Leadership in Complex, Large-Scale Change
Key learning and insight from the Digital Fund in March
Every month the 29 grantees of the Digital Fund reflect with us on a new theme and we share their insight and learning. In March, the theme was on Leadership — and grantholders shared reflections with us on the qualities of leadership necessary to navigate large-scale, complex organisational change. In the same month, the Covid-19 global emergency arrived and changed everything.
In a few short weeks, charities have had to adapt to changes that would usually take years to happen. In this article, we share with you the insights and learning that we have been collecting from grantholders from before Covid-19, and reflect on their relevance today.
Digital Fund Webinar with Parkinson’s UK, Refugee Action and Law Centres Network
The webinar we hosted focused heavily on the experience of leading a team and organisation in these deeply uncertain and fast-changing times. We had three amazing panellists, all in leadership positions in their organisations: Julie Dodd (Director of Digital Transformation and Communication, Parkinsons UK), Julie Bishop (Director of Law Centres Network) and Stephen Hale (CEO of Refugee Action).
You can watch the full recording of the webinar here:
The panellists answered questions on the leadership they had exercised in the last week, and reflected on the ways they found they were prepared for the crisis. We asked them about what they had learned during the last two weeks — and what they would have done differently looking back.
The themes that came up throughout the webinar included organisational and team culture, resistance to change, and the importance of daring to be bold and innovative in leadership while taking people with you and managing risk. The panellists spoke about the limits to their leadership — and constraints within which they need to work in as leaders.
Looking back on the insights gathered in February, below you can find the synthesis and trends identified across our cohort of grantholders. We had 24 responses to a Typeform survey, collected insights on our cohort Slack channel, and have been having multiple conversations with grantholders over the course of the whole month.
Shifting ideas of leadership over the course of digital projects
Grantholders across the cohort have been telling us that their understanding of what is required of them as leaders has been shifting. What we heard was:
Keeping what works, and challenging old ways
As grantholders have been going through large-scale organisational change, many of them have been asking about the best ways to go through that shift, while holding onto the important parts of the organisational culture — and the mission and goals. The cohort spoke about the need to create a space for people to experiment with new ways of working — and harnessing the energy that already exists within the organisation.
In going through change, leaders find themselves asking what it is that needs to stay at the centre, and what needs to be challenged and discarded. People said that their mission, values and goals need to stay front and foremost, while they challenge old beliefs, habitual processes and ways of working.
“One leadership challenge is preserving the most important parts of our mission, values and culture while introducing new ways of working that reflect the internet era. What should be kept? What should be discarded? What is the cross-over?”
Another grantholder focused on delivering care said: “It’s important we challenge the day to day — the but we’ve always done it this way. It’s vital we bring everything back to our mission & goals — are we really achieving what we want to achieve for carers? If not, what do we need to change in order to deliver & improve?” In amongst this transition, integrating existing organisational processes with new best practice design processes is also important. Instead of replacing one with the other wholesale, managing this transition and bringing the people of the organisation along with you was cited as an important skill as a leader.
Creating space for experimentation
Another key theme that emerged across the cohort was the shift in the style of leadership — from leading from the front to seeing themselves as ‘facilitators’ or ‘enablers’ that create space and soil for solutions to grow. Grantholders spoke about “not needing to have all the answers” and “starting small, trying it out or trying again”. This opens the door to solving problems that originally felt too hard but broken down into iterative steps suddenly begins to loosen. One grantholder said that “as a result of this, it is expanding our ambition.”
The importance of communication, transparency, and team culture
Many grantholders spoke about the shift in culture at their organisations, and how necessary this shift was to enable their digital projects and ways of working to function smoothly. A quarter of our grantholders rated “creating the right culture” as the most important place to invest time in as a leader when undertaking large-scale, complex change.
One grantholder said: “I’m much more aware of how transparent I need to be. I think it’s really important as a leader and an innovator that I bring other people in the organisation along on this journey — otherwise it isn’t a journey of organisational transformation at all.” Others spoke about how the practice of transparency and clearly communicating project aims increased trust, which then meant that “when things get tough, we navigate it together”.
It’s interesting to consider that this increased need for transparency came about while evolving to a different, more digital way of working. Shifting to a more user-led approach and agile ways of working makes it important to share information and coordinate in efficient, agile ways.
Users at the centre
While working on their digital projects, most of the grantholders have worked with support partners who advised them on data-driven and design-led approaches. Using a user-led approach is a practice that has led to deep cultural shifts and shifts in leadership in our grantholder organisations.
One large organisation in our cohort said: “I don’t have to do it all, even where others have less skill or experience, the user-led approach has lead to us working in a way that allows junior staff to take the lead and is exciting.” Another spoke about the “need to focus our organisation on the value we’re delivering for our users, moving people away from ‘but this is what we’ve always done’ to ‘what do our users need from us, and how and when do they want it?” By focusing on beneficiaries grantholders can design for them and develop the best solutions.
Devolving decision making
Involving employees in decision-making and showing “participatory leadership” was also a key theme that appeared multiple times throughout our grantholders’ insights. Grantholders talked about the tension between of spending too much time on this process, and the pay-off of getting ‘buy-in’ on the organisational change. By opening up decision-making one grantholder said they were: “Being inclusive, listening to different voices, and being open to challenge and change enables staff to trust in the direction of travel you are taking them in and reduces the fear of change.”
It was also mentioned several times that creating an open culture where the team is invited to feed into the overall vision was empowering and engaging for the team. It gives more people an opportunity to show self-leadership and a sense of ownership over the work together.
In the face of resistance
In the case of any large-scale, complex change, there is always the possibility and chance that there is resistance to this change. Grantholders were asked about how they manage the resistance that may arrive. Building on the themes that emerged above, there were three common approaches to managing this resistance identified:
- Bring people back to data and mission
- Communication, transparency and involving employees from the start
- Relationships and finding the champions of change in the organisation
Thank you to everyone who contributed to our March Typeform and the many conversations we have hosted on Leadership! Stay tuned for April’s theme on Responsible Technology.
