Every organization is unique. How a change is managed and implemented varies completely based on the people involved, the company's culture and outside factors like competition and the economy.
Even the most change-resistant cultures can, and have, implemented successful change initiatives that have driven their bottom line. Here are several examples. Can you see parts of your organization here?
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Situation
When the largest consumer electronics retailer in the United States acquired the largest consumer electronics retailer in Canada, they faced significant implementation challenges during the integration. Each team felt that they had the best processes, the best systems and the best business model. There was a natural sense of competition. There could have been serious integration issues if both teams didn't work together.
Fortunately, the acquiring organization had previously experienced the result of an acquisition that could have gone more smoothly and they concentrated on their lessons learned. Utilizing the Implementation Effectiveness methodology, the acquisition team focused on the critical success factors before the acquisition was final.
Solution
Every member of the acquisition team was educated in the concepts of the Implementation Effectiveness methodology. Team members learned about the psychology of change and worked to make this large scale change successful in both organizations. The team worked on defining and communicating the business case and rationale for the acquisition, assessing the culture, defining organizational capability, engaging employees, managing resistance, tailoring motivation to drive performance, securing executive sponsorship and mitigating risk.
Result
Employee engagement increased in both organizations as the integration progressed. Employees from both organizations helped make many of the projected synergies happen within the necessary time commitments ... and helped to find even more opportunities to work together.
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Situation
A multi-billion dollar global organization identified significant value in implementing a standard stage gate process for capital allocation. Employees directly involved in the process believed that the organization needed to make this transition. Research showed the financial benefits to be gained. Executive sponsorship was lacking. Although the project was adequately staffed, without senior level commitment of funding and resources, the project was stalled.
Solution
Through a detailed stakeholder analysis, including a review of the executive sponsor, the cause of the resistance was identified. None of the project team members had direct influence over the senior leader, so a relationship map was developed to understand who could be leveraged to reach and influence the potential sponsor.
Result
Once they knew who had influence with the sponsor, the team asked those individuals to relay information to the sponsor. Over time, the information overcame the executive sponsor's initial resistance. Once his initial concerns were addressed, the sponsor saw the tremendous upside of the project and became a committed activist for it.
Ultimately, in a desire to increase his effectiveness as a sponsor, the executive requested coaching. Plans were developed to help him ensure alignment between what he communicated, the behaviors he practiced and those he reinforced in others. His behavior drove commitment by others and, as a result, implementation was expanded to include all areas of the company, producing a quicker rate of return for the project.