Change is hard, but it doesn't have to be if we better manage our expectations and our attitude toward change overall. After all, change is an inevitable constant, and part of developing a mindset for accepting change comes down to how one prepares for and communicates those changes.
In the workplace, the formal term for addressing change is through a process called organizational change management, where methods and strategies are deployed to help drive employees to accept and embrace change.

Organizational Change

Before launching a change management effort, you should have an established vision and an implementation plan. If not, it will be difficult to ask people to change when they don't even understand what the plan or change is. A plan with a clear vision that explains where you are, where you are going, and most importantly, what it means for participants impacted by the change is critical to get right.In providing the plan and vision, use data and tell a story to help crystallize the vision.

Provide the Vision

The success of an organizational change process is often predicated on who you start your message with. As leaders, you want to get buy-in as well as input from your key stakeholders on the plan and vision. By starting with the right audiences, you can attain strategic alignment from the onset and cascade it up and down the organization. Early buy-in can help reduce unforced errors and other unintended consequences later on, such as decreased employee morale or a loss of leadership credibility.

Who to Tell First

One of the most important aspects of organizational change management is managing expectations. This is bedrock: Too often plans are rolled out and timetables are committed to but leaders don't give those impacted a clear understanding of what will happen next.Depending on the complexity of the organizational change and the magnitude of what the change might feel like for those impacted, managing expectations is paramount. Managing expectations comes down to letting people know what is or isn't going to happen.

Manage Expectations

A pitfall some leaders make is sugarcoating the message and engaging in equivocating double talk. People deserve respect, and being straight up with people is a form of professional consideration and decency.Another important aspect of managing organizational change is recognizing that different audiences may need different information. The right level of information is key. Too much information may overwhelm, while too little may cause unneeded tension. Figure out your audiences and who needs to know what and when.

Being Clear

When delivering messages, it is important to have the right messenger -- a person who is trusted, an authority, and who can help lead the change as an effective messenger. There can be times when the wrong messenger was selected and they couldn't effectively meet the moment, which undermined the organizational change efforts. When the messenger isn't acceptable, the whole message can be discounted simply because there is an aversion to the presenter.

The Right Messenger

And at times, there can be multiple messengers for multiple audiences. As a leader, think about all the people on the team who have the necessary credibility and leverage their leadership to cascade the message. Often, people will welcome the opportunity to hear from other leaders.

Tailoring Of The Message

Some messages bear repeating, so complex organizational changes usually require multiple channels through which to communicate and then reiterate the message. You can't expect all audiences to hear or see the message the first, second, or even third time.

Rinse, Repeat, and Reinforce

Leaders need to consider all the channels they could use to convey the message -- video, email, Slack, town halls, FAQs, office hours, and newsletters -- to effectively meet staff where they typically like to receive information. <ul><li>The primary goal of a successful organizational change effort is making sure the plurality of those impacted understand what the message is and how it impacts them. </li><li>Secondly, it's getting them to take action if any is required.</li></ul>

The Bottom Line

Change is an opportunity and the outlook is the mindset.

Stashed ideas

5 Tips in Communicating Organizational Change

Middle management used to be the place where careers stalled, but the pandemic has turned that notion on its head. In fact, mid-level leaders possess more agency now than at any other time in recent history.
The tight job market is opening up new opportunities for capable middle managers who show initiative. The old saying “people don’t leave organizations; people leave people” has never been truer. Companies that don’t tangibly show that they value their best people—by developing their skills and helping them reach their full potential—will lose them, perhaps to competitors.

The Rise Of Mid-Level Managers

Companies tend to gauge capacity based on leaders’ technical execution of tasks, but that perspective overlooks foundational elements that help these professionals reach a higher level—the T-shaped leader.
In this development model, the vertical line of the T represents depth of expertise, and the horizontal line reflects broadening experiences aimed at preparing the individual for enterprise-level leadership. The goal is to build technical competencies in both directions. The T-shaped manager framework has a critical flaw: It overlooks the importance of emotional intelligence.

