Last week I was doing research for a new book I am writing about change – the pace of change, the challenge with it, and the consistent inability of corporations and leaders to get their teams to embrace it.
It’s really fascinating when you think about it. According to some recent studies, change is more challenging than ever:
The pace of change has increased 183% in the last four years
Four out of five employees are completely burned out, stressed and overwhelmed from the pace of change
Over 70% of change initiatives fail
Only 38% of employees are actively and willing to support change
Now think about that; we are living in a world where there is so much change happening yet your ability to navigate it, get your team on board with it, and execute change effectively is seriously declining. At a time when you need your teams to embrace change, they are actively resisting it. And that is costing you big time.
The Cost of Failing Change
Your inability to make change effectively has a financial cost and an opportunity cost. The financial cost is money wasted on consultants, training, and resources that don’t stick. Research shows that change failure can burn as much as 25 to 30 percent of an organization's total budget.
While I found that alarming, and I do, I think the lost opportunity cost of failed change is far greater. Failed change initiatives hurt your reputation, erode trust with both employees and customers, and allow your competitors to capture market share.
Why You Need To Stop Managing Change
The statistics, the stories, and the fatigue from failed change should tell you one thing. Managing change is not working. It’s time to do something different.
The idea of managing change is outdated.
- It implies that change is a project with a start date, an end date, and clear goals. In today’s world, change is anything but that.
- It is reactive, not proactive. When you manage change, you respond after the change happens. In today’s world, you need to be predicting the changes coming in the marketplace and even driving the change.
- And most importantly, managing change treats change like a problem. A modern leader views change as a growth opportunity and competitive advantage.
How To Ask For Change
So if you are not managing change, what do you as a leader need to do with change? You need to ASK for change. So what does it mean to ASK for change?
It’s simple really. ASKing for change means you simply make the decision to stop resisting change, or waiting until it’s forced on you, to actively seek change out and drive change on your own terms. At its core, ASKing for change is about taking your fear and turning it into fuel.
And how you ask for change is simply by using my ASK for change system:
1
Perspective
Shift how you view change, think about change, and respond to change. By implementing the power of relentless vision, replacing competition with collaboration, and using your core values as your north star.
2
People
Leverage and engage the right relationships to increase speed, save resources, and solve problems more effectively. Through using customer complaints as the path to profitability, strengthening your team, and building your network.
3
Process
Get in shape for change, use processes and systems to remain highly focused and agile, and replace busyness for productivity. Integrate change into your culture.
Ready to Learn More?
Ready to gain the tools you need to shift your perspective, engage people and implement processes? Ready to stop letting change control you and start to control change?
