Leading Edge Leaders: Managing Change

Tuesday, December 9, 2008

Managing Change

Soon I am off to Asia to work with a group of managers who are undergoing huge changes in their organization. In preparation, I have been reading up on the theories of change management. What caught my attention were the articles about managing the people issues in any transition. These are soft issues, not as tangible as developing a new budget, for instance, but critical to the success or failure of organizational change.

For myself and my clients I drew up a checklist to help themselves stay on track with the people management aspects of a change process. If you use it let me know what you found useful and what you would add to this list.

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What We're Doing Here

This is the space for discussing, sharing ideas and pushing our own understanding and ability forward. The time for leadership is now and the place we need it to arise from is all of us.

Leadership is something we here a lot about and it is a word overused to the point of being useless. But we need leadership. We need it now in today's world and we need each of us to bring our own unique attributes to the leadership table.

Over the years I have worked with a lot of people on their leadership - in their jobs, in their lives, in their own assessment of themselves. Take charge of your life, I urge.

One day, while urging a client to take a stand for who she was and what she wanted to do, I had the image of a large jigsaw puzzle with many small pieces. You know the kind, they come in boxes and on the outside it says something like " 3,000 piece puzzle" with all the pieces being unique and have to be fitted together before you get the complete picture.

"You are a puzzle piece," I told her, "you are unique. And the rest of us are waiting for you to put your piece into the picture to finish the puzzle. Until you do the puzzle will be incomplete."

What we are doing here is providing a forum for getting closer to understanding your own unique puzzle piece. What we are also doing here is understanding how to bring our unique attributes into the world for their most effective presentation.

I look to everyone to help guide the discussion and learning.

I will go first.

Lynne

6 Things I believe:

1. If others tell you your behavior is getting in the way, then it is. Being defensive is your sign that a true note has been struck. Stop defending and do something about it.
2. Leadership is an act of courage. Be willing to be found lacking and to be found perfect.
3. Shaming others is never an option
4. The goal of perfection cripples everyone from innovation, action and creativity
5. There is nothing to gain from wishing your colleagues, boss, direct reports were different or met your expectations. The real work is this: What are you going to do about it?
6. Treat people as you would wish to be treated. Be the leader that you would like to follow.