The T-shaped leader

This approach builds on the Day, Harrison, and Halpin’s view of leader development, which argues that improving leaders’ knowledge, skill, and attitudes will increase their capacity.
The pyramid shaped MSK Framework takes these principles a step further, offering organizations a way to apply these three principles:
<ul>
<li>M: Mindset</li>
<li>S: Skills</li>
<li>K: Knowledge.</li>
</ul>

MSK Leader Development Framework

The foundational level of the MSK Leader Development Framework pyramid targets a leader’s mindset, in particular, the beliefs that orient the way we handle situations and sort out what is going on.
In order to assess what a leader can do and build additional capacity, the organization must create the space for the leader to gain clarity about conscious and unconscious beliefs they hold. An understanding of those beliefs and how they inform actions is critical to understanding different perspectives and thinking more broadly.

M: Mindset

The middle tier of the pyramid addresses a leader’s skills. Conventional thinking considers skills merely a person’s abilities. In the MSK Framework, the skills level seeks to answer the question: Who are you as a leader? Emotional intelligence reigns supreme here.
Leader development work around skills presents both the leader and the organization the opportunity to assess whether the leader is flexible, resilient, adaptable, empathetic, and self-aware, among other qualities.

S: Skills

The top tier of the Framework considers a leader’s knowledge. Knowledge includes the leader’s technical training, socialization, and executing abilities. Some organizations focus on this tier at the expense of the previous ones, but a shift in perspective can produce significant results, particularly for middle managers.
Whereas the T-shaped model emphasizes technical competencies in the vertical and horizontal axes, the MSK Leader Development Framework assumes that leaders are technically competent and will continue to grow.

K: Knowledge

To begin exploring and cultivating a leader’s mindset, organizations should shift from “telling” to “inquiring.” Directive dialogue teaches your direct reports about how you think. 
Inquiry creates the opportunity for your direct reports to slow down and gain insight into how they think. When you engage with direct reports, inquire about the beliefs that underpin their assumptions. Avoid questions that begin with “why,” as they tend to place people on the defensive and stifle dialogue. Instead, ask questions that begin with “how” or “what.”

Cultivate the Leaders Mindset

Organizations should invite leaders to identify no more than two areas in the emotional intelligence domain on which they would like to focus. The areas selected will offer greater insight into the question: Who are you as a leader?
<ul>
<li>During periodic assessments, organizations can ask leaders:</li>
<li>What are they noticing in themselves?</li>
<li>How have they responded to evolving events?</li>
<li>How do they use those insights as they lead their teams?</li>
<li>How do they want to respond to the next challenge they encounter?</li>
</ul>

Facilitate The Exploration of Skills

Too many companies fail to see the potential of their best middle managers—and lose them to other firms. Hise Gibson and Shawnette Rochelle offer a framework for helping these promising leaders grow.

Want to Build Better Leaders? Focus on Mindset, Skills, Knowledge

For months, the Great Resignation has been looming over business leaders. Post-pandemic employees are rethinking life and work and some are heading for the doors for more fulfilling opportunities. The upheaval has largely been portrayed as a negative. But the reality is that it’s an opportunity: call it a “Great Realignment,” in which people and organizations redefine who they are.It’s a once-in-a-generation moment for organizations to reassess and reinforce the glue that keeps them together: their values.

From Great Resignation to Great Realignment

From the beginning of the pandemic, many organizations have found themselves doing things differently out of necessity—only to realize that they preferred the new ways of working. It’s only natural that after a period of great disruption new perspectives and values take root while preexisting ones are left behind.
Reflect on what matters to you and your teams, and how that’s changed since March 2020. Think about what your own takeaways have been and how your values have shifted as a result.

A pandemic redux

There’s nothing worse than a set of organizational values that try to cover all bases—the muddle won’t attract top talent, nor provide current employees with the clarity they need to know if they’re trying to decide whether to stay or go. Spending time to clearly articulate what you stand for (and what you don’t), and then proactively communicating is key to making the Great Realignment a positive force of change for your organization.

Be clear, consistent, and proud of your values

Employees are hyper-aware of the signals coming from leaders and they evaluate both the policies and values their bosses have put in place—and the actions they take. As a leader, you need to ask yourself whether your own behavior matches the stated set of values. Don’t be surprised to find a mismatch. The point is to use this to update your values and make “walking the walk” something that comes naturally. The goal is progress, not perfection.

Walk the walk

People are tired. They are stressed, maybe even burnt out. So, feeling like your organization cares for you at a human level—not just as a productive cog in a machine—has never been more important. This Great Realignment has made engaging with your existing employees more important than ever. Start by devoting time for one-on-one chats, set up anonymous surveys to gather data, and conduct group discussions to review how values are applied in the company. It’s also important to be completely honest with your teams about how you and the company as a whole, have lived up to the values.

