My previous post described challenges with triggering changes bottom-up. This post focuses on three key elements of successfully preparing and announcing changes in organizations from the perspective of the change author and driver. The approach described here is mostly relevant for organizational or process changes.
The difficulty in announcing changes depends on the scope of change, the situation of the affected individuals, and the perceived difference compared to status quo. Diligent preparation and rollout planning for changes is crucial for driving a successful change process. Missing out on planning may lead to diminishing returns, create unnecessary friction, and put additional pressure on the change authors.
When preparing a change, three elements are crucial to consider:
- Set of key changes alongside with reasoning on why these were decided upon and which constraints were taken into account.
- Change map with measures and messages appealing to the needs of those affected by the change and those who will support it.
- Communication approach: announcement vs. communication cascade.
Noting these down serves as an easy way to assess the confidence of change authors in the change and uncover areas that may have been missed out during preparation.
Key changes, reasoning, and constraints
Listing the key changes that are being made and preparing a crisp reasoning for each point helps in verifying the completeness of the scope of change. Capturing the constraints that influenced scope or decisions allows to set the right context as part of the announcement. It also ensures that assumptions about the status quo are validated ahead of proceeding further.
The change map (four quadrants of change)
Every person who is affected by a change is asked to adjust their behavior, which involves learning. Adults learn both on an individual level or collectively with/from their peers. Both ways have an internal and external dimension to it, forming a change map or four quadrants of change. The likelihood of success when rolling out changes is increased when the messages used throughout the communication as well as the additional measures accompanying the change process cover all of the four quadrants:
- mindset/values (internal / individual) — What facts need to be acknowledged about the status quo, values, or beliefs of the individual to ensure the change is easy to understand and relate to? What measures are needed to promote buy-in? What key concerns of individuals need to be addressed in order to explain the reasons for the change, speak to their potential anxiety for change or fear of losing something they had or mastered before?
- behaviors+skills (external / individual) — how are individuals expected to act after the change is announced? What material can they read or interact with in order to learn about the changes? What skills to they need to acquire and what training opportunities are provided? What behaviours would define a successful rollout of the change? Which behaviours should be reinforced and which rather prevented from happening and how?
- cultural (internal / collective) — what support will be provided through changes in culture (or expectations), communities, and means of exchange for those who are affected by the change? How can groups be nudged or empowered to interact and discuss their concerns or understanding of the changes? Who will be the change agents and supporters/promoters?
- systems/processes (external / collective) — what processes or mechanisms will be put in place in order to support the change? Is there a need or opportunity for enforcing the change through process or rule changes? Will there be any mandatory trainings or re-skilling?
Filling out the four dimensions during change preparation ensures coverage of the full spectrum of needs of the target audience (usually the internal dimensions) and organization (usually represented in the external dimensions). A common pitfall is to underinvest in the two quadrants with internal focus on the individual, resulting in merely stating the change and facts. This happens especially if there is external or time pressure or when the authors exhibit excitement and relief for the changes being finally ready to announce. The mindset/values quadrant ensures that care is given to help understanding the state of mind, knowledge, or needs of the target audience. It’s crucial to meet the audience where they are in order to convey a convincing and relatable message, thus reducing friction when the change is announced. Change authors need to be careful to keep a realistic view of the state of knowledge and sentiment within the organization. The longer the preparations take, the more familiar with and convinced they become of the new course, making it rather easy to underestimate the degree of change.
Communication approach
Announcement
The simplest way to roll out a change is to announce it to everyone stating the facts (key changes), either in person or in writing. The bigger and more diverse the audience, the more care is required alongside the announcement text, with aspects prepared in the four quadrants required to be mentioned to increase success.
Regardless how sophisticated and clear the communication will be, there will (almost) always be questions. Including a short FAQ section in the change announcement helps to address anticipated questions upfront. To source these questions, put yourself in the position of the audience and those individuals who are most affected by the change. Try to anticipate what the most controversial or just the obvious reactions will be. To strengthen the set of questions, feedback can be sourced from a few individuals who have not worked on the change or from representatives of the leadership team.
To better structure the conversation around the change, it’s advisable to host a Q&A session and to include an invite in the original announcement. Questions asked during the Q&A should be also added to the FAQ later on.
Communication cascade
It’s common to combine the announcement with the cascade for major or complex changes. There are two types of cascaded rollouts, which differ in the role leadership plays in the change process — a supporting or leading one.
In the first model, the change initiators use dedicated sessions to announce the change to different groups, for example following the organizational hierarchy (following the reporting chain) or its structure (sessions per department). Here, the change authors play a stronger role in the rollout and are supported by leadership.
In the second model, the change is rolled out top-down with leaders owning the change, starting with the first leadership level who then roll it out to their team who communicate the change to the next level, and so on. The FAQ section mentioned above is extended at each level and leaders are supported with additional talking points which help to ensure consistent messaging. The key changes, reasoning, and constraints captured before serve as a base for the talking points and enable leaders to communicate the change as if they had worked on it themselves. Here, it’s also possible to adjust the messaging at every leadership level.
Summary
Depending on the complexity of the change and size of the organization, sufficient time needs to be invested in preparation. How much time to invest is highly contextual and depends on the culture of the organization and the affected individuals. For simple changes, quickly noting the key changes and mapping the key messages onto the four quadrants will help you to tune the content of the change announcement. For complex changes, separating work on the three elements more explicitly is advised. The more changes you will initiate and drive, the better you will be prepared for the next one.
Should you encounter individuals challenging the changes, help them understand what opportunities they have to influence changes and participate in the change process themselves.
