Solutions: What to Do in Each Room Here are some general guidelines to help you manage yourself and others as you navigate the four rooms of change. Although broad, the OED team has found them remarkably valid and helpful in timing change management activities for healthy individual and organizational development. The solutions below are Weisbords recommendations with minor embellishments from us. In the organization translates some of those into an organizational context. In Contentment: No need to do anything but carry on maintaining and tuning the system. In the organization: This is the status quo, which in our changing society and workplace implies a certain continuous learning and continuous improvement of the status quo. Making time for periodic check-ins to see how the organization inside and out is doing is a good health maintenance practice that will lessen the chances of being blindsided by change. In Denial: Share information calmly. Dont force advice (youll only deepen the resistance of denial). In the organization: By definition, one is unable find oneself in the depths of denial -- but youll recognize it as you emerge from it. So the strategy here applies most practically to helping others in denial. A typical first instinct when dealing with a person or group in denial is either to not bother with them, or knock them over the head to wake them up. The former is too subtle and the latter too harsh -- neither will fit through the barely open cracks of awareness of those in denial. In a real life example, people might withhold information from a leaders likely angry reaction, so the problem grows and the leader and group chime in too little and too late in responding to the change. They may make it through, but far less gracefully and effectively than if they had followed Weisbords advice not to force things on someone in denial, but to share information and create an environment where input is welcome. In Confusion: Get people together. Share information. Focus on short term goals. In the organization: These strategies are simple and practical. In Confusion, everyone is talking, imagining, wondering. Some are dreading. Eighty-five percent of the information that circulates in the Confusion Room is smoke with no substance. Much of it is rumor built upon rumor (think of the game of telephone, where people in a circle whisper a message from person to person and discover by the time it completes the circle that a far different, often amusing, message has emerged). Getting people together helps them stay grounded, test information, and contribute ideas. Focusing on short term goals helps sustain the commitment to current clients and activities that remain at the core of the organization. In Renewal: Give people some structure and let them put the new together. In the organization: The promise and perils of the Renewal Room are often illustrated during retreats. In the prioritizing activities of some retreats, an energizing initiative comes to the fore. Then the meeting ends. If it ends without an action plan, the whole result is at risk -- and the group will probably settle for much less than that envisioned at the height of the meeting. Too structured an action plan is also risky, since people can feel excluded (especially those outside the room), or the invitation to be bold in responding can be squelched. Your target is a promising solution that will challenge and stimulate people to be energized AND create enough structure to channel that energy into results. Recall one other caveat from the Room of Renewal -- having emerged from the waves of confusion into this more buoyant place, it can be tempting to declare victory and abandon this change effort to go battle other change efforts that are still stuck in late denial or confusion. Do that and you will be pulled back into confusion. Bring it home first by keeping your focus on action and results.
Posted on: Fri, 08 Aug 2014 18:13:01 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015