You know the adage “People resist change.” It is not really true. People are not stupid. People love change when they know it is a good thing.
No one gives back a winning lottery ticket.
What people resist is not change per se, but loss. When change involves real or potential loss, people hold on to what they have and resist the change.
Ron Heifetz in The Practice of Adaptive Leadership
And yet … in complex and far reaching organisational change, there will inevitably be losers as well as winners. If I am going to be a loser, and change is imposed from above — the usual approach — it is totally understandable for me to resist the change, and blame my oppressors: “This change sucks, it’s making my life worse — I hate you.”
Imposing change is asking for resistance! But there is an alternative …
Inviting change
On the other hand, if leaders wish to invite participation in the change process, they can begin by being transparent and vulnerable about the realities of the situation:
- “We need to change because …” ,
- “This is what we seek to achieve …”, and
- Acknowledge that there is likely no perfect solution that makes everyone better off.
So rather than impose a solution from above, I recommend throwing open the challenge to the whole group — since we will all be affected — to explore possibilities and come up with the best and fairest solution.
- We want to get the most creative ideas, and as many wins as possible
- Where there are downsides, we want them to be as fairly distributed as possible
In this way, not only does the organisation draw on the wisdom of the crowd, it generates buy-in, and the opportunity to work through the negatives.
Instead of having downside aspects imposed from above, I may end up “taking one for the team”, with much better understanding, and consent. And in some cases compensation may be part of the solution, e.g. if downsizing and redundancy is part of the solution that emerges.
Do leaders shirk responsibility by not designing the outcome? Far from it: their role shifts. Instead of imposing a solution, they
- articulate the challenge,
- supply additional context and perspective,
- engage and empower effective facilitators,
- participate in exploring options, and
- help hold open the co-creative space in which solutions can emerge.
Open Space
What kind of structure works best for this kind of exercise? I recommend running an Open Space internal unconference.
I highly recommend Prager Consulting to anyone wanting to build or refine their agile processes as well as using the Open Space approach to build your action plan.
Shaun Coppard, Asia Pacific Services Director, LabWare
Open Space is a method for self-organising and running a meeting or conference, where participants are invited in order to focus on a specific, pressing purpose. In our case: initiating change.
In contrast to conventional conferences where who will speak at which time is scheduled in advance, Open Space sources participants once they are physically present at the live event venue. In this sense Open Space is participant-driven and self-organised.
An Open Space unconference sets up a strong container in which self-organisation can succeed:
- An inspiring theme, crafted by the leaders in consultation with the facilitators
- An opening circle in which participants are warmly welcomed
- An explanation of how the day will work: including the (fairly minimal) rules of Open Space
- A call for topics from any participant — volunteers must be prepared to convene a session on their topic
- Self-organisation of the agenda: topics are combined, sequenced, and scheduled by the conveners to make an enticing program with multiple, parallel tracks
- The sessions take place, with participants self-selecting where they go
- A closing ceremony to coalesce the key learnings
My favourite aspects of Open Space are:
- The Law of Two Feet: The obligation to leave a session where you feel you are neither contributing nor benefiting
- The Injunction to “Be Prepare to be Surprised”
One notable aspect of Open Space in the context of change is that it sets up the opportunity for change champions to spontaneously emerge during the course of the day. The Law of Two Feet removes the obligation to sit through sessions — instead participants discover what energises them.
By gathering learnings and unlocking energy the potential for real change is maximised.
Learn more
You can learn more about Open Space here, and may also be interested in Open Space Agility and Inviting Leadership.
I am available to facilitate Open Space internal conferences in and around Melbourne for Agile, transformational change, and other challenges.
Prager Consulting 