Companies are making great efforts in internal communication and informing employees about organizational changes in the hope that changes will be embraced as soon as possible and that employees will act accordingly. Despite this, a large number of initiated changes are ineffective or not in line with expectations.
According to a study conducted by the University of Arizona, we share approximately fifteen thousand words each day. The average self-help book (engl. self-help) contains between thirty thousand and fifty thousand words, which means that based on the number of spoken words, we could write one book every third day of our lives. An extraordinary thought. We could share our ideas, values, discoveries, and observations, and anyone who reads the book would understand the world just as we do and see it in the same way. We could even provoke change. In the realm of self-help, all readers would resolve personal issues and dilemmas.
Unfortunately, this is an illusion. Not the part about writing a book, because with some dedication and practice, our book could become a reality. The illusion pertains to achieving the same understanding and provoking change, as every word and every sentence written in the book has a completely different meaning for the reader and the author. Readers live in their own world, in a different context, and every sentence they read triggers different associations and images conditioned by their worldview, lifestyle, and environment. More is needed to provoke change.
Two Levels of Change
Changes occur on two levels: the level of action and perception. Most organizations are trained at the level of action, e.g., in defining new rules and processes, digitalization, introducing work methods, conducting training and workshops… They are less trained in changing the way we see things – such as stereotypes, paradigms, and dogmas that form our construction of reality. Companies, for example, are making great efforts in internal communication and informing employees about organizational changes in the hope that changes will be embraced as soon as possible and that employees will act accordingly. Despite this, we read that a large number of initiated changes are ineffective or not in line with expectations.
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The reason lies in incorrect assumptions. For example, if you ask board members eager to transform their organization or become more agile why they need change, why now, and what they mean by agility – depending on their number, you will receive seven, nine, or eleven different answers. Therefore, the question arises as to how we can expect hundreds or thousands of employees to understand that concept equally if several board members gathered in one room have completely different images, different expectations, and understandings.
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Perception cannot be changed by written words, internal newsletters, communication platforms, visuals, podcasts, or video messages, which are the most commonly used activities. They allow for the transmission of information, but information without our personal context is dead letters on paper.
To provoke change, one must engage in meaningful conversation with colleagues, which means that to start, one must build a common understanding of the context in which they operate and what those changes mean for everyday reality through conversation. It sounds like a simple answer to a complex problem, but without understanding why, where, and with whom to provoke conversation, we can hardly expect positive shifts.
Reacting to Surprise
German physicist Dr. Gerhard Wohland has studied high-performing companies for the past three decades. Observing them, he noticed that there are two types of problems that arise in every organization. The first can be solved with knowledge. For example, if you want to go to the Colosseum in Rome, you need a map and someone who can interpret it. Similarly, if you disassemble a car, you need someone who knows how to correctly assemble the parts for the car to be functional again. For this type of problem, instructions, standardization, and a prescribed process approach are useful.
The second type of problem is related to imagination and ideas. Unexpected events in the market arise from inventive concepts of direct and indirect competition, prompting your organization to become more advanced. Information and knowledge are not enough for this type of problem. They cannot be solved with regulations, instructions, and standardization. Companies that try to prevent the negative consequences of these surprises by prescribing new rules and instructions cause great irritation and discouragement both on a personal level and in collaboration among employees. The cause lies in the inappropriate approach to surprises. Surprises in the organizational world require a project approach, a lot of discussion, and the creation of a common understanding of the context in which changes have arisen. Such problems are easier to solve with principles that serve as a guide for decision-making.
Outdated Practices
Let’s take the pandemic two years ago as an example. In search of solutions to the problems faced by most companies, crisis teams were formed with people from different specializations. Everyone agreed that the consequences of the situation were far-reaching and that a common understanding was needed. With that premise, crisis teams found new solutions week after week. However, the market situation changed from day to day, and every answer they found was a solution to one immediate problem and completely inapplicable three weeks later. Intense discussion among employees from different business backgrounds enabled (un)success in overcoming challenges.
