A Safe Prediction for 2011: Change, Change and More Change

When I speak to groups with participants from different companies, I frequently

ask them to stand up if they have had new CEOs, changes in leadership,

downsizing, rightsizing or reorganizations in the last five years. Of course, by the

time I finish the list, the whole audience leaps to its feet.

"Aren't your people just tired?," I ask "Aren't they exhausted from all the changes

they've had to adapt to?" And yet managing that change is an essential business

skill.

Laurie Kelly, Sr. H. R. Business partner at Western Union, provides support to the

CFO and the CFO leadership. Her role is as a business partner, to make sure that

HR is aligned with business strategies. A trend Kelly sees is making sure that the

leaders she supports effectively manage change, including cultural change

management and business process change.

The reality is that most people don't like change and don't know how to deal with

it. If you're going to handle change skillfully, you need to learn new skills. One of

the most important is realizing that conflict follows change as reliably as spring

follows snow.

Kelly notes that as the economy's rebound slows, companies have had to take a

hard look at how they can operate the business differently, including answering the

question: "What do our customers really want?" She urges leaders to help

employees drive the whole business and to look at the way they do business.

For example, Kelly encourages leaders to consider whether sending people to a

remote location to train new employees is the best, most cost effective option.

Perhaps they need to focus on creating best in class training which is process

focused, standardized and repeatable in a global environment, as well as training

that utilizes technology for delivery.

In another example, an aerospace company that Kelly worked with had to conduct

reductions in force when the government cut funding. The company focused on

keeping all the employees with seniority. By doing this, the company was at risk

for business continuity. Kelly believed that they needed to keep some less tenured

employees as well who would have a long runway and new skills to retain a

competitive advantage. Overall, she thought that they needed to retain employees

who were versatile, had multiple skill sets and could take on a broader scope of

work.

All of these issues involve managing change and encouraging leaders to question

the way they do business.

As I wrote in my book

The Power of a Good Fight; Embracing Conflict to Drive

the additional factor in dealing with

change is dealing with conflict.

When an organization makes changes, conflict increases. The upheaval creates

uncertainty that can degenerate into turf wars, resentments, sabotage, and multiple

negative behaviors. Underlying many of these behaviors are issues of culture,

grief, loss, or fear of loss. These are major organizational issues that determine

whether a merger will succeed or whether the employees will work to make it fail.

On a smaller scale, substantial change within a single department or in reporting

relationships can create crippling conflicts if not handled with foresight,

thoughtfulness, and respect. Coping with change is probably one of the single-most

important skills in today's business arena.

Never before has so much change taken place so quickly. In the last 40 years there

has been more technological advancement than in all of recorded history, and it has

altered the way people, communities, and entire countries interact, work, and live.

In order to use conflict creatively, we must understand the impact of change in our

organizations and in our own lives.

Many times intractable conflicts are really about our resistance to change whether

organizational, personal, or practical. Skillful conflict management requires an

understanding of this dynamic at the strategic and employee level. While senior

managers are worried about changes in leadership style, teams of employees may

be upset about simple but small changes such as a change in the coffee or

discontinued free sodas. It's hard for executives to look at both the large and small

reactions to change and focus on the essence. When we find ourselves resistant to a

new idea, it's usually because we're resistant to

change. Even if we don't like the

way we're currently working or behaving, it's familiar. Sometimes we create

unnecessary conflicts in the workplace because we refuse to recognize or admit

this. If we continue to resist the change, we're unlikely to creatively harness the

power of conflict.

I've worked with many groups who had conflicts between old leaders and

employees and new leaders and employees. Many times, for example, when I'm

facilitating a diversity workshop, the most conflicted groups will be those who

represent the old versus the new as a result of mergers or acquisitions, not those

who represent different ethnic backgrounds or genders.

In one such instance, I was brought in to help a larger HR department manage a

simmering dispute between old and new members. The old managers saw

themselves as serving the more traditional role of

employee advocates. The old VP,

Joe, came from an employee relations background and emphasized representing

employee needs. The newer members of the department aligned with Ron, a new

high-powered vice president of HR, and saw themselves as strategic

business

who needed to serve the highest-ranking manager of whatever business

unit they were assigned to.

After much discussion, we came up with a creative definition of their role that

embraced both ideas. The reason it took them so long and required my assistance

as a facilitator was not so much the substantive conflict itself as it was the whole

issue of

change. The old managers were struggling with the grieving process as

they moved into a new and uncertain future. The new VP and the new managers

were also struggling with the change process. Even though the move to new jobs

was something they had all sought, they had to learn that even positive changes

take us through the predictable stages of loss and grief. If we don't acknowledge

and move through each stage, we will flounder. Frequently, because we're not

conscious of why we feel upset, we will project our anxiety outside ourselves onto

our co-workers. Conflicts naturally follow.

Once the group had an opportunity to talk honestly about the changes they were all

experiencing and were able to express the common feelings they shared, the

underlying issues were much easier to creatively explore.

How are you and the people you lead managing the inevitable business changes?

Take some time to learn this essential business skill.