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Lead through Change: The 10 Steps Most Forgotten by Change Leaders

1. Where are we headed? Though there are no maps, there are compasses. Paint a clear and visual image of the future as you see it and future opportunities that might open up. Do you see a new vision? Or just more, better, faster? If the former, don’t assume that others know it.

2. Accentuate the Positive. Publicize and repeatedly underscore the positives about the current and proposed changes. Most companies neglect or underplay this. Just because senior management gets it doesn’t mean it filters down.

3. Share what you’re thinking and what’s going on in a way they can hear and understand.  Other species communicate constantly during change through touch, smell, sight and sound. Humans need to hear from you on a regular basis on at least one of those dimensions. And make sure there’s an open line back up to you.

4. Go on a Listening Tour. Tell people where you’re going and ask them how to get there and what roadblocks they foresee. Take action on their suggestions when possible. When not possible, and you forget to give feedback on why not, disengagement is sure to follow. This one step will salvage your change effort. 

One Wisconsin Health Care system kicked off a system-wide lab scheduling software without consulting the individual labs. Needs were so different among the labs that bookings decreased over 45% within a month. If they had checked-in, they could have tweaked the software before implementation and saved hundreds of thousands of dollars in lost bookings.

5. Find and keep cultural beats. Surprisingly, people can be more afraid of losing important elements of their culture than they are their status or position. Relationships with others are a central part of the glue that holds them to your company. Find out what parts of the culture are important to your people. You’ll be surprised at how easy it is to safeguard and enhance these. 

One real estate brokerage learned that Friday lunches were sacred. For an aerospace company, blue-shirtTuesday was important (who knew?). A large pharma had appointed rotating volunteer ‘cheerleaders’ to cheer up the workforce. An efficiency expert recommended removing the post, resulting in cries of protest. The cheerleader had become a central part of their culture.  

6. Appoint Change Agents from mid-management levels around the organization who monitor, unblock and expedite change. They get silos talking and working together, push vision through blocks to the first line, identify triangles and tangles (explained later), open up blocked communication lines. These should be objective, honored and rewarded leadership training posts.

7. Follow through. Don’t make any decision without detailing who, exactly when, and how you’ll follow up and then follow up. Don’t blow this part; the start-stop nature of change efforts is how cynicism develops. Schedule follow up alerts and pop-ups in the software system. Post the people or departments responsible for action on public boards and highlight those who complete on time. Program screen savers with prompts, rewards and punishments. Execution is everything. 

8. Take the lead on getting agile and efficient. How are your meetings? Long-winded and report based? That’s more ego than activity. Things happening fast enough? Anyone being tolerated who’s not up to it? People in lead positions who you wouldn’t fight for if they wanted to quit? When you play the game “Put Us Out of Business” do you always win?

9. If you are starting a new way of working, show them you mean it. They’ve been here before, are jaded and don’t believe you. Do something dramatic as a kickoff. One company starting an open door policy, burned down some manager’s doors in a parking lot (not recommended). Senior leaders who declared they were starting a Servant Leadership attitude served employees in the cafeteria with white gloves. These might not work for you, but think of something that screams: “This time is different.”

10. Establish leadership best practices and hold people’s feet to the fire to develop them. These are well documented in other areas; the point is to decide on a few that are central to you and make them happen! Many leaders write down a few practices and assume they’ll stick. They won’t.

Life Becomes Real at the Point of Action

I love that quote from Plato. Reality is in doing, not wishing or wanting. Making the Decision. Starting. Persevering. When Diana Nyad was asked how she accomplished the swim from Cuba to Florida, she responded: “Just do it, find a way, never, ever quit.” Sounds easy.

Start with What – Not How

“How did she do that?” OMG, that’s amazing – how do you do all that you do?” Questions involving ‘how’ lead you into a jungle of confusion. Never ask how. Only decide what. In an ideal life plan, you’ll have created your matrices of overriding life visions (e.g. happiness and joy, creative and meaningful work, health and fitness), then broad actions that will lead to the fulfillment of those visions, then specific actions that can be accomplished now. Always start with the vision, then work back to broad action. When an action shows up that is part of the vision, make a decision to do it. It wouldn’t have shown up if it weren’t meant for you. Make the decision to do it, despite all reasonable evidence that it wouldn’t be possible for you (the hows don’t line up).

Balanced or Burning Out?

Burnout is a gradual loss of energy that develops from wanting to succeed, caring a lot, and lacking a turn-off switch that makes you stop when you’ve done enough. You’re probably even missing the system that monitors “enough.” Here’s a link to a quick assessment to find your Zone: Safe, Caution, or Danger.

