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Change management: creating shared meaning, commitment and sustained effort in organisationalchange initiatives through interactive and collaborative communication techniques 18 September 2008

Interactive & Collaborative Communication V002

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Presentation I delivered at a Seminar hosted by Knowledge Resources focussing on Internal Communications (18 September 2008) Topic: Change management: creating shared meaning, commitment and sustained effort in organisational change initiatives through interactive and collaborative comunication techniques

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Page 1: Interactive & Collaborative Communication V002

Change management: creating shared meaning,

commitment and sustained effort in

organisational change initiatives through interactive

and collaborative communication techniques

18 September 2008

Page 2: Interactive & Collaborative Communication V002

Agenda…

• Does this Sound Familiar?

• Organisational Change

• The Change Curve

• Case Study

• World Café

• Aspects to Address during Interactive Events

Page 3: Interactive & Collaborative Communication V002

Does this sound familiar?

• Why could the change initiators not transfer the

energy for the change to the organisation?

• Why didn’t people “get” that this change was

ultimately for the good of everyone?

• What could be done to create ownership of the • What could be done to create ownership of the

problems and the solutions among all people

involved?

Page 4: Interactive & Collaborative Communication V002

“Tappers” and “Listeners”…

• Elizabeth Newton (1990) studied a simple game in

which she assigned participants to one of two roles:

“tappers” or “listeners”.

• Tappers have been blessed with the “curse of

knowledge” – once we know something, it is hard to

imagine what it was like not to know it (Heath & imagine what it was like not to know it (Heath &

Heath, 2008).

Page 5: Interactive & Collaborative Communication V002

Organisational Change…

• All too often, organisational change is initiated by

executive and/or senior leadership, with the help of

a few external consultants.

• This small group of people spends a significant

amount of time discussing, debating, arguing, and

analysing the reasons for having to change – creating analysing the reasons for having to change – creating

the tune in their heads.

Page 6: Interactive & Collaborative Communication V002

Denial Sense of accomplishment

AnxietyIncreased productivity

Confidence

Competence

Productivity

Current Reality

The Change Curve…

Transition

Fear

ResistanceImmobilisation

Disruption

Anxiety

Recognition of opportunity

productivity

Productivity

Time

Valley of Despair

Exploration

Commitment

Page 7: Interactive & Collaborative Communication V002

Organisational Change…

• This apparent gap between the leadership group and

the rest of the organisation can create a great deal of

frustration:

– on the one hand because the leaders appear

unsympathetic, and

on the other hand that the employees appear – on the other hand that the employees appear

unwilling, non-supportive and non-committed

Page 8: Interactive & Collaborative Communication V002

Case study…

• A regional office of a South African Information and

Communications Technology (ICT) company

implemented a strategy that is focused on improving

service delivery and support, as well as client and

employee satisfaction.

• Senior management team launched an initiative at • Senior management team launched an initiative at

the various operational sites.

• Longest period of service stability 24 days.

Page 9: Interactive & Collaborative Communication V002

Case study…

• Employees became discouraged due to all the

“resets” and the programme started losing

significance and credibility.

• It also appeared that employees did not support or

understand the guidelines of what constituted an

incident; and that they lacked information on how to incident; and that they lacked information on how to

prevent previous incidents from occurring again.

• Employees interpreted this as “just another

management intervention”.

Page 10: Interactive & Collaborative Communication V002

Case study…

• Management team found themselves in the

unfortunate position of having to continue with the

programme without the necessary support from the

employees.

• Management team agreed to use an interactive and

collaborative conversational process (the World collaborative conversational process (the World

Café) to create shared meaning and buy-in.

Page 11: Interactive & Collaborative Communication V002

World Café Conversations…

• Have been used

successfully with

groups as small as 12

and as large as 1200

peoplepeople

• Participants

encouraged to

contribute in small

groups

Page 12: Interactive & Collaborative Communication V002

World Café Principles…

Clarify the context

Create warm and friendly environment

Make collective knowledge and insight visible

and actionable

Explore questions that

matter

Connect diverse people

and perspectives

Harvest and share collective

discoveries

Page 13: Interactive & Collaborative Communication V002

The Intervention…

• Ninety employees (out of a possible 120) attended

the intervention and spent only two hours exploring

the following three questions which related to

aspects of legitimacy of the programme, motivation,

and ownership:

– How do you feel about the service improvement – 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?

