Harnessing People-Driven-Change to accelerate transformation and the implementation of strategic priorities.
As another milestone on the roadmap out of lockdown is passed, now is the time for leaders to ensure that business and digital transformation activity underway is implemented successfully, at pace and delivering ROI. Whether the priority is to respond to new customer needs, generate efficiencies or to consolidate gains in the face of competitors who are intent on raising their game. The successful implementation of strategic initiatives to deliver growth, profit or resilience is imperative.
However, according to McKinsey 70% of transformations fail and just 16% of executives say that their digital transformation efforts are succeeding. So how do business leaders accelerate transformation and ensure they are successful?
As an experienced leader of both global and in-country transformation, I have experienced first-hand what really makes a difference when driving successful transformation and strategy implementation. I have also felt the pain and learnt from what doesn’t work.
Regardless of the change and programme management methodologies applied, it is people that drive success. Change happens at the individual level – whether it’s the implementation of a new operating model or technology, changes to process or an improved customer delivery approach; business benefits are delivered because individuals embrace working in a different way. The focus of transformation activity needs to be on driving employee behaviour change, ensuring individuals are capable of working in a new way and that the culture encourages them to do so - business benefits follow. The speed at which benefits are delivered are, to a great extent, determined by how committed and capable individuals and teams are to adopting the changes.
People-Driven Change builds on best practice change and team management, it involves the participation and engagement of individuals from all levels of the business in the design and implementation ensuring 1) the development of ‘fit for purpose’ organisational solutions and 2) leader and employee belief, advocacy and ownership of the transformation which drives momentum. Individuals are motivated to want to change and to want to work for change. Change Accelerators are critical activities which support successful delivery of the transformation.
Research by McKinsey supports this view, it shows that companies that have successfully delivered transformation are more likely to have roles across the organisation including line managers and front-line employees, visibly engaged in the transformation.
People-Driven-Change: an example
Pre Covid-19, a transformation team that I led in a UK market research agency ran a working session on ‘systems and automation’ as a part of a launch week for a new strategy. During the session those who had volunteered to attend discussed ideas around the ‘leveraging technology’ strategic priority. The session was surprisingly energetic and engaging given the attendees were mostly market researchers not typically interested in systems and process optimisation. It resulted in the resolution to investigate whether manual components of the research delivery process could be automated to free up time for researchers to focus on their clients.
Following agreement from the Board, I initiated a People-Driven Change approach by forming a cross functional team of enthusiastic or appropriately skilled IT, operations and client service people to spend a proportion of their time identifying automation solutions. A systems implementation specialist supported the team, providing guidance and challenge. The involvement of cross functional, multi-level teams of this nature were not the norm at the time, so it was important to reinforce the significance of what they were undertaking. From day one, the team, their mission and their progress was made visible to the whole business. This not only motivated the project team to succeed, it showed people that the system was being designed by people close to the work and close to the clients which built trust and belief.
Working in conjunction with a people-led approach to change are Change Accelerators, critical activities which support successful delivery of the transformation. Leadership buy-in and involvement for example is an accelerator. In this case the CEO, not someone close to the detail of the delivery process, spent time understanding both the issues being addressed and the technical solutions being developed. He became a visible advocate of the work and continually reinforced how it delivered not only the business strategy but also the many benefits for individuals and teams.
The task the team was undertaking cannot be underestimated- introducing new system functionality and process to replace inefficient, inconsistent, error prone, manual processes. However, the biggest barrier to the success of the digital transformation was the aversion of the users to move away from embedded ways of working. A prerequisite for the automation to work was both selling and delivering in a more standardised way, something client service teams had concerns about. Involving people from all levels of the business at the design phase not only meant that solutions were fit for purpose, but also meant that they were owned within the business and the benefits understood, this helped to overcome concerns.
To further drive participation, I gave the team the specific task of involving as many people as possible in the design and build process. Content development and expertise were crowdsourced, automation champions (change agents) were identified and positioned in delivery teams. All in all, over 110 people were involved out of a user population (the client service team) of 400, plus a further 15 people from the IT and Data Operations teams. Wide scale participation ensured not only that the best possible solution was built, but that from a very early stage there was an excitement within the business about what was coming, and individual commitment to support the implementation.
Engagement and communication is also key, a huge amount of focus was given to engaging business leaders, delivery teams and end users through the design, build and piloting phases. Progress and issues were shared openly, employee and client feedback was listened to and changes made in response. People not only knew what was going on, understood the importance but they felt a part of it.
Automation was launched to the business using a compelling employee benefits driven story, crafted and told by junior members of the client service team during a strategy activation week. They produced a short movie called ‘A day in the life of a researcher’ that emphasised that the digital transformation would mean less issues to deal with, the ability to spend more of their time on higher value tasks and less late nights in the office. In short, automation made the work more interesting and valuable. People also appreciated the value automation delivered for clients – quicker results, less errors and for our business improved efficiencies meant projects could be priced lower or be deliver more profit.
A sure sign that People-Driven Change was working was when, employees took the lead sharing their success stories at team meetings and in posts and videos on internal social media. In-team focus on progress and ROI became competitive across teams – with each wanting to be seen to be doing the best job embracing the automation. Another indication that the transformation was owned and being driven from within the business was the proactivity of the change agents. We put them in place to motivate change, answer questions and to support those struggling with the personal transition into the new ways of working. Very early on in the implementation process, the change agents started working together across teams and creating their own materials to support the roll out.
The energy, ownership and advocacy created by the approach drove high levels of adoption of the new technology, with 65% of applicable projects harnessing the new capability within 8 months of launch. The system improvements and new ways of working delivered benefits for clients, for teams as well as the business with up to 15% of project hours being saved on every project that was automated.
People-Driven Change delivers benefits beyond the transformation.
Perhaps one of the biggest benefits a participative approach to transformation delivers is the level of engagement, excitement and satisfaction that people feel being part of a major change initiative. You can feel an energy within the business.
As we emerge from the pandemic, experience the challenges of home/office hybrid working and recognise the experiences people have faced living through covid, People-Driven Change will provide the focus, energy and engagement to help businesses drive positive team experiences and build genuine engagement and commitment into the future.
