Culture Change is Easier Than You Think

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G00276736

Culture Change Is Easier Than You ThinkPublished: 21 April 2015

Analyst(s): Leigh McMullen, Bard Papegaaij, Patrick Meehan

When CIOs are asked, culture change is the excuse often given for why

enterprise transformations fail. This leads to the notion that culture change

itself is hard, but what if it was easy, even dangerously easy?

Key Findings Organizational culture is much more mutable than believed, but changing it haphazardly can be

disastrous.

The IT function's mission is changing, meaning its culture must change as well in order to

succeed.

Failure to understand the key drivers of culture and their attributes, and to make informed

choices during transformations, is the main reason for culture issues in transformations.

Recommendations Use the customer experience as the basis for deningyour future-state culture.

Do not denedecision rights, measurement strategies, engagement methods and work styles

based solely on personal preference or past experience. Pick the styles that will reinforce your

desired culture.

Explicitly recognize what has denedsuccess for your IT organization thus far, and what will

denesuccess going forward.

Analysis

What Is Culture, and Why Does It Seem So Hard to Change?

Organizational culture is, simply put, "the way we do things around here." More technically, it is the

sum of unconscious automatic success behaviors of individuals in the culture. We say unconscious

because most of what people do during the course of the day is simply repeating previously learned

success behaviors. Change seems hard because our approach to change tends to be completely

backward.


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Traditional approaches to change tend to focus on denableactivities to redesign the organization,

processes and metrics. They are often kicked off with big-bang galvanizing events that are designed

to "get everyone on the same page"; the perception is, "I don't have a choice in the matter anyway;

and the future seems full of uncertainty." These approaches leave staff with the notion that

something is being done tothem, as opposed to withthem or forthem, and are precisely the

reasons why change fails.

What If Culture Change Was Easier Than We Think?

Culture change is widely regarded to be the bane of business transformation, such as a merger,

acquisition, spin-off or development of a new line of business. Clashes of two cultures are

frequently cited as the reason why business transformations fail. But what if it wasn't hard? What if

it was easy? That would be pretty dangerous actually.

Imagine that you and your IT team were going on a visit to Buckingham Palace to meet the Queen.

Would your team behave differently than they do at work? Would everyone be on their best

behavior? Might even the guy who works in the wiring closet ndhimself wearing his best tee shirt?These questions aren't silly. They imply that, from a popular media context, the staff understands

the vision (this is a big deal and could be a life-changing event) and the path to get there (you did

something great to earn this audience, so respect the venue by behaving well and dressing the

part); they imply that the staff understands the from/to and how to bridge the two. They also

illustrate the point that behavior change is easy; one must simply change the context for behavior in

a way that everyone agrees is important in this case, meeting the Queen.

What If You Don't Have a "Meet the Queen" Moment?

That's ne,because you don't really need one,and they're not that helpful.Meet-the-queen

moments are big-bang kinds of events, and it's obvious to all but the most socially inept oreccentric personalities that folks need to behave differently, and they will for a short time. But if

you moved in with the Queen really started living there in the palace absent any guidance to

the contrary and peer reinforcement, you would quickly revert back to your default behaviors. Big-

bang approaches without sustained effort and follow-through fail. Conversely, sustained effort and

follow-through, even without the big bang, often succeed.

We don't really even need big moments to get people to change their behavior. People change their

behavior signicantlymultiple times a day in mundane, everyday circumstances. Imagine rushing to

the ofce,and ordering coffee and a sandwich for breakfast at your favorite fast-food joint along the

way. Now, compare that with sitting down for dinner at a nice restaurant. Human beings are literally

wired to adapt and modulate their behavior based on context and the expected rewards inherent inthat context. It turns out that behavioral change isn't that difcultas long as we understand the

context, and apply the appropriate reward system. In fact, setting context and rewards is

surprisingly easy, and very easy to do badly and that's the problem.

Culture Clashes Happen Because Leaders Let Them Happen

All too often, CIOs have culture change thrust upon them, as enterprises initiate a transformation,

such as a merger, acquisition, spin-off or a new line of business, with little or no regard to culture,

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and with very little advance warning to the organization. In such circumstances, IT ndsitself

quickly immersed in the technical and personnel aspects of the transformation (such as

consolidating teams and systems), with often little focus reserved for the cultural changes required.

