willie Nelson Biodiesel Fuel and Lance Armstrong’s LiveStrong mutual funds failed. Consumers may love Nelson’s music and respect Armstrong for his many “Tour de France” cycling races; their brand promise has no connection with consumers concerning car engines and finance.

The moral of this story is don’t mess around with a successful brand unless you truly understand the brand connection with its consumers. The Virgin Group’s example shows how a brand promise is bigger than a product (a plane, cell phone etc) but is intricately linked to the core values that drive the entire Virgin group of products. This brand promise connects each product strongly to the brand and to the consumer. A Virgin medical centre may not succeed.

Derrick Rozdeba – I am a connoisseur of fine brands. Using my brand appreciation and insights, like a sommeliers, I will impart my knowledge and opinion in savoring the many brands that identify our lives. Visit my blog http://derrickrozdeba.blogspot.com/

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Why is there resistance to change? Are people just naturally perverse, or are there concerns which if understood and correctly dealt with will create the buy-in required to turn resisters into supporters and generate the momentum needed to overcome the gravitational pull of the status quo?

There are six layers at which resistance can occur.

We Do Not Agree on the Problem

Go into any poorly performing organisation and ask people from various functions what the issues are. In all likelihood, within each function you will find different opinions as to what the problem is. The situation is not unlike the six blind men in the rhyme, who went to see the elephant. Each honestly describes his experience, but none of them captures the essence of the whole.

This is why different initiatives are launched in each department to try and solve the different problems. But if we remember that organisation are systems and departments/functions are interacting parts of a whole, we then realise a more holistic approach is needed. This is where the method outlined in the last article is useful. Through a combination of rigorous logic and experience based intuition, we build tight cause effect relationships that lead us to the core problem.

Usually disagreements as to the problem disappear once this approach is used.

We Do Not Agree on the Direction of the Solution

If a problem is long standing, its persistence indicates that there are conflicts preventing its successful resolution. An example of such a conflict is where management proclaims quality as number one and generally supports actions that guarantee quality until sales volumes are threatened. Then the quality mantra is quickly abandoned – especially if we are talking about the last quarter of the year. When the pressure eases early in the new year, quality becomes important again.

Another case is the conflict between delegation – to improve speed of operations and customer service on one hand, and control – to contain costs on the other hand.

By questioning the assumptions behind each of the conflicting positions, erroneous paradigms can be unearthed and thus the basis of the conflict eliminated. Thus a particular direction for solving agreed problems can be pursued. A powerful tool for resolving conflicts is the Evaporating Cloud which is part of the TOC logical tool set.

We Do Not Agree that the Proposed Solution Resolves the Problem

Even with the problem and the general direction of the solution agreed, it may be difficult to convince stakeholders that a particular solution completely solves the problem. In this case just as logical cause effect relationships can be used to construct a diagram to represent the problem (as described in the last article) so also can they be used to construct a diagram logically relating the proposed solution to the new desired states.

Thus such a logical description can be used to convince stakeholders that all the original problems are eliminated when the solution is implemented. Yes But… the Proposed Solution Will Create Other Problems

It is not unusual that the designer of the solution is blind to the shortcomings. So even though stakeholders now agree that the solution solves the stated problem, they may claim that it creates other problems in their place (like the case where eliminating a pest causes a proliferation of other undesirable creatures that it preyed upon).

The solution here is to acknowledge the concern and then work with those affected to eliminate it by the same logical process already described. Involvement of affected stakeholders creates even stronger buy-in. At this point every one is ready and willing to go ahead, but…

Yes But… there are Huge Obstacles to Implementing the Proposed Solution

The solutions proposed may require skills, resources, technologies, approvals that are currently unavailable. The obstacles are attacked in a step by step manner. The outcome of the process is a sequence of prerequisites needed to overcome the obstacle and thus implement the solution.

At this point there is complete buy-in along with a plan for executing the required changes.

Unverbalised Fear

At the end of the day, any residual resistance is most likely due to unverbalised fear – a vague feeling of unease arising from the fact that we will be doing something entirely new. Leadership is what is needed here to provide the inspiration and confidence to go forth and just do it!

Samuel Okoro is the CEO of Leapfrog Alliance Ltd, a management training and consulting firm that helps organisations to reduce costs and improve quality through better business processes. His personal passion is to help move Third World business to world-class levels. For further details please visit [http://leapfrogalliance.com/resources.html]

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