It takes imagination to lead change

“My job isn’t to imagine. I’m here to get things done.” ??

He spoke with worry in his voice. A Chief Commercial Officer in the petrochemical industry, he along with his CEO and C-suite teammates recently made the decision to divest their longest-standing and highest-revenue business and pivot to an ostensibly more promising, but unproven market focus. ?

A huge bet. ?

As we discussed the competing pressures they were facing, I could see his apprehension. He’s among a growing number of organizations where CCOs are granted sweeping responsibility for transformation, remaking product portfolios and go-to-market approaches, and if all goes well, repositioning the company for long-range growth. ?

His role, not unlike other CCOs, requires a digital transformation, new technology infrastructure, business development and sales, marketing, product design, operations, and others. It’s probably easier to define the CCO role by listing the functions that are NOT directly related. ?

But it’s not only Chief Commercial Officers. This is but one example among many executive assignments that can very suddenly require massively broad and complex deliverables. Of course, the bottom-line is where CCOs and other senior executives are ultimately scored, but the path to getting there zig-zags through a labyrinth of challenges. ?

These enormous tasks cause executives to reflexively leap into the mode of “getting things done” – a high-velocity rhythm of situation-analysis-decision-action, week after week, month after month. Speed is critical and rapid-fire decision making helps leaders feel a sense of movement and progress. ?

But there are snags, always. In the case of my CCO client, associates have begun to share some tough feedback about what’s happening in the midst of this organizational shift: ?

• “I don’t get it. Who are we trying to be as a company?” ?
• “I’m not sure I understand what my team’s role is going to become. All I know is we’re confused and exhausted.” ?
• “We’re not working together. I can see colleagues doing things that run in direct opposition to what my team is trying to do.” ?

As the CCO and I tried to dig for the source of these concerns, he made the remark, “I can’t communicate any more than I already am. I’m constantly explaining what we have to do and why. We don’t have a choice. This is how we survive.” ?

So I asked, “How are people going to help you get there if they can’t yet imagine what it’s supposed to look like when they arrive?” ?

His response came with some exasperation: “Well, I don’t know what it looks like either!” ?

“Have you tried to imagine it?” I asked. ?

And that’s when he spoke the opening line of this article. For him, the thought of spending time imagining things in the middle of a business transformation seemed not only counterproductive; It seemed silly. ?

His perspective isn’t unique. Imagination is a word we tend to associate with broad, open, unstructured thinking. There are blue skies, rainbows, and children with crayons and fingerpaints telling stories and reading fairy tales. And from that point of departure, anyone would conclude imagination has no place in business. ?

But this framing oversimplifies and causes us to overlook a key aspect of how change happens. As this provocative research piece puts it, imagination is better thought of as the soil than the sky, particularly when it comes to leadership. Why? Because imagination is the source, the roots from which possibility becomes reality. Imagination is the required starting place from which people develop beliefs in an unrealized future. And without those beliefs, action has no grounding, and engagement suffers. (My CCO client is facing this now.) ?

Einstein knew this. He famously contended that imagination is more important than intellect, and was an active practitioner of the former. By his own account, he would not have been able to sort through the concept of gravity had he not spent hours imagining the experience of being inside an elevator when the cable breaks. ?

But how might we translate this to making change happen in modern business? Without trying to be Einstein, let’s apply some basic questions that my CCO client might pose to himself and those he is seeking to engage in the transformation: ?

• How will these changes affect who we are as a company and the effect we have on people? the world? ?
• Who will be most affected by the changes we are making? How will their experiences change? ?
• How will these changes affect the work experience inside our company? ?
• What are the most challenging adjustments we will have to make? What might that feel like? ?
• What support will we need from each other? ?

These aren’t blue sky and rainbow kinds of questions. In fact, they’re quite ordinary. And in my experience, senior executives typically have answers to them, but the people they lead often don’t. Hence the value of spending time imagining the future together. ?

Leadership is far more than convincing people to do what is needed. It’s about looking beyond what can be seen and leading toward what can be imagined. Beware the perpetual-action cycle, and consider devoting a bit of that energy to imagining the specifics of the better future you are striving to create. ?

You might be surprised by the people who suddenly begin to achieve more than you imagined. ?

I’m imagining you having a great week. Thanks for sharing your time, and if you’re so inclined, we’d be grateful for your thoughts as well. ?

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