Burnout creeps up, stealing energy as it gobbles up your life. The best way to deal with it is to prevent it.

In this article are the seven usual steps. They’re not symptoms–just a description of the progression of the disease. The steps reflect the assessment.

Never Too Late!

This morning an article appeared in the NY Times that I can’t get out of my mind.

Fernando Miteff was a graffiti artist until his mom threw out all his materials (“get a job!”). This powerful gesture threw him into despair where he stayed for almost 30 years. One day a friend asked him: ‘Do you believe in God?’ He said, ‘Of course.’ His friend told him to be serious for one moment a day for 30 days. Every morning, he said, ask God a simple question: “Can you please give me the information I’m seeking?”

Five Things You Should Never Do

Change demands energy! Here are five energy wasters that seem subtle, soft, and innocuous. But they are choices that absorb a lot of energy. If you make changes in any of these areas, you’ll have a lot more energy to spend on making worthwhile changes.

1. Don’t do anything for anyone over the age of 18 that they can and should be doing for themselves. This behavior weakens the recipient and usually causes resentment in the caregiver. Resentment is powerfully disabling and leads to other bad habits you don’t need. If you are rescuing anyone over 18, you are not helping them. Rather, you are meeting your own unmet needs and it is time to meet those from other sources.

Better to “Want” Than to “Get”

Next time you announce a new incentive program, or the possibility of an award, start measuring productivity, well-being and satisfaction month by month until the actual award period, and for a couple of months afterward. 

The ANTICIPATION of a reward feels better than receiving the actual award and is more motivating. It is a quirk in the structure of the brain’s reward system.

What Holds You Back?

This is a little encouragement and reminder message. These four steps have boosted me in slow times, maybe they’ll encourage you too.

  1. Stop comparing yourself to what other people have done. Think of the distance you’ve already covered. You always do the best you can, so there are no failures and there are no mistakes.

  2. Every now and then, with each new step, say “Thank you for my freedom.” With every breath say: “Thank you for my power.”

Being Wrong is a Good Idea

One of the first lessons of aeronautics is “whatever pushes against you, lifts you up.” The wind against the underside of the wings helps the airplane fly. Similarly, what we have to push against helps us grow. All nature follows the same physical principles. Everything that is hard for us makes us better.

Being wrong creates the same energy dynamic. If you can tolerate it, being wrong also stretches your mental boundaries, creates friction and growth. Being right is mildly reinforcing only following a struggle.

How to Procrastinate Well

If you’re going to do something, do it 100%. If you are going to procrastinate, do it 100% so it becomes a pure activity.

If you a) avoid an unwanted task by procrastinating and b) do something rather pleasant and mildly fulfilling during that time (tidy up, make labels, make another cup of tea) you are double-dipping into the Rewards Jar with both positive and negative reinforcement at play.

Procrastination. If procrastination is causing you problems, it might be because you make it so rewarding. Whatever you find rewarding will be repeated. Here’s an escape route for you.

Why? Robin Williams’ Suicide

There are no answers to Robin Williams’ suicide, only questions.  
Little is known of Robin’s family history of depression, but there are reports of childhood loneliness, shyness, sadness, and melancholia. He played alone for hours. Did the inability of his parents to allow him to attach to them lead to a lifetime of attachment-seeking through substances and entertainment? 

Little is known of his father, Robert Fitzgerald Williams, who as a Ford executive responsible for the midwest traveled a great deal, and appeared to be distant emotionally and physically absent. William’s only mention of his father was when he recalled his father’s wrath when Robin bought his first foreign car rather than a Ford. Did his inability to identify with him lead to his inability to form intimate enduring attachments to women?   

More Robin Williams Aftermath: When Someone you Love Commits Suicide

Suicide of a loved one can blanket us with an oppressive morass of confusion and guilt for the rest of our lives, if untreated. Of all deaths, it is the most difficult to accept and the most intractable in its response to treatment.

Know these things:

1. No matter what, it was not your fault. He did what he did because of his own demons, not because of you. There was nothing you could have done.

Five Things You Should Never Do with Other People

Anything for anyone over the age of 18 that they can and should be doing for themselves. This behavior weakens the recipient and usually causes resentment in the caregiver. Resentment is powerfully disabling an leads to other bad habits you don’t need. If you are rescuing anyone over 18, you are not helping them. Rather, you are meeting your own unmet needs and it is time to meet those from other sources.

 

With the skills that people need now and the inspiration they need for the future.

Cut through resistance, instill optimism, and lift everyone to a place of hope and courage.