A good change story can rally the troops and change the story about change

The change story of the day is about a company which was and still is the king of it's industry. An innovating organization which, when it started at the beginning of the years 2000, was the original disruptor in the market. Starting with a small team, a great vision and a lot of enthusiasm they quickly became the player to watch. But one day, after a lot of years have past, the youthful energy had passed and everybody reached maturity, the king took a look around it's kingdom and was not pleased with the state of its organization. He realized people in his team were not really loving the kingdom anymore. Too many of them were leaving to find better places to live and work. We have to admit that in the years that have past the kingdom grew twenty fold and the population was far from the homogeneity it had in the beginning. More people, more complexity, more problems.

The first reaction our king had was to spruce up the place. Improve the climate, give them a reason to smile while only addressing the surface. Change some colours, build some parks, organize some festivities. Alas those were only going to fix the visible effects. Lucky for our king, a mage from another kingdom (transformation consultant) was passing by and talked them out of it. And after convincing the king to put in the time and really do the work, they decided that in stead of a one time pill fixing the head ache, they should start a deeper healing process, trying to fix the root cause – an organizational culture transformation process, bringing the great kingdom to its former glory. Some call this magic, I call it my day to day job :)

The king understood at the exact right moment that things had to transform in order for them to stay relevant in the realm, keep leading the market and still grow. He supported the process, rallied the troops and was the first ally of the transformation initiative, putting his actions where his words were. And to this day, his kingdom is a beacon of the industry, an example of things done right.

The exact moment when you reach the maximum potential of an organizational development stage is difficult to identify. It's usually a combination of "feels like something's missing" and "what's next?" And you know you're ready for the next stage when you understand that changes bring results, just not always results that everyone agrees with. Strategic decisions are made for the organization, not for the individual.

When a company is born, more often than not from the creative fires of a brave entrepreneur's vision, most bets are that it will fail. The more innovative and rebellious, or disruptive as it is now fashionable to say, the harder it is to understand. Precisely because they fight against everything and still succeed, the teams in these companies are the most reluctant and the most strongly opposed to change. Paradoxically though, because in the beginning, they were the ones who changed the game in their field. When a company reaches maturity, it has no excuse to keep the culture, not always appropriate, with which it started. That is if it wants to remain successful.

It is true that not all members of a community or an organization mature at the same time. So at the beginning of a change process you will fight with your own team. Fortunately C. Otto Scharmer of MIT says, "Five dedicated people can change the world." These pioneers act based on their beliefs in a better world and the power of the organization to realize that vision. And the dissemination of this emotion is done through a good story told to the other colleagues. Helping by force only makes enemies, but when you know that it is the solution that can help the organization, it is a mission worth undertaking, with all the risks. It is easier to work with people who oppose the process than with passive people who have nothing to say, because then you cannot measure the evolution of the process.

Change is difficult to understand initially, at all levels of the company, because it requires resources, learning new patterns and skills, barriers appear that must be overcome. It's an acceptance of the unknown, a moment of professional vulnerability, when the team will have to say "I don't know, we might fail, but it's the right decision." In all this chaos, a story that brings clarity, motivation and shared understanding to the equation can make a difference.

We need allies to go the long run, nothing brings people together better than a good story. The king from our story wrote a great change story together with his consultant mage and managed to have a group of twelve change ambassadors in the beginning of his process that really made disseminating the advantages of change and trust in the process easier in the whole company.

After you have clarity and know where you are going, find allies because you will never make it alone.

The story of the week emphasizes the importance of getting people on board quick and create common understanding to boost your change process. Find allies in the first few days of starting and the adoption rate will grow exponential. The easiest way to make this reality is to build a good change story, but we will talk about that in more detail in the next episode of "Change stories about change" coming out next week.