Change - scary, or potentially brilliant?

"Change" has a bad reputation. Too often, change is seen as an explicit threat, bringing with it unknown dangers, and almost certain risks and catastrophes. However, in this article, I make an argument that change, if managed well, offers up a wealth of opportunities. Giving change a bad name is not only unfair, but potentially damaging to business success.

According to dictionaries, a general meaning for the word "change" is

"to make or become different".

The definition doesn't include words like "better". It also doesn't include words like "worse". And it most definitely doesn't cover "and the world is going to end as soon as this happens". The issue is simply that altering patterns of behaviour for some of us comes as a bit of an unwelcome stop-you-in-your-tracks distraction, in busy work lives which are already full of distractions. There's then the fear of the unknown, another well-known human trait. Again, this doesn't apply to all of us, but it does affect a lot of people. So if you add fear of the unknown to an unwanted and unexpected disruption, you create an immediate atmosphere of negativity.

Change Managers are often tasked with introducing change into situations or organisations. This has been a role popularised in the last quarter of the 20th century, and it's still alive and well. I wonder whether that is actually helpful - but the perceived separation of change from management as a separate entity is food for a separate blog...

Suffice to say, change managers or agents have often been viewed as outsiders, doing change at teams. It has to be said that this suggests that their existing management might not have been taking their management responsibilities seriously, and were looking to an external change agent to be the "bad guy". To be honest, I have been on the receiving end of this viewpoint, where, with a reputation in an organisation for being brought in specifically as a change agent, I have entered a meeting with a new team only to see shoulders sag. I hasten to add that these people didn't actually know me, just that they knew I brought change and that was automatically a bad thing. I am happy to report that many of the same people in that room went on to embrace the changes we all introduced (important point, this) to such an extent they took on spin-out organisations to run for themselves. There is little so inspiring as watching people blossom when they realise the wealth of opportunities which open up for them, as a result of change.

And that's the point. Change is what you want it to be. Seriously. Anything different is change. Our hair growing is change. The seasons shifting from Winter to Spring, as I write, is change. Our children maturing into wonderful young adults, keen to take on their futures with both hands, is change. It's all good. It is all down to how we view the change, how we respond to it, and how we choose to behave. And this is important - as Viktor Frankl said:

When we are no longer able to change a situation, we are challenged to change ourselves

It's fair to say that most workplaces pose sufficient challenges for most people's taste, most days. However, the kind of challenge to which Frankl refers is one of choice; what will we choose to do, in response to this change? We can always choose opposition, either angry or - most often - passive-agressive inertia. However, what if we were to choose to simply be curious, and open to seeing what might happen? Not a massive commitment (but a pretty massive mindshift from the opposition viewpoint). What could happen if we embrace the change to explore the possibilities it opens up for us? What could we do to influence the change, to increase opportunities for our teams to thrive, to make our workplace a happier and more sustainable place?

This is where my starting point, of change being managed well, comes in. When you are a manager of people, those people will look to you to help them with their everyday work issues (and, sometimes, their domestic issues which have an impact at work). So you are in exactly the right place, at the right time, to support your team through whatever changes come along. And let's be honest, many change expectations will be top-down affairs, with savings or sales targets imposed from above. This could lead to a real sense of powerlessness ... if you let it. Let's imagine, then, that you were to bring this news to your team - and then invite them to work out the solution. They could be free to examine working patterns, practices and systems. They could be free to explore new markets and competitor / best-in-breed examples of other ways of doing things. They could even be free to decide what this could mean for future team numbers. They would be empowered, because they felt trusted to control their own destiny. They would be more understanding of the change required, and almost certainly want to share in its delivery. They would have more sympathy for your position as their manager, understanding you're between a rock and a hard place. Most importantly, their eyes could be opened to totally new ways of doing things, and the opportunities (personal, professional and commercial) that this could bring.

How can I be so certain of this? Simple - it's how I approached implementing politically-driven change in the public sector for over a decade. It was a straightforward, inclusive, transparent approach which really worked (and works still). It yielded the savings required (and bear in mind this was during the 2008 Financial Crisis and the austerity that followed it), and also created a range of different opportunities, some involving community charities, some involving commercial partner organisations in the locality, some involving former colleagues becoming entrepreneurs, emboldened by the change management process to go it alone - to great success. Today, I work as an external change agent in organisations, supporting their change programme with their management, not instead of them, and by forming strong, trust-based relationships with those affected. Effective project management with a healthy dash of reassuring, very human, support and encouragement - and it is a winning combination.

I wonder how much fear of change, or simply being unable to grapple with "change" because you don't quite understand what might be involved, is holding you back, personally and in your workplace. If you are reading this, and you run an organisation, are you demonstrating a change leadership approach which is working, or could you use some help? If you are reading this and you are tasked with delivering change for others, and you don't know where to start, could you use some help too? How much is this lack of engagement in change actually costing you, in lowered productivity, slowing market engagement, lost income?

If a chat over a cuppa, or Zoom or WhatsApp, feels like it might helpful, simply comment and I will get in touch. I am always happy to work with people to boost their confidence with change. There's no harm in having a chat. If you think I can help more formally, that's obviously great from my point of view, but often just a chat about a problem is all that's needed ... and I'd still be very happy to help.