The human dimension plays a vital part in organisational change initiatives
The 2002 book ‘Crucial Conversations: Tools for Talking When Stakes Are High’ seems to bleed into every trending discussion that I have followed lately. In his description of the book, Paul Arnold writes that “many defining moments in life come from having crucial conversations as they create significant shifts in attitude and behaviour.”
Crucial conversations are an ever-present part of our world and have a huge impact on organisational learning and growth. Not surprisingly, authors Kerry Patterson and his three co-founders at VitalSmarts say their book is about situations where “opinions vary, stakes are high, and emotions run strong.”
It is thus fair to conclude that crucial conversations also translate to the more familiar difficult conversations; they challenge, frustrate, confuse, frighten, or annoy the conversationalists.
But in all these outcomes, it is important to remember that the conversations can have a marked effect on one’s life.
It is an established fact that successful relationships, careers, organisations, and communities share the same strength of openly talking about high stakes, emotional, and controversial topics. For this reason, I have found the NeuroLeadership Institute (NLI)’s series on Your Brain at Work not only eye opening but also a useful guide for those working in organisational change.
One of the NLI’s programmes, for example, reflected on the high failure rate of organisational change initiatives. Generous budgetary allocations, energy and workforce seem have repeatedly failed to deliver the desired change. Of note is that the NLI’s Rachel Cardero, Ryan Curl, and Mary Toomey referred to their research which found that seventy percent of employees say the last change initiative did not achieve its goals.
Additionally, 65% of the surveyed population indicated that their organisations did not achieve a higher degree of effectiveness after the attempts at change.
Closely allied to this finding is that a further 68% of the respondents say they did not work more effectively after the change effort.
The three NLI researchers and consultants agreed that change initiatives fail because they do not clearly articulate their objectives, do not prioritise people, and fall short of promoting effective change of behaviour. The research is scathing in respect of organisations which seek to implement change without indicating what the success of the measures will look like.
They advise organisations to guard against the illusion of transparency, that is, the assumption that every employee will somehow know the intended outcomes of the change initiative. Rather than seek protection in incomplete conversations, NLI says organisations need to bring employees into a place of psychological safety, a place where people share meaningful discussions on important matters. Psychological safety also allows people to thrive in discomfort because organisations have clearly enunciated the threat versus the positive future dichotomy. The Institute concludes that “change initiatives do not necessarily fail because they are complex; they falter because they are often not designed with the human brain in mind.”
Further, the NLI says change must introduce employees to priorities, habits, and the systems necessary to sustain the change initiative. Alternatively, organisations must bear in mind that quality conversations create engagement, develop others, and improve performance. Hence flexibility and empathy also play an important role in illuminating the reasons for the change.
Writing about The Art of Conversation, John Armstrong of the University of Melbourne is convincing when he notes that “the traditions of law, science, and scholarship, and even of politics” have a tendency of “putting the argument first.” Armstrong’s response is that “while an argument has priority in a debate, in conversation, the person comes first.”
Author Marlene Chism contends that “the meaning of communication is the response it elicits, not the intention.” I can only add that crucial, vital, or critical conversations need appropriate handling to prevent poison, drivel, and unfortunate misrepresentations from ruining trust.