Interactive And Collaborative Communication Techniques Eriaan Oelofse April 2009

Copyright © 2008 ChangeWright Consulting (Pty) Ltd 1

CREATING SHARED MEANING, COMMITMENT, AND SUSTAINED EFFORT IN ORGANISATIONAL CHANGE INITIATIVES THROUGH INTERACTIVE AND COLLABORATIVE COMMUNICATION TECHNIQUES by Eriaan Oelofse, Ph.D., ChangeWright Consulting

Published as part of the conference proceedings of the Prosci Global Conference on Change Management held in the US in April 2009.

Introduction It is generally accepted that personal change precedes organizational change. Stated differently, it is not organizations that change, but the people (Gravells, 2006; Holden, 2007). All too often, organizational change is initiated by executive and/or senior leadership, with the help of external consultants. This small group of people spends a significant amount of time discussing, debating, arguing, and analyzing the reasons for having to change – providing them with the opportunity to move through three of the four phases on the change curve a person typically encounters when confronted with change. These phases (denial, resistance, exploration, and commitment) are based on a derivative of Kübler-Ross’s (1989) five stages of grief (denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance), as applied in an organizational change context. When this select group of leaders decide to announce the planned initiative to the rest of the organization, the majority of employees are thrown into stage one (denial) of the change curve, while the leadership group is effectively in stage three (exploration). This apparent gap between the leadership group and the rest of the organization can create a great deal of frustration, on the one hand because the leaders appear unsympathetic to the effects of the initiative they are supposedly “pushing” through, and on the other hand that the employees appear unwilling, non-supportive and non-

committed to the proposed initiative in support of the objectives of the organization. Holman, Devane, and Cady (2007) claimed that effective organizational change initiatives are possible through high involvement of employees and a systemic approach to improvement. High involvement is achieved by engaging as many as possible employees in changing and designing their own system, while a systemic approach implies that all people, functions, and ideas that have an affect on, or can be affected by the change, are included in the process. One of the methods through which this can be accomplished, is the World Café conversational process. Café conversations are flexible and can easily be adapted to different organizational settings and circumstances. (Brown & Isaacs, 1996, 2001). The purpose of this paper is twofold:

• to present a description of a World Café intervention that was conducted at a South African Information and Communications Technology (ICT) company as part of an approach designed to create continued effort and improve employee buy-in and commitment in a service improvement programme and

• to examine the impact of the intervention on the effectiveness of the service improvement programme.

This will be done by considering actual operational statistics regarding the site’s service stability, as well as an analysis of in-depth individual interviews that were conducted with six participants two months after the intervention.

The World Café The World Café provides opportunities for creating meaningful conversations or dialogue around questions that matter. Although it appears to be a relatively simplistic practice, it is built on the principles of dynamic networks and living systems and provides a unique opportunity to access a system’s creativity and shared knowledge that might not be available through more traditional approaches. As such, the World Café provides a safe space where participants can contribute in the process


of knowledge sharing through dialogue, engage with each other in a living system of personal relationships, and act decisively in pursuit of common aims (Brown et.al., 2007).

How does it work?

World Café conversations have been used successfully with groups as small as 12 people and as large as 1200 people from around the world (Brown & Isaacs, 2001). During these events, participants are encouraged to contribute in small groups by speaking and listening, without being concerned about solving the issue or saying the right thing. The purpose is to share ideas, while learning from others in the process of discovering innovative ideas and generating new possibilities. It is not about reaching conclusions. During a World Café conversation, up to eight people sit around a table or in a conversation cluster to explore questions or issues related to their work. Other participants at nearby tables or conversation clusters explore similar questions at the same time. Participants are requested to write down key ideas and insights of the dialogue. After a first round of conversation (20 to 30 minutes), participants are invited to change tables, carrying ideas and insights form the first conversation into a newly formed small group. A table host stays at each table to share the key ideas and insights that surfaced from the previous dialogue with new arrivals. This process is usually repeated for three rounds and is followed by a feedback session to which all participants contribute. This process doesn't have to be taught, but it can be guided by using the following principles as discussed in Brown and Isaacs (2001), Brown, Homer and Isaacs (2007), and Schieffer, Isaacs, and Gyllenpalm (2004a, 2004b): Clarify the context This involves determining the purpose of the Café and deciding on the outcomes to be achieved. When the purpose and outcomes have been defined, it will focus the way questions are framed and ideas are explored. Create a friendly and warm environment A friendly and warm or hospitable space provides a context where all participants feel

