Barriers to a successful change process

What most holds back a successful change process?

There’s lots of stuff published about organisational change and how to do it. But there’s less about why change processes don’t work or fail to gain traction. And this is a big problem both in business and in the world of charities. In a recent survey by =mc of charities trying to instigate major change we found that 50% of change processes instigated haven’t worked.

Let’s start with what should work and should happen. Perhaps the best-known change model approach is the 8-Step model developed by US management consultant and Harvard Professor John Kotter.

The model, in case you’re not familiar with it, is outlined below.

Step	Implication and action
Step 1 Establish a sense of urgency	Make sure that key stakeholders are aware there is a problem and that they agree on what the problem is – otherwise you’ll have no momentum for change.
Step 2 Create the guiding coalition	To steer the organisation through the change you need a group with the authority to design the approach. This might involve a small change team, a mix of the board and SMT or even the whole staff. But you need to be clear on change mandate.
Step 3 Develop a vision and strategy	You know from Step 1 what you don’t want. But you need to move beyond that and develop a positive and engaging vision of what the changed organisation will look like. Then you need – with your guiding coalition – to establish what steps and stages will help you achieve that.
Step 4 Communicate the change vision	To get key stakeholders on board you need to communicate the change vision – a mix of where you want to get to and how you’ll get there. This communication needs to be constant and consistent to ensure it arrives and is re-enforced.
Step 5 Empower broad-based action	If the change is to happen then it’s not enough to have the guiding coalition on-board – you need to have smaller groups and individuals contributing to the change. This broad based action – involving board, senior staff, front liners and perhaps even volunteers – is essential.
Step 6 Generate short-term wins	It’s possible for the individuals involved in the change to lose heart – and even revert to the pervious unhelpful approaches. You need to build into your change programme an acceptance that the process can be long and difficult. So you need some successes. These needn’t be huge victories but they do need to be public and recognisable successes. A significant new donor coming on board to support your programme is an example.
Step 7 Consolidate gains and produce more change	Your change processes now has that key ingredient – momentum. But you need to build on that momentum and use it to leverage greater progress. As you create more momentum so more people come on board. You have almost finished
Step 8 Anchor new approaches in the corporate culture	It’s not enough to change structures, processes, or even people. To create sticky permanent change you need to change culture. You need to find symbolic and practical ways to ensure that the change you want is so deeply routed that there is no chance of things rolling back.

The Kotter process seems pretty straightforward. So why doesn’t that work? Where are the big challenges that derail the 8 steps?

During a recent =mc Thought Leadership event on Change, we asked 12 of the top organisational development and HR professionals in the UK charity sector what they thought most held back successful change. Their analysis was based on Kotter’s 8-step model. Each person was asked to allocate points to the steps according to the degree to which they can or do hold back or disrupt change. The results are below and may be quite surprising… (The size of the bar represented the largest challenge.)