INVOLVEMENT BREEDS COMMITMENT

AUBREY Q. DEL ROSARIO

Few principles in the management of change are as well documented or understood as the idea that involvement breeds commitment, yet organizations continue to ignore this principle.

Where individualism reigns supreme, managers who do not involve their workers in decisions that affect them run the risk of stalled change efforts. “But it takes too long,” is the most common complaint and source of resistance to the involvement imperative. To that we respond, “And what is the cost of failed implementation because you went too fast?”

During our research at Microsoft, we heard one manager get it right when he said, “Managers consistently overestimate how fast they have to move and what needs to be done in the short run and underestimate what can be done in the long run.” The lesson is that involving people in change decisions provides improved estimates of time tables, expectations, and commitment.

First things that a leader should do is to task people across the organization to study the organization’s existing structure and to recommend alternatives. By involving key people in the analysis, extended his own personal commitment into the organization, the members themselves became convinced of the need for change and evangelized the effort throughout the organization. Intact work groups met throughout the company to discuss how implementing the new strategy.

This activity spurred additional conversations between work groups, and the conversations became departmental and global because somebody has reached out to a colleague or work group that they wouldn’t have trusted previously, to work together and to make something happen. It is happening out there on a day-to-day basis, in the most remote corners of the organization. That is awfully powerful.” — oOo— The author is Administrative Assistant I of DepEd Division of City of San Fernando (P)