This lack of consideration is more often a result of enterprise priorities than it is an oversight on the

part of the CIO in a merger, for example, the enterprise has a timetable for benetsrealization,

much of which is derived from business process, staff and application system integration, with IT

being central to enabling these benets.When culture change is considered at all during these

transformations, it is often secondary, and thought of solely within the context of organizational

change.

Given that culture is the foundation of our organizational architecture, the conundrum above causes

us to make those foundational decisions based on personal preference and what's been successful

in the past, or not to make them at all and just to let things sort themselves out. Focusing solely on

process or organizational model change yields a transformation that looks a lot like a Hype Cycle

(see Figure 1).

Figure 1. Enterprise Transformation Hype Cycle

Source: Gartner (April 2015)

In the transformation Hype Cycle, there is a tremendous amount of change potential early on, but it

quickly falls into a Trough of Disillusionment, from which most organizations don't escape. Allowing

the organization to "just sort itself out" is a recipe for disaster.

Gartner, Inc. | G00276736 Page 3 of 11


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The Digital Humanist Approach to Culture Change

Ultimately, the digital humanist approach to culture change focuses on motivating behavioral

change rst,rather than changing things like processes and metrics, which only suggest or imply

desired behaviors that is, the difference between doing things withyour staff versus doing

something tothem. Putting in place the context and the reason for the change, and getting personalbuy-in, galvanize and motivate people to change around a concept that is distinctly humanist: the

personal experience.

Understanding the Different Layers of Human Behavior

There are any number of models of human behavior; we present the following as a simpliedmodel

to provide context for this research (see Figure 2). It is not intended to supplant any of the more

sophisticated models that may exist.

Figure 2. Five Layers of Human Behavior


Within the gure,the top two layers of behavior are the highest levels, and are situationally specic

and purely tied to repetitive societal norms. They are the behaviors that humans change several

times a day, depending on even mundane contexts, like being at a coffee shop versus a museum.

Our research focuses on behavior change at this upper-most level of situational behavior, which we

refer to as the "personal brand."



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Beware of the Danger Zone

Changes below the red dotted line in Figure 2, including intimate personal behaviors down to

survival reactions, are dangerous to attempt. This does not stop organizations from attempting to

do so. A quick Internet search of "corporate boot camps" reveals all manner of retreats that promise

deep change and quick results. There is a legitimate danger in some of these that employ military-style tactics to "break people down" quickly into a state in which they are supposedly more

receptive to lasting deep change. Our recommendation is to avoid these. Certainly, the military can

break down enlistees in just a few days and prime them for change, but then great care is taken and

signicanttime invested to build them back up again much more care and time than are usually

offered during a weekend corporate retreat. Moreover, this level of change is not necessary or

productive, and quick results often diminish just as quickly.

The Personal Brand Is the Most Effective Lever for Real Change

Not only is the personal brand layer of behavior the most easily changed, but it is also the most

effective lever for real culture change. This is because people recognize that improving theirpersonal brands will have a positive impact on their career and future within the organization. Even

the most cynical are usually willing to go along and play the game to succeed. Thus, framing your

change program as "helping people improve their personal brands," rather than "forcing them to

behave differently," primes the organization to embrace the change more easily.

This has the added benetof being true. The above is not merely clever word play; it is literally what

we're proposing. Imagine you lead a large professional services organization, a large IT consultancy,

and you wanted to change your corporate brand, your image. What would be your focus? The

brand of any professional services rmis nothing but the aggregate of the personal brands of the

people who work there. Given that most IT organizations are really just professional services rms

with one client, the truth is that, to change your organization's brand, you must change the personalbrands of the staff. And what do we use as the unifying factor for personal brand change? The

customer experience.

A Word on the Word "Customer"

Using the word "customer" to describe a consumer of IT services has fallen out of

fashion, because people believed that it created a master/servant relationship between

IT and the rest of the enterprise. The authors of this research would submit that, whenspeaking about personal brand and the customer experience, everyone is a customer,

and every employee is a customer-facing employee. Organizations that are world

famous for their customer experience are also regarded as some of the best places to

work. Why? Because they understand that, unless associates care for and treat each

other exceptionally well, they won't treat their customers exceptionally well.



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For the remainder of this research, the word "customer" refers to everyone, inside or

outside of IT. The term "customer experience" means everyone's experience.

