It doesn’t matter whether you call the change digital transformation, project X, or solution Z fueled by AI, people typically have an aversion to change that’s hard-wired into our brains.
It’s not surprising, then, that the vast majority (60-70%) of change initiatives fail, mostly because of people’s natural resistance to change.
Hard Truths About Change
Change initiatives generally involve coordinating people, processes, and technology. Sure, it helps to have the right technology tools targeting the right use cases for your business. But change isn’t a “set and forget” proposition.
Being intentional about driving change takes time, attention, and constant effort. IT leaders who think that kicking off or rolling out a change initiative is the same as “making a change” are foolish. People don’t need to adopt your change, and if you don’t respond effectively to their anxieties and resistance (whether direct or indirect), the change you intend will most likely not happen.
While IT leaders can’t “force” anyone to change, they can influence people. Here’s how:
8 Best Practices for Driving Change
1. Address the fear. The first job of change management is to get people to move past their initial, automatic aversion to change. Perhaps people’s fear involves a potential change in their role or maybe them losing their jobs (“the robots are taking over!”). Perhaps it's fear people have of losing control, agency, or status. When people are afraid, their emotions can negatively impact their logic and their ability to adopt change.
Effective change managers must acknowledge and empathize with the emotions that people feel in order to move them to a place where they can think more strategically about the change. Empathy, by the way, is not the same as agreement.
2. Define a vision. What will life look like for stakeholders after the change? You should be asking for people’s input as you define and drive the vision behind the change. Hopefully that process looks like a two-way conversation where you seek to understand other people’s perspectives, as well as influence them by addressing any questions or concerns they may have.
You can't address or move beyond what you're not aware of and you don't want hidden resistance undermining the change management process.
You’ll need to motivate your teams with a strong vision, then align that vision to the execution of the change from a baseline of where you are now to the desired destination. Doing that requires you to track progress against strategic goals in order to build momentum and drive results.
3. Articulate the “why.” The why is so critical to helping stakeholders understand and jump on-board with any change. Write down all the reasons supporting the change, then distill those reasons into something memorable, something people can easily make their own and explain to others. Maybe different reasons will resonate with different stakeholders, so be sure to customize your communication to the target audience.
If your team has trouble answering why they're working on a change initiative, their work becomes directionless. You need a clear plan, articulated well, and your entire organization needs to be brought (and kept) on board through clear, consistent communication.
4. Identify the stakeholders. List the groups and teams that will be impacted by the change you envision. If you're not sure whether a group might be impacted, go ahead and ask them. Next, list the people you think might become an impediment to the change.
Consider what you can do to strategically influence the “resisters.” Perhaps it's a conversation about agreeing to disagree, but moving forward nonetheless. Also consider giving the naysayers an active role to keep them close.
5. Set clear expectations. What does a timeline for change look like? When do you actually expect the adoption of the change? When do you expect to see something different happening consistently? When it comes to change initiatives, there's typically a beginning (baseline), a messy middle, and hopefully full adoption at the end. Have a transparent timeline and communication tools that allow for updates and data sharing.
While planning is great, you also need to be willing to change plans if the incoming data is different from what you expected. The critical part is staying in constant communication with your stakeholders about how the change initiative is going.
6. Use tools effectively. If you're going to lead a complex change management process, the question becomes “what tools do you need to make the change happen?” What are the tools you're going to employ to provide stakeholders with what they need to support the change.
In order to drive change, you will likely need real-time data about the impact of the change. This data can help identify issues, such as:
- Whether users/employees are concerned about a recent process change;
- If new technology is performing as expected;
- If efficiency and productivity have improved.
DEX tools, for instance, can help you visualize the process of employee/ user adoption and also help you deploy personalized campaigns to drive awareness and adoption.
7. Close the loop. You need to share ongoing results with stakeholders. Whether the intended change is the adoption of a new software solution or OS or any other IT initiative, sharing results helps participants feel like they’re part of something bigger than themselves. People who are falling behind, on the other hand, may feel compelled by the data (94.5% of my colleagues have adopted the software solution in the first month) to finally take action, thus increasing adoption.
8. Take care of you. Leading change can mean stepping outside of our comfort zones. We need to ask others what they think, and understand that we may not have all the answers. That said, trust is largely a product of vulnerability – it grows over time and it requires work and full engagement of head and heart.
As a leader of change efforts, it's essential that you don't deplete yourself. You can't give what you don't have, so take good care of yourself, which might mean exercising, sleeping, spending time with family and friends, eating well, and doing anything else that contributes to your wellbeing.