What are the signals that your organisation needs to change? Part 4 of 4 - Taking action

Clients and colleagues often ask us what we sense and experience that tells us an organisation needs to change. In this series we’ve discussed how leadership, operations, culture and complexity within and around organisations generates signals that - in the time we’ve spent unpacking challenges - tell us there are opportunities to change for the better.

Right now you might be experiencing some of these signals, and whether they’re measured so you can determine if they’re ideal performance or not, it’s clear they’re not the kind of signals you want to be receiving.?

So how might you respond?

Gather signals

Whatever your role or place within an organisation, you’ll be on the receiving end of many signals, discrete or connected, that cross your path. You may have recognised them now that we've shared some key signals that are particularly important to look out for.

We’d consider:

1. Raising your alertness. This doesn’t mean actively seeking out problems, but rather becoming aware of and open to seeing and hearing actions, opinions and outcomes around the organisation. Assemble evidence of activity that you can begin to measure against what is known (and more importantly agreed) to be best practice. An example might be waterfall projects continuing to struggle alongside Agile delivery teams demonstrating better outcomes
2. Separating the spot from the bush fires. Realistically, not every minor issue could or should be addressed, so it’s important to log issues over time and size their impact. If they’re repeated in multiple parts of the organisation, they’re likely substantive, but sometimes they’re simply circumstantial or project specific speed bumps
3. Validating with others. It’s critical to get a sense check - is this something that only I’m picking up or is it a systemic and repeated issue? It’s imperative to debias the issues from your own perspective or worldview to ensure there is subjective evidence of an issue. Be careful not to go lighting fires but instead enquire with an explorer’s mindset if others have observed similar instances.

We can’t advocate enough for a pragmatic and collaborative approach. The lone warrior will rarely succeed within a system as complex as an organisation, and risks ruffling too many feathers along the way. Test your own observations through the insights and support of others to verify the reality of the issues that you’re observing. Best of all, take a hypothesis based approach to debias in a scientific way.

Start small & try new things

Many of us have experienced large scale change or transformations that have faltered. Some fail altogether - especially digital transformations - but many achieve change with unintended collateral damage such as key people and intellectual property leaving.?

Achieving change that is sustainable and acceptable to the organisation is the goal, and starting small mitigates unforeseen impact. Start small to minimise organisational and people risks. Identify a frozen, lagging or failed opportunity that’s sizable enough to understand impact but not too complex or unwieldy to ‘rock the boat’. Investment can be limited both in terms of time and budget, and set it up as a test and learn case for change.

Organisations become rigid (and emanate the resultant operational signals) due to business as usual. We encounter the most signals in large complex organisations (in any sector), and there’s usually an undercurrent of change fatigue. Change may be held back for any of the reasons already shared in this series, but in our experience design led approaches and techniques can be the key to unlocking the usually well intended but ineffectively executed change or transformation.

Try some new approaches in a low risk way:

1. Co-design. Design your future with, not for your employees and customers. It sounds almost trite, but other methods often involve an assigned team of specialists to hide away or discreetly engage an external party, then try and the ‘insights’ which employees in particular feel blind sided by. This approach is especially important (and usually fails without it) in the public policy, social impact and people services sectors
2. Service design. When we map out an organisation’s service from the perspective of an employee or customer, it almost always results in new thinking. By articulating the value being delivered across the departments (or silos) of the organisation, new perspectives are gained and cross collaborative teams can be formed. Most of all, shared accountability becomes obvious
3. Capability building. You can’t simply step forward into the future using the same tools, skills and methods and expect better outcomes. There’s mounting evidence that learning organisations are the ones adapting to and thriving in ever more complex circumstances, so training up in new ways of working is foundational. Fresh skills bring fresh muscle to your organisational challenges.

This may all feel like a convenient pitch but there’s good reasons behind the methods Meld Studios and many other practitioners in our industry use: they surface and unlock opportunity in a unique, clear and collaborative way.?

We sometimes get asked to apply human-centred design approaches in the wake of other change or transformation attempts. Mature clients that have worked with us for some time apply them prior to product, service, policy or organisational changes, because they’ve seen the positive impact of designing employee and customer experiences together.

Build a movement

Even with the most structured efforts, change can be exhausting. Ensuring progress remains viable for the organisation to do and sustainable enough to continue is critical. To do this, consider:

1. Assigning roles and responsibilities. In larger organisations there’s likely change management roles or functions tasked with implementing change. Our view is that change is continual, inevitable and holistic, so any accountability that can be assigned beyond change managers to amplify their work will mitigate the potential for ‘us and them’ behaviour and the resultant push back that freezes organisations
2. Adopting a program approach. Changes or improvements can be quickly viewed as one time fixes, but as we see with good design, improvement is an ongoing program, is iterative, and is rarely ‘done’. So as with any task - set goals to measure progress against, describe clear milestones, and reframe once you’ve moved forward because so has the world around you. Foster a continuous improvement culture.
3. Curating and showcasing champions. Leverage the fact that: some people are more willing to step forward and act; some are more candid in sharing challenges; some people are more enthusiastic about improving their place and space; some people are avid learners; some people are brave leaders at any level. Champions can be found anywhere from the front line to the back office to the workshop floor, and by using co-design techniques you’ll find them. Not everyone can, will or should step up, but assembling a representative and empowered group to own their opportunities and showcase outcomes will set a positive energy through the organisation. Support willing champions, and soon the pockets of improvement become a movement that takes the organisation forward.

Empowered employees are the greatest asset an organisation has. Some organisations have gone so far as to develop new structures that bake in continual, people focused change, and the evidence to date is that they’re thriving.

Final thoughts

Change can be labelled many things including innovation, progress, strategy and growth. Whatever forward movement means for your organisation, listening out for and acting on the common stress signals will help you develop resilience, become more adaptive in challenging times, and ensure a sustainable and thriving organisation that brings value to the people it employs and serves.

And of course, if you can’t gain traction, support or even recognition (many people and organisations thrive in denial), seek help from others outside the organisation, be it through your own network or the many expert providers who can help you build a case for and execute positive change.

If anything in this series has piqued your interest or you’re looking for support, we’ve helped over 250 organisations and engaged over 15,000 individuals to co-create better outcomes across a broad spectrum of clients, sectors and industries. Our vision is to create equitable, sustainable and just futures.

How might we help?

Meld Studios

Designing better futures, together.