If the rapid rate of change in your organization is taking your breath away, read the late Isaac Asimov’s take on the situation:
“If the last 50,000 years of man’s existence were divided into lifetimes of approximately sixty-two years each, there have been about 800 such lifetimes. Of these 800, fully 650 were spent in caves.
Only during the last seventy lifetimes has it been possible to communicate effectively from one lifetime to another – as writing made it possible to do so. Only during the last six lifetimes (375 years) did masses of men ever see a printed word. Only during the last four (250 years) has it been possible to measure time with any precision. Only during the last two (120 years) has anyone anywhere used an electric motor.
And the overwhelming majority of all the material goods we use in daily life today have been developed within the present, the 800th lifetime.”
You’d think with that perspective, everyone in your organization would feel overwhelmed by change. But, as we all know, it just ain’t so. Some folks thrive on it. Particularly those who are in charge of making it happen. The rest find themselves somewhere along a continuum: some frozen solid, some grudgingly moving along, some gasping for air while running as fast as they can.
How about you? If you are stuck, why are you? And what are you still holding onto?
If you lead a team and they’re stuck; why are they? What are they holding onto and why won’t they let it go?
Take the time to figure it out. Relentlessly pushing yourself and your employees won’t get you “there” faster when you’re not ready to leave where you’ve been.
William Bridges, a leading change management consultant and author of several books on work transition issues, is complexity simplified when he writes, “It’s the transition, not the change that people often resist. Every transition begins with an ending. We have to let go of the old thing before we can pick up the new – not just outwardly, but inwardly, where we keep our connections to the people and places that act as definitions of who we are.
Bridges’ Seven Principles of Transition Management elaborate:
1. You have to end before you begin.
2. Between the ending and the beginning, there is a hiatus.
3. That hiatus can be creative.
4. Transition is developmental.
5. Transition is also a source of renewal.
6. People go through transition at different speeds.
7. Most organizations are running a “transition deficit.”
Does it help to change the word “stuck” to the word “transitional”? It should, if the description better fits the condition.
Anyone who has lost a long held job or meaningful relationship, knows and understands grief. Grief fills a transitional period that separates what was from what is yet to be.
Wise managers understand and acknowledge that time. They realize that many employees grieve their losses as sweeping change moves across a formerly stable workplace.
Wise managers help their employees gain closure. They know that denigrating the past or those who represented it only extends the period of mourning.
Wise managers remove excuses to hold onto the past. They make their case for why change is necessary; what is at risk if change doesn’t happen; and what the future direction will be.
Wise managers figure it out. They involve more minds than their own. They consider solution options and assess the upside and downside impact of each.
Wise managers make their decisions while developing an organized plan of implementation. They incorporate multi-level feedback loops and adjust as necessary.
Wise managers communicate more times than they think it’s necessary, then communicate some more. They say it, write it, and say it again.
WHY we’re making these changes;
WHAT are the means and method for making them;
WHO will play a part in moving the organization forward;
HOW it will look like when we’re done.
A sense of urgency is enough to stimulate some to action; others just need a road map. The majority need a reason why. Give them what they need and there’s a better chance they’ll follow you into the future.
