Leading change
We are inspirational and collaborative leaders, dedicated to quality.
We inspire each other to be brave and bold, leading through creativity and innovation. We build trust, communicate and support each other. We take pride in a job well done.
All organisations need to change to survive and we can only thrive if we have the confidence and expertise to deliver change better and faster in order to “out-execute” the competition.
As leaders, we have a critical role to play in change. People look to their leader for guidance and will generally copy the reactions they see – good or bad.
Check the hints and tips section for practical input to your conversations.
Match the Tool
to Your Need
When you have an important message about change, use the Planning to share a business update or change tool to help you plan what you will say and how best to say it.
Use the Describe desired changes to describe both the current and desired future position in order to get a shared view.
There are four types of reactions that almost everyone will experience to different degrees during a change. Use the Stages of change to help you understand what stage they are at and what actions you can take to help them deal with the change.
Understand and rate yourself in your role as a change leader with the Change leader assessment tool. Identify actions to help you improve.
Use the Change impact assessment to understand how planned changes will impact specific groups or individuals.
The Stakeholder analysis tool will help you to understand the likely support of stakeholders for the change and plan actions to increase that support.
Develop a clear change message will help you clarify your change message making it easier for you to ‘sell’ your change.
Some people resist change and others welcome it is an opportunity. The Resistance to change tool will help you consider the reasons for possible resistance and plan how to overcome it.
Tools, Guides
& Resources
Tools:
- Planning to share an update or change
- Describe desired changes
- Stages of change
- Change leader assessment
- Change impact assessment
- Stakeholder analysis
- Develop a clear change message
- Resistance to change
Other areas that might help:
Hints and Tips
- The first step in becoming an effective leader during change is to develop new and different ways of thinking about change.
- Acknowledge the inevitable disruption but avoid negative talk. Positive language encourages more openness to change and helps focus everyone on the positives and what is possible. Remember people will look to you as their role model.
- It is important to recognise that we are never facing just one change. All change involves individuals and groups, structures, processes and practices. Change is not discrete and confined, it always has a broad impact.
- Leading change is creating a favourable ‘conditions’ for progress. The decisions you make about your change plans will be affected by factors such as the degree of resistance, the size of the change, the number of people affected, the time frame for change as well as the expertise and resources available.
- Everyone reacts differently to change and those emotions are normal. Your aim as a change leader is to move them through the process as quickly and sustainably as possible.