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For every organization, awareness of these two dimensions of problems is crucial and how the legacy of industrialization still affects company practices today. If we look back one hundred or one hundred twenty years, to the time of industrialization and sluggish markets, most of the problems companies faced could be solved with expertise. The 1970s and 1980s marked the beginning of globalization, and the 1990s brought the internet, leaving companies to grapple with unpredictable problems and surprises.
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Some situations can still be solved with written words, regulations, and one-way information transmission, but that is no longer enough – more than ever, it is time to introduce formats and time for conversation!
Where Discussions Take Place
American business consultant from the early twentieth century Mary Parker Follett, dubbed the ‘mother of modern management’ and a pioneer in organizational theory and behavior, was deeply intrigued by group and social dynamics. During one study conducted in factories, she observed people working and collaborating and noticed that every employee is part of three different types of leadership. The types of leadership do not refer to leadership styles but to the processes of communication and interaction that occur in the company all the time, among all employees, and in which each individual is part of all three leadership structures: position, personality, and function.
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Three Types of Leadership Each individual is part of all three structures
Position-based Leadership: Conditioned by formal hierarchical position. Communication follows a waterfall approach. It is mainly one-way and does not involve conversation or discussion.
Personality-based Leadership: Informal communication prevails, such as conversations that colleagues have in hallways or in the cafeteria. Everyone participates in it.
Function-based Leadership: Nowadays, the name of this type of leadership can easily create misconceptions as it can be equated with position-based leadership. It refers to the roles that employees take on in creating value based on their skills.
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According to her observations, most communication and attention are directed at the first two types of leadership, but if today’s management wants success, it should emphasize the third type of leadership more, learn to observe patterns of behavior and interaction among employees, and find formats to initiate meaningful discussions about work and collaboration.
The Story of Kurt Lewin
Social psychologist Kurt Lewin, known as one of the pioneers of organizational development and human resources, was asked by the U.S. government during World War II to conduct a study on identifying the urgent needs of the American population and designing tailored solutions that politicians would use to reduce poverty. For example, people were asked to limit their meat intake to support the war. The main question of the study was how to convince individuals to change their dietary and cooking habits. Beef offal such as kidneys, liver, and tripe were categorized as less valuable and were usually thrown away during meal preparation. The research council was tasked with convincing housewives to include them in their daily diet.
With the help of the Red Cross, Lewin and his colleagues gathered 120 female volunteers for the study. The women were then divided into smaller groups of thirteen to seventeen people. Several groups (marked as ‘first group’) listened to lectures by nutritionists on various recipes, while others (marked as ‘second group’) were allowed to freely discuss and exchange opinions and concerns about how they could make the most of leftover meat.
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Unexpected events in the market arise from inventive concepts of direct and indirect competition, prompting the organization to become more advanced. Information and knowledge for this type of problem are not enough and cannot be solved with regulations, instructions, and standardization.
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After several weeks of lectures and discussions, the results revealed that participants who were allowed to communicate and share their ideas and concerns changed their dietary and cooking practices (more than thirty percent) more than the first group (three percent).
What Brings Change
The main explanation for why housewives in the nutritionist cluster failed to change their eating habits was that they could not share their own stories, concerns, and ideas. Instead, they were only given instructions on what dishes to prepare. This prevented group members from exerting potential pressure that could provoke change. In the second group, the pressure to change was initiated by the housewives. They discussed ideas among themselves and pooled their strengths to support the transformation.
This led researchers to suggest group discussions and decisions as drivers of change and how changes require change agents – people who firmly believe in their ideas about change and can support it. In the first group, the change agent was the nutritionist, while in the second, all participants were.
So, before you launch your next change initiative, think carefully about what domain of problems your organization is facing, in which sphere of leadership discussion is encouraged, and who your change agents are. Start change with conversation.
