Leverage Critical Thinking to Make Change Management Inquiries

Digital is all about rapid changes, blurred functional, business or industry territories, or expanded organizational horizons, It is a continuous journey to adapt to the new world of businesses, faster, always on, hyper-connected, interdependent, and fiercely competitive. It’s important to leverage critical thinking to make Change Management inquiries. The following questions should be answered before any change is started, but they should also be validated and perhaps adjusted "every day" of the change journey as the current situation and its net value changes. The insight-driven digital transformation can create synchronization of all functions running seamlessly.

What's the current situation and the future if it's not changed? Change is the new normal. In the digital era, any business can be at risk for survival at any minute due to continuous digital disruptions. Greater awareness of some critical issues can provide insights from a hidden part of the organization that might actually help to fine-tune change objectives and increase inclusiveness of influential individuals or groups. Make sure there is dissatisfaction with the current situation. People who make up the organization must see a compelling need to change from risky practices, obsolete ideas, or outdated processes and do so proactively before issues materialize. Organizations could miss the opportunity if they get stuck in the comfort zone, only focus on operations in low-risk territories and incremental enhancements only. Change impact analysis and business readiness are two key processes that need to be conducted to give the management a glimpse of what’s the current situation and the future if it’s not changed. Coach people to shift from the belief that change is "loss" to a belief that change leads to "growth" and growth leads to organizational viability, relevance, and long-term prosperity.

What's the vision (future situation) and the net value of this in the future if there is a change? Change happens seamlessly when change is easier than maintaining the status quo. Change leaders must have a clear vision about change, not vision clouded and distorted by rosy colored glasses or narrow-minded perspectives, and the net value of change in the future if there is a change. The range of emerging digital technologies foster a deeper sense of vision and digital connections to changes,when people enjoy learning, spend more time on creativity. Generally speaking, the key driving factors of transformative changes are organizational culture reinvention, information management optimization or innovation, etc. Digital transformation is a journey and needs a clarified vision, a larger strategic investment, and a step-wise change scenario.

What's the robustly trustworthy plan to change from the current situation to the future situation? Change is never for its own sake, there are both hard values that can be measured by dollars of cost saving or improving efficiency and soft values such as culture innovation and employee satisfaction. From digital transformation perspective, change is simply a shift from the “Old Way - Chaos - New Way” to do things. Change is inevitable, but the success rate of change is very low, especially for the large scale of digital transformation. Changes are best when they do not look like changes. Enabling and motivating teams to select the best options and providing framework or tools help organizations align all the options from all teams so that organizations can leap forward as a "natural outcome" of every individual's effort. It is important to apply simplicity as a management principle, sometimes Change Management needs to be changed when necessary in pursuit of simplicity. Change Management needs to make the robustly trustworthy plan, allow the cross-functional change community to have a voice for feedback, build strong relationships with stakeholders, in order to change from the current situation to the future situation.

We are living in a complex world in which changes and conflicts are continuously changing and that make it impossible to have complete knowledge and understanding of many issues facing the business today. Change Management is both science and art. Clearly identify where you want to be once the change is complete. Leading businesses across the vertical sectors are the ones that can adapt to the digital new normal and manage the proactive change continuum smoothly.

Posted in: Change Management,Leadership Master,Leading by Questioning,Mindshift,Thinkingaire