What does it mean to manage change?
It’s September, and change is in the air. Committees and work groups are back from their brief summer hiatus with a fluster of emails and a new meeting schedule. Like squirrels, we’re scampering around in a focused preparation for the upcoming season, and things can feel a little nuts.
Change, of course, is inevitable and necessary. Sage Portfolio Group coach Sylvia Goodeve, who has been a change agent within a corporation and now coaches executives through personal and organizational change, puts it in perspective. “If there isn’t change, your organization is dead,” she says. If change is essential, it warrants some attention in every organization.
‘Change management’ is like so many commonly used phrases: hear it enough times and it loses some of its meaning. ‘Managing’ change, to me, sounds a bit like ‘breaking’ a horse; we ride that change ’til it’s exhausted and collapses, spirit broken. Why ‘manage’ change? Why not ‘embrace’ it, or ‘foster’ it, or ‘grow’ it?
I pitched this interpretation of ‘change management’ to Goodeve when we spoke about change. It became immediately apparent that she carried none of the baggage about managing change that I was clearly lugging around. ‘Managing’, for Goodeve, was not antithetical to ‘embracing’, ‘fostering’ or ‘growing’. “Managing is just a process,” she said. “There is a process identified to provide the structure necessary for the change to come to fruition.” This sounded a bit like change manager as gardener, diligently tending change until it bloomed. I liked that metaphor better than the rodeo one.
Goodeve outlined the necessary components for successful change within organizations. But first she cautioned that, while I may think of change as a bed of roses, most people experiencing change fear the unknown and are anxious about an uncertain future. This was why the ‘management’ component was so critical.
Organizations need to prepare for change in a conscious, methodical, open manner. In short, successful change requires doing your homework. Goodeve, taking on the role of change management coach, fired off a series of insightful questions. “What are the goals? What does the organization want to get out of the change? What does the change look like? What are the ideal outcomes? Who are the people that are going to be impacted? What is their perspective on the change?” And still more questions. “What resources are needed, both financial and human? Who is the change agent, the person responsible for leading the process and doing the follow-up? What is your communication plan? How will you share the vision and get buy-in? Where are the logical places to establish check-points, evaluate progress and confirm that everyone is aligned?” It wasn’t so much that the change itself needed to be managed. It was the organizational context—the people, policies, and procedures already in place—that needed to be prepared and supported to accept and benefit from the change.
Unfortunately, change management in many organizations is a code word for damage control. “Usually a company will realize they need to manage a change pretty late in the process. They’ve made a decision, they’ve announced it, and there’s been a reaction or they realize they don’t have everything they need to make the change happen successfully. Then they hire a team of consultants to help.” Instead, Goodeve recommends that organizations take an approach that “change happens”, and train managers to be effective change agents, able to manage the process internally and secure outside expertise when necessary. “Some changes are very emotional and sticky and it can help to bring in an unaffected third party to play change agent for awhile,” Goodeve advised. “But the change process is still controlled by the organization itself.”
One of the resources Goodeve recommends to an executive team and internal change agents is an executive or corporate coach. “A coach is an impartial third party that they can use to help them work through things. The coach’s goal is to help them move forward, to navigate the change in the best way possible, and to help share a different perspective. A coach will call them on things when their perspective is skewed. People don’t necessarily choose to be involved in a change,” she stated, “and negative feelings can develop.”
The most effective organizations, Goodeve acknowledges, have change management as part of their corporate culture. Since the processes and supports are in place at all times, the organization is nimble, responsive and automatic in its response to change. Organizations with a change management culture don’t just attend to the big changes, either. Change is encouraged and welcomed because it isn’t regarded as something that diverts attention and resources; instead it defines the way the organization does business, and the resources, expertise and planning are already in place. These organizations ‘grow’ change. And I bet some have great gardens, too.