free to contribute their thoughts and feelings. The ideal World Café set-up consists of an informal atmosphere, background music, round tables with table cloths and refreshments on each of the tables, flipchart paper, and a cup of colored markers. Explore questions that matter Since the World Café conversational process is aimed at exploring new possibilities for inquiry and action, well-phrased and focused questions define intention, focus energy, and direct attention. Appreciative questions that evoke a sense of future possibility also create more energy and engagement than questions focusing on what is wrong in the present. Connect diverse people and perspectives A defining feature of the World Café conversational process is the intentional cross-pollination of ideas as participants move from table to table in several rounds of dialogue. As participants move from one table to the next, patterns appear and additional perspectives and insights surface in combinations not previously imagined. Harvest and share collective discoveries After completion of all the conversation rounds, the entire group engages in a conversation to share collective insights and provide the group with an opportunity to notice the underlying themes and discoveries that have presented themselves during the process – often leading to outcomes that no one could have foreseen when the conversation commenced.

How did the service improvement programme come about? A newly formed regional office of a South African ICT company embarked on a journey to implement a strategy that is focused on improving service delivery and support, as well as client and employee satisfaction. In support of the strategic objectives, the senior management team launched an initiative to


improve clients’ trust and confidence in the service delivery and support of the company. Employees were challenged to an 80 day incident free service delivery and support period, with rewards in the form of celebrations for every twenty incident free days as motivation. An incident was defined as anything causing a break in service delivery and support which could have been prevented from occurring by any of the departments. The occurrence of an incident resulted in a “reset” of the current number of incident free days to zero. The improvement programme was launched by means of a presentation during a communication “road show”, with a noticeable improvement in service stability after the first few months. However, the longest period of service stability was 24 days, after which a series of resets during the next few months prevented the company from reaching or improving on this record. Employees became discouraged due to all the resets (10 resets in less than three months), and as a result, the programme started losing significance in the eyes of many employees. Furthermore, it appeared that employees did not support or understand the guidelines of what constituted an incident; and that they lacked information on how to prevent previous incidents from occurring again. It seemed that the employees did not understand that it was in their own best interest to do things differently and improve service stability on the site – they interpreted it as just another management intervention. Due to the strategic importance of this initiative to improve service stability, the management team found themselves in the unfortunate position of having to continue with the programme without the necessary support from the employees.

The World Café intervention To address the issues discussed above, the management team agreed to use the World Café conversational process to create shared meaning and buy-in. Ninety employees (out of a possible 120) attended the intervention and spent only two hours exploring the following three questions which were asked to touch on aspects related to the legitimacy of the programme, motivation, and ownership:

• How do you feel about the service improvement programme?

• What will happen if we don't have something like the service improvement programme on site?

• How can we improve the service improvement programme to achieve exceptional results?

The first question provided participants with the opportunity to voice positive or negative emotions regarding the programme. Since many employees were of the opinion that the programme was not adding value, the second question attended to the matter of legitimacy and focused discussions on the beneficial outcomes the programme has had on the site since its inception. The third question addressed the issue of ownership and presented participants with the opportunity to make suggestions on how the programme could be improved. Moving from conversation to action At the conclusion of the process, the manager asked for five volunteers (not part of the management team) to form a design team that would consider all the suggestions that were made at the event to improve the programme, prioritize the key ideas, and suggest next steps. The design team submitted a proposal on how to enhance the service improvement programme to the management team one week after the World Café intervention. To address the suggestions made by all the World Café participants, the design team proposed the following enhancements:

• Departments to be measured separately in addition to the overall site measurement.

