The three essentials for driving change

By George Henderson

In The Art of War, Sun Tzu writes, “Regard your soldiers as your children and they will follow you into the deepest valleys; look upon them as your own beloved sons, and they will stand by you even unto death.” While organizational change rarely demands the ultimate sacrifice, great leaders understand that it can crush or lift the human spirit. As King Solomon wrote, “Where there is no vision the people perish.” (Prov. 28:19 KJV).

Most people actually support change-as long as someone else is doing the changing. The fact is that unless people collectively perceive a threat; unless they individually believe in a larger mission; unless they personally understand the sacrifices to be made, they will rarely lend their full support.

There are "Three Essentials" for mobilizing change across organizational lines. Until these are present and communicated by the senior executive, change agents will die a lonely death on a distant hill. These three essentials are a Burning Platform, a Shared Vision, and an Executive Mandate.

Burning Platform

Fire is one of the greatest threats to those who work on offshore platforms. Several miles from land, when fire breaks out at sea, people must choose between extinguishing the flames and swimming with the sharks. It does not matter how well they get along; on a burning platform they have a collective problem they must solve.

Leaders wishing to get their organization moving must identify a crisis. They may even have to manufacture one. The threat must be real, immediate, and affect each associate personally.

Shared Vision

The Burning Platform may get people moving but they have to converge on something positive. There must be a Promised Land that makes crossing the desert of change worthwhile. Otherwise, they are operating in crisis, motivated by fear. This is neither constructive nor sustainable in the long term.

Since people have what's in it for me? written on their foreheads, the Shared Vision must hold something for all stakeholders. There are three important elements to an effective Shared Vision:

1. The Shared Vision must offer a significant financial win. Corporations have an obligation to shareholders to give them a return on investment. Talking about widgets per hour or how much better people will "feel," while perhaps important, rarely strikes a chord with investors.

2. The Shared Vision must solve an organizational pain point felt by all. It is a mistake for leaders to appeal to the masses by speaking only in aggregate financial terms that benefit someone else. By addressing operational pain caused by ineffective and inefficient processes, policies, or practices, management communicates to their associates that they are in touch with real problems.

3. The Shared Vision must create a competitive advantage that protects against short-sighted solutions. The Shared Vision becomes that point on the horizon toward which all boats may steer while making the course corrections for their individual situation.

Executive Mandate

Leadership begins and ends with the sponsorship of a high-ranking senior executive. An Executive Mandate will describe what is expected and establish that non-compliance is not an option.

To create and communicate an Executive Mandate, the executive sponsor must:

1. Declare a Strategic Intent: Strategic intent is a high-level statement of where a company is going and how it intends to get there. Strategic intent helps others align their actions with the larger strategy.

2. Empower a Guiding Coalition of Senior Executives: A wise CEO will take a first cut at the Burning Platform, Shared Vision, and the Executive Mandate. He or she will then organize a cross-functional coalition of executives to flesh out the details. This communicates the issues and gives senior executives a chance to put their personal stamp on the strategic direction.

The Guiding Coalition must reach consensus about where the organization is and where it is going. Remember that consensus does not mean 100% agreement. It means that each member agrees to publicly support the decision of the group regardless of personal opinions.

3. Mandate a Governance Model: Linking strategy to execution requires governance at the executive, functional, and project level. There must be a forum for vetting and fact-based decision making. There must be a path of escalation all the way to the CEO for making decisions and resolving disagreement.

4. Commission and Focus Resources: People and resources must have permission to spend time on the change effort. Subject matter experts and project team members must not be put in the position of defying an immediate supervisor in order to participate.

5. Set and Enforce Standards: The senior executive must establish and communicate standards of performance and participation. They must also be willing to deal with obstructionists and ineffective leaders. There are few things more frustrating, or that will kill a change initiative faster, than a CEO who says the words but is not willing to follow up with consequences for those who defy the mandate.

In The Art of War, Sun Tzu further writes, "The victorious strategist only seeks battle after the victory has been won, whereas he who is destined to defeat first fights and afterwards looks for victory." The seasoned executive will spend time in counsel with a guiding coalition of committed leaders. Only when they have defined the Three Essentials and are prepared to personally enforce participation are they ready to ask others to make the sacrifices that effective change requires.