What are the best ways to manage performance in times of change?

1) It starts with “why.” Communicating the reasons for change is key to gaining a shared understanding across the business. 2) For change to take hold, and for change to last through shifts in leadership, it must follow the WIIFM model: “what’s in it for me?” Everyone across the business needs to be able to connect change to how it helps him/her. 3) Two-way communication gives leadership an understanding of what’s sticking, what isn’t, why, and how they can help.

Managing performance in times of change is crucial for organizations to adapt and thrive. Change, whether it be in the form of mergers, acquisitions, or internal restructuring, can create uncertainty and stress among employees. To ensure that performance remains high during these turbulent times, several strategies can be employed. Effective communication is paramount. Leaders should be transparent and provide regular updates about the changes occurring within the organization. This will help alleviate anxiety and foster trust among employees. Communication should not only be top-down but also encourage feedback and suggestions from employees. This will ensure that their concerns are heard and addressed appropriately.

To follow on @Marie Godfrey's post: Clear, and candid, communications about real priorities enables the people implementing the Change to make better decisions. It's much easier to get that critical buy-in when your people know and understand what they are supporting! Too often we obfuscate the real goals to make them sound... softer, more palatable. When we do this, we lose the compound effect of focused creativity.

1. Understand the benefits and targets to be reached of the change from strategy agenda. 2. Explain the benefits of the change to subordinates and their value in upcoming change curve. 3. Stand with your people during the change journey. Stay close. Be on the floor as often as possible.

When you change, you introduce uncertainty, the mother of fear. Before you make a change, one of the most important issues is to make sure that the team is ready for ‘change’ from a mental level. Focus first on the mental side, then on the technical/substantive side! Proper sequencing starts with discovering your employees' pain points, challenges, and visions about the change. Once your team feels understood, it’s time to lay out your vision clearly and concisely. Say something “Would you be opposed to me laying out my vision?” Then discuss implementation and create change management support. When you want more please follow me or check out my profile.

Much of what I added in the first communications section applies here as well. Alignment is important because it allows us to see why it matters. It also enables us to focus on the things that matter most. Our time is valuable and by aligning with the other business functions on the things that are highest priority we can say “no” to requests that would otherwise detract from the things we have committed to achieving. At very least, those requests prompt a larger conversation and a broader consideration about the priorities if needed. It also provides a platform to discuss support your team will need from other business functions. It’s critical the supporting functions are given the opportunity to discuss and commit or tell us why not

During times of change, aligning team goals and expectations becomes vital. Clearly communicating revised responsibilities and objectives, ensuring alignment with senior management, fosters a shared vision. This alignment creates accountability and direction amid change.

Much of this activity I consider deployment. Making sure everyone involved has what they need for a successful implementation. In many cases people are operating at near capacity leaving little time for any “additional” work. As the leader, I find more success by asking the team about time constraints and being empathetic to their needs. Working together to create a realistic plan, shifting resources, priorities, or whatever is necessary to enable feeling comfortable and confident they will have the time they need. From there it’s important to set a cadence of activity, call it a schedule, or use the agile sprint method to set expectations, track progress, and respond to new discoveries and challenges.

I've found that letting the team member measure and monitor their performance during times of change has a beneficial effect on morale. If they just rely on us to tell them what to do, or just wait for guidelines or instructions, their decision-making skills start to atrophy, as they aren't planning and preparing effectively for the changes that are coming their way. Allowing them to build their own highway to change helps them strengthen their grip on what they can control and what they can't

Have some patience here and be willing to give them the freedom to do it their way. Even if you think it’s not the best or won’t work. Let them do it and be there to guide and support them. It’s the only way people will truly take ownership. Create an environment where there’s no such thing as failure. It’s about making progress towards the result we seek. Finding out what doesn’t work, and why it doesn’t, is a very important part in the process, it’s essential. Know exactly the impact, a measurable result, and go for it. Fail fast without fear for its better than doing nothing and learning nothing as well.

Fostering innovation and collaboration among your team members is pivotal. Encouraging creativity and adaptability, while fostering a culture of open exchange, fuels positive outcomes and growth, vital for navigating through dynamic shifts effectively.

Recognition and appreciation are very important. Not just on big things, but the everyday little things that add up to a lot. Take the time to recognize each other, start off your daily huddles with recognition and open the floor for anyone to recognize and appreciate anyone for anything they want. This is culture building. There is no shame in trying to achieve something and having it not work out as we hoped it would. This is not a failure, it’s an opportunity to expose knowledge that we wouldn’t have found if we hadn’t tried something different, celebrate and recognize the discovery and get excited about what we will do next. These are the windows to success.

If we speak about change, we assume transition from one state to another. We expect the process / behavior / performance be improving, from A point to B. It is not given that such transition has linear upward (improvement) trajectory. It may take a form of U-shape quite often. Important is not to stress too much on incremental improvement, but combine stimulation, monitoring and recognition of an effort as such. We learn on mistakes, and results of those are never good. At the same time, it takes courage to take a step, it takes wisdom to accept mistake, and take learnings.