Rebuild Your Brand Around the Customer Experience

Recall any experience you may have had with members of one of the top-tier consultancies or

service rms.Do they tend to dress alike? Do they run their meetings the same way? Often, their

outgoing voice mail messages and email footers are identical. Why? Because these things impact

their customer experience, and their brand is too important to be left to personal preference.

Virtually everyone in your organization can buy into a program of change based on the customer

experience even if your enterprise doesn't have customers, per se. People tend to agree to this

as a rally point if for no other reason than because we're all customers ourselves, and each of us

values a great customer experience in our personal lives.

Now, imagine you're that consulting CEO. If you are going to rebrand around the customer

experience, how exactly do you do that?

Use Moments of Truth to DefineYour Customer Experience and Personal Brand

Moments of truth are denedas "the moment when the customer experience is dened."They can

be somewhat nebulous at rst,because customers have varied expectations. For example, an

airline doesn't create a moment of truth when it fails to crash the airplane during a customer's ight.

That is because it is a customer's baseline expectation that the airline will operate safely. But when

a customer is bumped from a ight,how that event is handled does denethe customer

experience. Is it seamless, and is it taken care of before the customer even knows he or she has aproblem? Or does the customer have to stand in line for hours and argue with desk clerks to get

rerouted.

Gartner has denedthe following as the most relevant moments of truth for the typical IT

department (see Figure 3). This list is far from exhaustive, but is intended to provide a starting place

for CIOs in developing and deningtheir own.



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Figure 3. Common IT Moments of Truth


Problems Are the Great Brand Building Opportunity

How you handle and resolve problems is key to deningthe customer experience. Most incident

management approaches focus on the machinists' view, how to lower call volume or how to

improve rst-callresolution. Instead, focus on the human elements, and use empathy. What causes

problems or stress for your customers? For example, at a global fast-food chain, if your meal is

waiting for the French fries to be nished,they will tell you every 30 seconds that they are working

on your fries. Why? Because it is incredibly stressful for a customer to stand there and watch their

food get cold while waiting, with no end in sight.

Developing the Personal Brand:Problem management techniques, customer expectation setting

and actively expressing empathy are so important that these techniques should be taught toeveryone in your organization. Train and reinforce with role-playing. Measure using customer

satisfaction and/or customer effort scores, and 360-degree reviews.

Getting Started:Pick two to three of the most common problem types per group (your help desk

will deal with different customer problems than your application development department). Map the

customer stress points, anticipate how customers may react and formalize processes to manage

those stress points to a positive outcome. This doesn't have to result in a large program kind of

change; often, it may just be the way and frequency of communication.

Use Collaboration to Create Mission Ownership

The word "collaboration" is a lot like the word "love," in that it means different things to different

people, and seems to be a jumble of interaction styles, communications, results, etc. Move past the

buzzword and look to where collaboration has an impact on the sense of ownership people feel for

the mission and the work. Is your strategy dictated from the top down or is it crowdsourced? Are

your solutions developed using agile iterative methods or the waterfall method? Is innovation

something that happens "over there," or everywhere?



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Developing the Personal Brand:Leaders should focus on pushing power away from themselves.

This doesn't mean consensus-based decision making, but rather empowering their teams to own

parts of the mission. Particularly, leaders must change from providing instructions (answering

questions and solving problems) to providing direction (coaching, asking questions and facilitating

root cause analysis).

Getting Started:Most executive leaders are pretty good at managing through subordinate

managers, and delegating authority and accountability, while middle management usually is not.

Focus there rst.Begin employing agile software development techniques, and consider using

some of them to solve problems not related to software development, such as architecture, strategy

or even budget. Use the customer experience as the central design principle for any solution.

Ritualize Interactions to Formalize Your Customer Experience

The Tier 1 consultancies are amazing at managing meetings; they recognize that there is not just

one kind of meeting, but several, each requiring different facilitation techniques, and with different

expectations and outcomes. They spend considerable time training their people not just on how to

lead meetings, but also on how to participate in a meeting properly. They do this because they

recognize that meetings and other such interactions are core to their customer experience. Think of

meetings, consensus building processes and the like as rituals. They are a key activity where the

shared experience and common sense of purpose necessary to a vibrant culture are created.

Developing the Personal Brand:Every meeting (with customers) builds or erodes your brand.

There are no ad hoc or throwaway meetings. CIOs should invest in developing formal meeting

management processes, and train everyone on how to lead or participate in various kinds of

meetings. The running of a meeting should be ritualistic and formulaic, even in very informal or

casual corporate cultures. Enforce these meeting rituals strictly.