Make one-on-one connections

We often think that values are qualitative and so can’t be measured. That's not true. <ul><li>For instance, if one of your values centers on having happy teams, you can track the results from employee NPS scores or Glassdoor reviews. </li><li>Platforms like Lattice, CultureAmp, and Leapsome can help gather and track employee satisfaction across key value dimensions over time—just like you do for customers. </li></ul>

Quantify and track your performance

Employees are reassessing their values. So should companies

Adjacent skills are skills that are close or related to the ones you already have.The main advantage is that you are not starting from scratch: you can usually use some of the knowledge from your existing skills to acquire adjacent skills. Not only will the process feel easier, but you will reinforce your current knowledge.

Building skills through adjacency

<ul><li>Sustain motivation at work. Having adjacent skills means you can switch between a wider range of tasks.</li><li>Build a distinctive viewpoint. Having skills from various areas that are relevant to your work will enable you to see overlaps and connections where other people don’t, bringing to the table non-evident solutions that may be more effective than the obvious ones.</li><li>Expand career perspective. Building skills through agency will open new doors and even allow you to craft a unique role for yourself.</li></ul>

The benefits of adjacent skills

<ul><li>Main skill: Writing- Adjacent skill: SEO</li><li>Main skill: Design - Adjacent skill: Illustration</li><li>Main skill: Content marketing - Adjacent skill: Content marketing</li><li>Main skill: Coding- Adjacent skill: Technical writing</li><li>Main skill: Product management- Adjacent skill: People management</li><li>Main skill: Marketing - Adjacent skill: Psychology</li><li>Main skill: Email marketing - Adjacent skill: Community management</li><li>Main skill: Interface design- Adjacent skill: User research.</li></ul>

Examples of adjacent skills

Adjacent skills

Gartner analysis shows that 46% of the workforce is projected to be working hybrid in the near future for midsize companies. Employees will have more choices about where, when, and how much they work.
In the past, managers used to be selected and promoted if they were able to manage and evaluate the performance of employees. Now managers are increasingly hired based on their ability to be great coaches and teachers.

The role of managers are changing

Three trends challenge the traditional definitions of the manager role:
<ol>
<li>The normalisation of remote work. Managers start to shift their focus more on the outputs of employees and less on the processes used to produce them.</li>
<li>Acceleration in the use of new technology to manage employees is replacing the tasks historically done by managers, such as allocating work and nudging productivity.</li>
<li>Employees' changing expectations. Knowledge workers expect their managers to be part of their support system to help them improve their life experience, not just their employee experience.</li>
</ol>

Changing the definition of the manager's role

The most effective managers of the future will be able to lead with empathy, although the 2021 Garner survey shows that only 47% of managers are prepared for this future role.
Qualities of the empathic manager:
<ul>
<li>They can go beyond understanding the facts of work. They proactively seek information to put themselves in their employees' context.</li>
<li>They develop high levels of trust and care and a culture of acceptance within teams.</li>
</ul>

Flexibility requires empathetic managers

While managers understand empathy, they are unsure how to use it as a managers tool.
How to build empathy:
<ul>
<li>Managers should engage in one-on-one conversations with their peers to diagnose current managerial challenges.</li>
<li>These conversations will offer a chance to engage in vulnerable discussions on how to support the well-being of their team.</li>
<li>Most importantly, these conversations offer managers the opportunity to make mistakes and learn to lead with empathy.</li>
</ul>

Developing empathy skills

While the roles of managers have expanded, roles and teams are not structured to support well-being.
Managers are more motivated to be empathic when they have a support system. Goodway Groups, a fully remote company, acknowledges that distributed teams face greater challenges with communication and shared visibility. They created a team success partner whose duties include fostering trust and psychological safety and supporting team health. Managers work with the team success partners.

Empower a new manager by creating a support network

Managers are overburdened by the demands of the changing work environment. Actions that focus on empathy is time-consuming.
In recognising the pressure on managers to maintain team connectedness in a remote environment, leaders should rebalance their managers' workload. Managers should prioritise their workload to focus on fewer, higher-impact relationships with individuals and teams.

