Achieved Strategies

“You cannot continue to expect quality results by constantly being in action. You cannot expect people to respond and do what you want simply by telling them.”  These are words I recently shared with a group of senior managers when discussing plans for introducing change into the business.

The Trap of Doing

Organizations today must be nimble. It’s critical to meet or anticipate changes in the market, customer expectations, and so on. It’s also critical to change.

And we must learn to adapt to constant change.  If you develop or strengthen personal competencies essential for change, you have a competitive advantage.  If you stop reading this blog for a moment and scan what you’ve read, you’ll notice it’s all about doing: be nimble, anticipate change, adapt, and so on.

There’s something missing: observation.

We’re missing “the doing nothing” part.

Flame-out

As human beings, we can withstand so much change at one time before we flame out, before we shut down.

A flamed-out workforce = a tired workforce, greater loss of creativity, absence of humor, increased “bitchiness,” increased stress-leaves, and on and on the impacts surface.  Most organizations fail to stop and recognize how much change is occurring and the impacts to employees.  Consequently, customers are impacted, too.

We’ve worked with clients when the leadership team continued to introduce new projects that introduced even more change: new change on top of future change that caused them to worry about current change. Change. Change. Change. Change.  Change.

The trap of doing is contagious and damn hard to slow down.

Do Nothing & Accomplish Something

At times of change, you’ve got to incorporate doing nothing as an important strategy in your change plan.  I don’t mean choose to do nothing or stick your head in the sand ignoring the need for action or change.  I simply mean let the dust settle a little before implementing the next change.

Change leaders consider these as part of your change implementation strategy:

• Stop all small projects; don’t allow them to be prioritized or resourced
• Incorporate a Monitor, Evaluate, and Adjust plan in your change plan.

For example, when you restructure a department, have senior managers hold department wide meetings to hear what’s working and to learn what’s not working. At the same time, conduct a post implementation assessment that seeks confidential input on what’s working and not working. Share the results and what will be done next, if anything.

• Schedule change tactics that allow you time to monitor, evaluate, and potentially adjust your plan.
• Hold celebrations through out the change effort to rejuvenate the workforce.
• Establish and maintain a policy of straight talk: don’t sugar-coat tough messages for fear of upsetting people
  

If you want your change to stick, then you must plan for time of doing nothing. You must observe how people are responding to change. You do this by monitoring the environment, people, interactions, and organizational trends; evaluate their cause and their impact, and determine or adjust your plan, if needed.

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Share below what you do to slow down to do nothing to keep change moving forward?