Getting Started:Start here rst.Organizations spend so much time meeting that this is the key

place to begin changing your organization culture. Invest in formal meeting management training

and methodology this could be just tapping some former consultants in your employ on the

shoulder and having them lead the development and training.

Communication SolidifiesYour Brand

How you communicate and the words you use do more to solidify your brand and the customer

experience than just about anything else. The axiom, "The message doesn't matter as much as how

it's delivered," is absolutely true when it comes to brand. Consider this: In at least one of the top

consultancies, the consultants are trained to only voice objections in the context of "I wish I knew"or "How to." For example, if the group was proposing to go to dinner at a new shrestaurant, a

consultant couldn't object, "But I'm allergic to sh."He or she would have to phrase it as, "I wish I

knew if this restaurant served something else, because I'm allergic to sh."Both statements voice

the objection or concern, but the latter is considered more constructive and positive. How often

does your IT department voice concern over solutions proposed by the business in terms of "We

can't do that because ," rather than asking clarifying questions?



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Developing the Personal Brand:Put your customer hat on and look for the moments of truth for

the customer in communications: delivering bad or good news, voicing objections, gathering

information, performing root cause analysis, or updating them on incidents. When changing verbal

or nonverbal communication, it will seem and feel articialfor a while. Thus, ndingtime to role-play

and practice these skills becomes important to let the new communication habits sink in. CIOs

should be mindful of not trying to change too much too fast.

Getting Started:There is a wealth of external communication training available for contexts ranging

from one-on-one communication to large stage presentations. CIOs should identify brand

ambassadors in their organization and send them to formal training, then bring them back to lead

workshops on the topic.

Putting It Into Practice Developing a Customer-Centric Brand

After considering and mapping the most important moments of truth, CIOs should start small. Begin

by ritualizing meetings and other interaction types, then formalize a humanist approach to incident

management, introduce more collaboration and, along the way, continue to work on communicationstyles. Executing this plan seems daunting, and there will be a natural inclination to bring in outside

consultants for their advice and help in establishing these programs. Gartner's recommendation is

to own as much of this as possible. Empower your teams to denewhich moments of truth are

most important and how they should handle them. This does more than just empower your team; it

also makes them own the problem and the solution. Additionally, don't be overly concerned about

getting things exactly right ndingand implementing the perfect way to handle a moment of truth

is as important as just doing something and owning it, and empowering your team to improve as

they go.

Today, denethe two to three core principles that your culture your IT brand will stand for. The

rstone should be customer-centric (where everyone is a customer). This Wednesday at lunch, takea group of people and pick two to three moments of truth that, if improved, would improve your

brand and reinforce those core principles. Branch out from there; next Wednesday at lunch,

empower subgroups to examine those moments of truth and determine how they should be

handled. Continue to branch out at one lunch at a time, focusing rston identifying problem places

for improvement, and then next on developing ideas on how to drive those improvements within the

core principles of the group.

Ultimately, Turn the Power Over to the People

Eventually, formal training will need to occur. The Wednesday lunches serve a purpose here, too.

They become a series of workshops on how to run a meeting, how to handle objections, how todeliver good or bad news, or new agile software development processes. What is key here is to turn

the power of training and development over to the people as quickly as possible. Sending brand

ambassadors off to receive formal training and then return as coaches should be the strategy, with

the goal of these Wednesday lunches becoming entirely self-directed. Once the core training has

occurred, the people use this time to practice skills or to identify areas for additional improvement.



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If you were to go to your favorite car dealership one day before it opened, you might nda group of

salespeople facing off one-on-one, working different customer scenarios on how to overcome

objections, and how to better articulate the value or features of a given new model. You'd see this

because even car salesmen know that they often have only one chance to sell the customer, and

that it's better to have role-played and practiced how to sell a customer on the features of a model

when he or she is also looking at a competitor than to have to try to overcome that objection cold.

The same techniques should be employed by your team. It will take practice to take new behaviors

and turn them into habits research indicates a mean time of 66 days or more than 50 repetitions.

Creating a self-directed user forum for that practice is a fantastic place to drive those skills among

the team members before using them on a customer, with whom they only have one chance to

create a positive rstexperience.

More on This Topic

This is part of an in-depth collection of research. See the collection:

Digital Humanism Makes People Better, Not Technology Better



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Culture Change is Easier Than You Think