• A change in the investigation, analysis, and communication of reset incidents to optimize learning and prevent similar incidents from occurring again.

• A change in the mechanics of the resetting process – incidents should be categorized in levels of seriousness based on the actual impact on customers. (Some “incidents” had no actual impact on customers.) If an incident occurs, i.e. a procedure was not followed or a preventable error has occurred, the count of the department responsible for the incident will be reset


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to zero, while the overall site count will be reduced by the number of days linked to the level of seriousness of the specific incident. However, any incident impacting on the customer still resulted in an overall site reset to zero.

Due to the collaborative process and the involvement of so many employees during the design of the enhanced initiative, it was possible for the management team to accept the proposal and implement the changes within three weeks after the World Café intervention. Based on the trend of resets depicted in Figure 1, it is evident that there was a noticeable improvement in the number of incident free days (service stability) after the World Café intervention. The first reset after the implementation of the enhanced improvement programme occurred on day 25. In accordance with the newly created resetting process, the count was moved back by three days. The second reset occurred on day 44 when the count moved back by four days. The last reset occurred on day 68 and the count moved back by four days. The site reached the goal of 80 incident free days 16 days later.

Figure 1 – Trend of resets of the service improvement programme

Research Design

Research approach Due to the dynamic nature of the World Café conversational process, a qualitative approach was considered most suitable to obtain in-depth data regarding participant’s thoughts and feelings about the service improvement

programme and the World Café conversational process. This approach is also ideal for gleaning rich and insightful information and eliminates, as far as possible, socially desirable responses.

Respondents All respondents participated in the World Café intervention and were selected randomly. One of the respondents was in the operational site management team, another respondent was a team leader and four were team members.

Method of data gathering Data collection was done by means of in-depth individual interviews lasting between 25–30 minutes. A semi-structured discussion guide was developed for the interviews to allow for more flexibility and responsiveness to emerging themes, whilst at the same time allowing sufficient structure to make a comparable analysis possible. The interviews were conducted until data-saturation was reached (i.e. repetitive patterns of themes emerged). Data saturation was reached after six interviews.

Treatment of the data Audio-recordings of the interviews were transcribed verbatim for content analysis. According to Jackson II, Drummond, and Camara (2007), content analysis refers to a variety of ways for conducting systematic and objective textual analysis that involves comparing, contrasting, and categorizing data. Statements that shared the same underlying meaning or idea were grouped together for each of the questions. Verbatim statements from the respondents were used (where appropriate) to illustrate and explicate the main themes.

Results

Employee perceptions about the performance improvement programme before the World Café intervention The issue of employees not taking ownership of the programme was a major theme and spontaneously mentioned by most respondents. Many respondents explained that the lack of ownership could be ascribed to the fact that


employees did not understand why the programme was initiated, or why it was important to support this initiative.

“People from head office came and told us about the programme and how it is going to work, but they didn't really give enough information... Then the process was kicked-off and the information was never really given to people on grass root level” (Respondent 4).

Furthermore, a number of respondents emphasized that senior management did not involve employees in the planning of the programme. This resulted in employees becoming despondent and de-motivated. Due to the stringent success criteria and the increasing pressure brought about by the numerous “resets”, many employees felt very negative about the programme. This also resulted in a situation where employees did not want to be innovative or do anything creative due to the fear of failure.

Experiences of the World Café intervention All six the respondents emphasized that they benefitted from participating in the event:

“It was excellent in my opinion... it was fantastic. We couldn't have asked for anything better... this thing really pumped life back into the initiative... We couldn't have had anything better in my opinion” (Respondent 3).

