Review: Leading from Now: A Leaders Guide to Navigating Change

"Change is neither good nor bad, only that which you make it." -- My Dad

Change is constant and inevitable and how you handle it often determines the trajectory of your life. Ask the Dodo bird (not good). Or my Dad (good).

As with life, businesses must adapt and change to survive. To do that, business leaders must embrace change, not as an event with a fixed start and stop date, but as part of their daily existence and practice.

That's the message of "Leading from Now," by David Coffaro.

The book came to my attention through an online article Coffaro wrote, "Shifting to a new paradigm in navigating change," which I shared with the team at my company that is working to change the organization.

In that article, Coffaro wrote, "Leaders can be lulled into perceiving change management as an event instead of an ongoing process, a special project in contrast to a core job function. Change Leadership recognizes change navigation as business as usual."

Change frightens people. Why do you think the food tastes exactly the same at every Chili's in the country? Most people do not like to be surprised that the chips and queso they ate in Baton Rouge tastes different from what they were served in Niagara Falls.

The EVP of a company I worked for gave out copies of "Who Moved My Cheese?," with a note encouraging us to read it, to each of the 200+ staff. I thought it was a pleasant gesture of someone sharing a book they found inspiring. Until, that is, one month later when he laid off 10% of the workforce.

He knew how disruptive the change he was bringing would be to the staff (those who were let go and those who had to pick up duties) and tried to prepare everyone.

That EVP moved a lot of people's cheese. So does Chili's, but that's a different story.

Caffaro posits that making change management leadership part of your daily activities will help you avoid the painful, life-altering moments. Or, at least, lessen their impact.

Instead of waiting until change disrupts the business, we need to be aware of the many ways that change can appear, live and work each day to hone that knowledge, and look for ways to adapt and benefit from the changes that will inevitably occur.

It is essentially what Clayton Christensen advocated in "The Innovator's Dilemma" -- disrupt your business before some other company does.

If you prepare for change and disruption, if you make it part of your company's DNA, your business won't be scrambling to catch up when change and disruption occur.

"Leading From Now" contained some important ideas that every leader should consider. Most importantly, business leaders should be socializing change as a core business acumen -- at all levels of the organization -- and supporting it every day.

Below are some of the excerpts from the book that stuck with me.

"Right now, at this moment, whatever the business:

• Customers change.
• Competition changes.
• How businesses engage with customers changes.
• Employees change.
• Technology supporting business changes.
• Economics of a business change.

“Many factors contribute to organizational longevity, perhaps none more than relevance with stakeholders: employees, customers, partners, and vendors. Earning and sustaining relevance -- pertinent, meaningfulness, importance -- is a leader’s ongoing responsibility. Relevance decays when overlooked. Organizations that slip into irrelevance face the difficult task of re-earning standing with employees, customers, and other stakeholders, or riding a cycle of demise.”

"What we perceive as normal is simply a point on a continuum of dynamic change to which we become accustomed. Ergo, normal must be continually redefined."

"Change stimuli emerge in two manners -- Systemic and Non-systemic cues. Systemic change cues impact all organizations -- inflation, national or global economic expansion or contraction, tax code changes, pandemics, geopolitical issues and the like. Non-systemic change cues are unique to a specific organization or industry."

“Within five years, if you’re in the same business you are in now, you’re going to be out of business.” -- Peter Drucker

"Recognize change leadership is part of leadership and own it. French philosopher Renee Descartes wrote that if you choose not to decide, you still have made a choice. All leaders need to adjust to a rapidly changing environment, and choosing not to act is rarely a good option. In the context of perpetual change, develop your organization's acumen in leading change. Champion a vision of where the organization is going in the evolution of who you serve and how you deliver to your customers and build esprit de corps with agility as a core competency."