Page 14: Interactive & Collaborative Communication V002

Mo

vin

g fro

m C

on

versa

tion

to A

ction

68

81

60

70

80

90

100

Number of days

Wo

rld

Ca

ev

en

t

0

52

7

2

9

24

16

13

3

15

16

18

10

91

2

25

44

0

10

20

30

40

50

Reset 1

Reset 2

Reset 3

Reset 4

Reset 5

Reset 6

Reset 7

Reset 8

Reset 9

Reset 10

Reset 11

Reset 12

Reset 13

Reset 14

Reset 15

Reset 16

Reset 17

Reset 18

Reset 19

Reset 20

Current

Number of days

Page 15: Interactive & Collaborative Communication V002

What Participants had to Say…

A perfect opportunity for interaction with

other employees:

“It felt good to participate in something like

this. I often feel that we are just sitting in our

offices, doing our job, but we don't really

communicate with the people around us...

and this created that opportunity... I didn't

feel like an outsider anymore...”

A positive impact on the effectiveness of the

programme:

“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

Employees could contribute without fear of

victimisation and add suggestions on how to

improve the current programme:

“In a normal forum, like the official site

communication session we have on a monthly

basis, you are not given an opportunity to air

your views... seeing that we could, caused

others to air their views and speak the truth.”

Opportunities for alignment, resulting 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.

It is more fun and not as rigid as it was before

when management initiated it... it now

belongs to all of us.”

teams. It also stimulated interaction between

the people and the various teams”

Page 16: Interactive & Collaborative Communication V002

Importance of involving employees…

• The 21st century global environment (uncertainty and rapid change) versus the more predictable twentieth century.

• Utilise more effective interactive and collaborative communication techniques.

• Various methodologies to consider:• Various methodologies to consider:

– World Café

– Whole Scale Change

– Open Space Technology

– Appreciative Inquiry

– Drum Café

– Future Search, etc.

Page 17: Interactive & Collaborative Communication V002

Importance of involving employees…

The depth and breadth of agreement on the

future is directly related to who is

going to get it done!

Whole System’s

Head & Heart

Connection

Percentage

HI

DVFS>R going to get it done!

--- in other words –

Those who envision the future are the ones

who end up making it happen!

Speed of

TransformationLO HI

Page 18: Interactive & Collaborative Communication V002

Aspects to address during interactive communication events

Direction

• Legitimacy in the eyes of all employees.

• Management should not be clinging too tightly to a

Energy

• “Gut-level” as well as “head level” engagement.

• Opportunities for good ideas to come from

Distributed leadership (employee ownership)

• Employees enabled to own their problems and

be clinging too tightly to a previously designed and implemented solution.

ideas to come from anywhere.

• WIIFM (What’s-in-it-for-me)

own their problems and solutions.

• They should have the information, skills, and resources.

• Should be important for all employees.

Page 19: Interactive & Collaborative Communication V002

Conclusion…

• Rhetoric of employee involvement in the planning and

execution of initiatives, yet organisations often plan and

communicate initiatives top-down, without involving

employees in the process.

• What is needed for effective, sustainable change are sessions

in which people collectively explore each other’s assumptions, in which people collectively explore each other’s assumptions,

seek and expand common ground, shape a desired future and

jointly take ownership of the solutions to the issues at hand.

• Example: Launch of a major programme consisting of a

number of projects to all affected employees…

Page 20: Interactive & Collaborative Communication V002

Questions…

Page 21: Interactive & Collaborative Communication V002

References…

Newton, E. (1990). Overconfidence in the communication of intent: Heard and

unheard melodies. Unpublished Ph.D dissertation, Stanford University.

Heath, C. & Heath, D. (2008). Made to stick. London: Random House Books.

Holman, P., Devane, T., & Cady, S. (Eds.). (2007). The change handbook (2nd

ed.). San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler Publishers.

Kubler-Ross, E. (1989). On Death and Dying. London: Tavistock/Routledge.

(Original work published 1969).(Original work published 1969).