The respondents agreed that the event provided a perfect opportunity for interaction with other employees. In addition, the increased interaction facilitated by the World Café conversational process resulted in feelings of ‘inter-connectedness’. Due to the friendly and warm environment created by the intervention, all respondents were of the opinion that it provided an opportunity where employees could contribute without fear of victimization and add suggestions on how to improve the current programme. Participants in the intervention also felt that their suggestions were taken seriously and that something was going to be done about it. Respondents also mentioned that the meaningful conversations or dialogue regarding

various aspects of the improvement programme created opportunities for alignment and resulted in participants taking ownership of the programme.

“This was the first time it was really communicated well. People could see and understand what it was about – and just this communication already made a big difference. One of the questions we discussed in the small groups was what the impact would be if we don't have something like this programme, many people understood for the first time that this programme is good and that we need stability on the site” (Respondent 6).

Finally, it appears that the World Café intervention not only created feelings of empowerment, but also of hope:

“...most of all, what was said there gave people hope... most people came out of there feeling hopeful... they felt positive and felt that they now have control over the situation and that their viewpoints were considered” (Respondent 4).

Perceived impact of the World Café intervention on the success of the service improvement programme When asked about the impact of the World Café intervention on the success of the adjusted service improvement programme, all the respondents concurred that the intervention had a tremendous positive impact:

“I am very sure that if we didn't have this intervention, we would still have struggled on like before... there were lots of new ideas that we worked with after the session and created a new process. This intervention definitely created the turning point in our programme and created lots of energy and creativity in teams. It also stimulated interaction between the people and the various teams” (Respondent 5).


Discussion

The analyses of the qualitative interview data, as well as the actual success of the modified service improvement program as depicted in Figure 1, reiterated the fact that those who envision the future are the ones who end up making it happen – in other words, people tend to support and defend that which they help to create (Cady, 2007). The design of the World Café intervention encouraged interaction between participants which not only resulted in feelings of inter-connectedness, but also generated a lot of energy that stimulated the creation of new and innovative ideas. As the intervention unfolded, participants could sense that their contributions were not only heard, but also taken seriously. This encouraged most participants to provide suggestions on how to improve service delivery, which contributed a wealth of new and innovative solutions. Additionally, the meaningful conversations or dialogue regarding various aspects of the improvement programme created opportunities for alignment and resulted in participants understanding the strategic need for implementing and supporting a service improvement initiative at the operational site. While the measurement rules of the service improvement programme were changed as a direct result of the World Café intervention, one should keep in mind that the ultimate purpose of the programme, i.e. improving service stability and therefore customer satisfaction, was achieved with great success. Although the rhetoric of employee involvement in the planning and execution of initiatives resonates through the corridors of many South African organizations, the experience is that leaders often impose top-down initiatives, without involving employees in the process. The results of the individual interviews highlighted the fact that leaders should not underestimate the significance of involving more employees through conversational processes like the World Café when developing new initiatives. The outcomes of this paper provide evidence for the argument that it makes sense for organizations to move slower by involving employees when they are developing new

initiatives in order to move faster and more effectively once the initiative has been implemented. And often it does not necessarily require long, intricate and big budget interventions – in this case, a relatively simplistic, but well-planned, two hour intervention had a major positive impact on the success of a service improvement programme.

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Qualitative Research Reports in Communication, 8, 21-28. Retrieved 7 November 2007 from Academic Search Premier database. Kübler -Ross, E. (1989). On Death and Dying. London: Tavistock/Routledge. (Original work published 1969). Schieffer, A., Isaacs, D., & Gyllenpalm, B. (2004, July 14 a). The World Café: Part One. Transformation, 18, 1-7. Retrieved 6 November 2007 from the World Wide Web: http://www.collectivewisdominitiative.org/papers/WorldCafe.pdf. Schieffer, A., Isaacs, D., & Gyllenpalm, B. (2004b, July 21 b). The World Café: Part Two. Transformation, 18, 1-9. Retrieved 6 November 2007 from the World Wide Web: http://www.collectivewisdominitiative.org/papers/WorldCafe.pdf.

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Interactive And Collaborative Communication Techniques Eriaan Oelofse April 2009