Create manager capacity for empathy

Managers need a new set of skills to succeed in a world of remote work, automation, and shifting employee expectations.

Career

What Does It Mean to Be a Manager Today?

The Xerox 914 copy machine of 1959 is a great breakthrough in office technology and product design. Its hallmark was simplicity: You simply paced your paper on glass and pressed a button.
How Chester Carlson invented it is a story of risk and persistence. As with most innovation, it took decades from having an idea to making it a real product in the marketplace.

The Xerox 914 is a story we can learn from

<ul>
<li>Carlson worked at Bell Labs in the 1930s in the patent department. He had multiple ideas for different inventions. However, he focused on copying because typing on two sheets of paper with a carbon paper in between was messy and frustrating.</li>
<li>Carlson was fired in 1933 during the Great Depression. By 1936 he had a new job and also went to night school to study law. To relax, he read books on science and learned about Pál Selényi’s work on electrostatic images.</li>
</ul>

Chester Carlson focuses on a copying invention

Carlson did chemical experiments in his own home, to the frustration of his family and neighbours. He mad smelly compounds, melting sulfur over zinc plates in the kitchen smelling like rotten eggs, and once even starting a fire.
Carlson used Selényi’s ideas (more or less to use light to remove static charge, not create it) and his own. After many experiments, he had a breakthrough and created the first copy in 1938.

Chester Carlson used Pál Selényi's ideas

<ul>
<li>Once patented, Carlson was turned down by 20 companies between 1939 and 1944, including IBM and the U.S. Navy.</li>
<li>Carlson continued to work in patents at the P.R. Mallory Company and demonstrated his work to an engineer from Battelle, who was there to testify for a patent case. Batelle was impressed and offered financial support.</li>
<li>In 1946 they signed a deal with Haloid (later renamed Xerox). In 1948 they released the Xerox Model A Copier that took 39 steps to make a single copy.</li>
</ul>

Chester Carlson get financial support

Another decade of development produced the Xerox 914 - named because it could copy paper up to 9″ x 14″. This model was simple to use and didn&#39;t damage originals.
As with most new tech, it had some problems. It tended to overheat and often came with a fire extinguisher. The machines required a small team of people who maintained them. But relative to competitors, it was a breakthrough in many ways.

Further development of the copy machine

Lessons from the Xerox-914: the first real copy machine

"Anyone can steer the ship when the sea is calm."

Just like a chain is only as good as its weakest link, a product or service is only as good as they are when they malfunction or break.
We all are programmed to focus on the winning streak, skyrocketing valuation, and great success. What is more instructive and enlightening is to observe what happens during the rough times.

When Things Go Well

From a customer's standpoint, the reputation of a company is made or broken during the time there is a problem or a crisis.
If a faulty product or service results in endless customer care calls that lead nowhere or jumping legal loops, then the customers will take their business to some other company.

How Companies Behave During Crises

<ul>
<li>Companies prove their real worth when they adapt themselves to changing market conditions during a financial crisis.</li>
<li>Companies which pivot themselves and take care of their employees, customers and stakeholders are the ones that thrive.</li>
<li>If they are raising CEO bonuses and firing their own employees when the chips are down, they are not to be trusted.</li>
</ul>

Decisions During A Financial Crisis

Leaders who are at the helm during pandemics, natural disasters, wars, economic crises are the ones which handled the turbulent waters with their grit and resilience. 
An empathic leader who provides reassurance, comfort and security during times of uncertainty is the one to bank on.

Leadership During Uncertainty And Fear

<ul>
<li>If your spouse stood by you during your jobless months, when there were uncertainty and stress all around, then the relationship is worth its salt. Anyone can stand beside a successful person during a good time.</li>
<li>How a partner is treated during a bitter argument is something that is remembered, not during a holiday at the beach.</li>
<li>Even the boss would remember how you toiled and ground yourself during a stressful project, not when all was smooth sailing.</li>
</ul>

Relationships When Things Go Bad

Our worst day is a chance to show our best qualities, and to stand out.
What we do during the times of turmoil and crisis cannot be faked. It’s when the real ‘us’ is out there in the open, for all to witness. One cannot stall or cook up an excuse when the problem is up close and personal. Our plans, preparations and behaviours show how much we care for our loved ones, and the people who depend on us.

