Change is unavoidable. The effective leader makes it a positive driver not a hurdle to be overcome.
Frequency – constant.
Key participants – all colleagues.
Leadership rating ****
There was a time when change seemed exceptional and embracing it a choice to be made. No longer. It infects and affects all aspects of working, being driven especially by the transformative power of technology. In some ways our vocabulary is behind the pace of circumstance: ‘change’ implies the alternative of ‘permanence’ when the reality is that not changing is not an option.
This is an exquisitely tough challenge for any leader, to
The objective for the leader must then be to achieve this balance: to drive continuity and change, a sense of belonging to something whose identity is constant and yet also changing.
As you lead your organisation you develop the change imperative – that change is the necessary source of survival.
Change is difficult and challenging. Change requires vision and resilience. It requires the ability to see through short-term hurdles and setbacks for the sake of a greater longer-term goal. It demands clarity and relentlessness of purpose.
If change is the new norm, then managing change demands acceptance of some fundamental principles:
The key challenge then for any leader is to embed change in the daily way of working as part of normal process.
Talk of change naturally provokes uncertainty, even fear. Colleagues worry that changes to any aspect of the business with which they are familiar threaten their roles and the comfort zone that is part of being within a business-social community. The response to change may therefore include a range of behaviours:
The effective leader must be prepared for any or all of the above responses and be able to identify them. A key part of dealing with challenges to change is being able to articulate effectively the reasons for change and to demonstrate that change is allied to a clear sense of purpose and not being implemented for its own sake. The risk is that the challenge to change will always be more substantive – and potentially the more successful – where change is described negatively (‘this is what we are no longer doing’) rather than positively (‘we are changing from x to y to meet the following opportunity …’).
As change is no longer a project but a business way of life, then being successful in change cannot simply be about the achievement of specific change projects (though those will always be on the organisational agenda). Success will instead be primarily about attitude and behaviour and will be represented by:
Achieving this position will require some specific behaviours from the effective leader:
There are two main risks for the leader in driving the change imperative:
So change is at the heart of effective leadership. It is a cornerstone of leadership vision, strategy, demeanour and tone. Not articulating it regularly and relentlessly as a business norm risks undermining the foundation of a leader’s performance.