Time for change?

By Lauren Fenthum

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Change is an important factor of any modern-day business. In today’s fast-paced and dynamic world, one needs to be able to keep up. It is important to embrace change in order to stay relevant and competitive, ultimately leading to growth opportunities for your company.

Success is the main objective, and in order to achieve success, one should look at what needs to be done in order to reach that goal. What should your business be doing differently? What needs to be changed in order to reach success? Change is not an easy factor to grasp, as there are so many other influential factors that contribute towards its effectiveness. Astoundingly, there is only a 30% chance of organizational change being a success.

Using John Kotter’s 8 steps for change, we have found a simple, and helpful way to ensure that implementing change is smooth sailing for both your employees and your business.

Create a Sense of Urgency- this is the most important step, according to Kotter. By creating an urgency of the matter at hand, employees will be more likely to support change. This too creates an open dialogue, where employees could voice any concerns they may have, which could even lead to possible solutions.

Create a Guiding Coalition- establish a project team, with members from different job descriptions. This way, a constructive approach to change means that there will be fewer bumps in the road and it becomes easier to manage. This once again encourages open communication and allows everyone’s opinions and concerns to be voiced.

Create a Vision for Change- by creating a clear and concise vision, helps everyone in the organization to understand what the end goal is. This step makes changes more concrete and allows more support from employees.

Communicate the Vision- in order for the vision to become a reality, there needs to be accepted from all involved. This can be achieved by allowing employees to get involved and communicate their ideas towards the task.

Remove Obstacles- remove anything that undermines the vision. Again, this can only be done through open communication. In order for the vision to work, it is vital that everyone is on board and excited about achieving the business’s goals.

Create Short-Term Goals- this creates motivation and excitement to carry on pursuing such goals. Acknowledge and reward employees that have been working closely on the project, this encourages a stronger work ethic and further encouragement to carry on meeting goals.

Consolidate Improvements- change is a slow and on-going process. Victories should not be declared too early as this could lead to failure. Learn from your improvements and keep looking at how else to improve on different aspects. This shows that the change is paying off.

Anchor the Changes- employees must continue to support the change. Values and strengths of the change must match the employee’s behaviour. Regular evaluation needs to take place in order to continue improving.

Change is a risk. There is no doubt that this process could affect your business in more ways than one. However, it is a vital part of any system, of which is inevitable. Embrace it. Encourage good communication within your business, as this could ultimately place you above your competitors, making your business more relevant in the busy marketplace, and allowing for success to be your virtue.