We Are As Good As Our Worst Day

You're Only As Good As Your Worst Day

Managers who can expand their imaginations to see a wider range of possible futures will be much better positioned to take advantage of the unexpected opportunities that appear.By identifying basic trends and uncertainties, a manager can construct a series of scenarios that will help to compensate for decision-making errors from overconfidence and tunnel vision. That’s what scenario planning does.

Scenario Planning

References 1. C. Cerf and V. Navasky, The Experts Speak (New York: Pantheon Books, 1984). 2. P.J.H. Schoemaker and C.A.J.M. van de Heijden, "Integrating Scenarios into Strategic Planning at Royal Dutch/Shell," Planning Review 20 (1992): 41-46. 3. C. Sunter, The World and South Africa in the 1990's (Cape Town, South Africa: Human and Rousseau Tafelberg, 1987).

Scenario Planning: A Tool for Strategic Thinking

Workplace personality tests are used to sort people according to various thinking styles, such as into/extroversion and thinking/feeling. Many psychologists feel that the theory behind the different categories fails to predict performance or to find high-performing candidates. Some critics even claim that it is a pseudoscience.

Testing for workplace personality

Recently, six traits were identified that are consistently linked to workplace success: Conscientiousness, adjustment, ambiguity acceptance, curiosity, courage, and competitiveness.Each trait may have drawbacks at extremes. The relative importance of each trait will be determined by the job you are doing. Knowing the traits can also aid in personal development so that you can identify your own strengths and weaknesses and the ways you may account for them.

Traits and workplace success

Conscientious people are committed to plans and ensure they carry them out accurately. They consider the wisdom of their decisions for the long-term.They are essential for strategic planning but can be too rigid.

Conscientiousness

People with high adjustment can cope well with anxieties under pressure. Stress doesn't negatively influence their behavior and decision-making.People with low scores on this scale can suffer from poor performance at work, but reframing a stressful situation as a potential for growth can help.

Adjustment

People with a high tolerance for ambiguity can take in many viewpoints before coming to a decision. They find it easier to react to changes and to cope with complex problems.People with a low ambiguity tolerance may be dictatorial, but this can be useful when a more ordered approach is needed.

Ambiguity acceptance

People with this trait are more creative and flexible and learn more easily. But, in excess, curiosity may lead to moving from project to project without completing any of them.

Curiosity

People with this trait prefer to avoid potentially unpleasant confrontations. Dealing with difficult situations in the face of opposition is critical for management positions.

Risk approach (or courage)

Competitiveness can be a powerful motivation that leads you to go the extra mile.At worst, it can lead to unhealthy jealousy of others.

Competitiveness

We're bidding farewell to 2018 with some of BBC Capital's greatest hits from over the last year. With these compelling stories, indispensable tips and expert insight, you'll be ready to make 2019 the best it can be. Are you curious, conscientious and competitive?

The secrets of the 'high-potential' personality

We all make decisions. However, few of us realize that the process we use to make decisions is more important than the analysis we put into the decision.
A McKinsey Quarterly survey pointed out that 60 percent of executives thought that bad decisions were as frequent as good decisions.

The quality of our decisions

When it comes to decisions, organizations rely on gathering data and analyzing the decision. People believe that analysis reduces biases, but most business decisions made this way turned out to be poor decisions.
Research shows that good analysis from managers who have good judgment won't necessarily produce good decisions.

Analysis doesn't always lead to good decisions

Analysis alone does not yield good decisions as the people who put it together have a subconscious bias and interest in a particular outcome.
Instead, a disciplined decision process involves guarding against decision-making biases by exploring and discussing major uncertainties or discussing contradictory viewpoints.

Bite-sized knowledge
to upgrade
your career

Rebecca L.
@rebbll

5 Tips in Communicating Organizational Change

Want to Build Better Leaders? Focus on Mindset, Skills, Knowledge

Employees are reassessing their values. So should companies

Adjacent skills

What Does It Mean to Be a Manager Today?

Bite-sized knowledgeto upgradeyour career

Rebecca L.@rebbll

5 Tips in Communicating Organizational Change

Want to Build Better Leaders? Focus on Mindset, Skills, Knowledge

Employees are reassessing their values. So should companies

Adjacent skills

What Does It Mean to Be a Manager Today?

Bite-sized knowledge
to upgrade
your career

Rebecca L.
@rebbll