- Assessing where we are now
- Creating & Executing a change plan - which way should we proceed?
- Sustaining the changes
1. Assessing where we are now
ABC Co, with sales of around £20m, was acquired in 2000. The new owners wanted to implement a continuous improvement initiative, quickly, not only to add value, but to move the company on, as it had apparently started to 'rest on its laurels'.
The company was previously part of a much larger group, which was split-up and sold. It had now become a stand-alone company, which required a certain amount of restructuring to provide the infrastructure that the previous parent company had provided. The average length of employee service was 15 years+.
We expressed concern that the employees could see a continuous improvement initiative as an imposition, representing some sort of hidden agenda on the part of the new management. Essentially, the culture wasn't receptive to the desired ways of working that the new management team were eager to implement.
We proposed an organisational culture assessment, which was accepted with some hesitation - "Why do we need to find out where we are? We just want to get on and do it."
The cultural assessment showed that Leadership & communications within the organisation were going to be the two main barriers to change. The organisation was seen as being a highly sociable place to work by the employees, but not very market focused. An action plan to improve the organisational climate was created with the management team. The management team decided that they would implement these actions.
Over the next year, or so, we kept in touch. Reports from the management team were initially that the changes were going well, but this changed to not so well. We proposed a review meeting, which was held 16 months after the original culture assessment. From what was being said, and a review of the actions that had been taken, it was clear that the implementation momentum hadn't been maintained, largely because the management team were stretched with the commercial challenges of the business, and had little time to attend to improvements and changes.
A second culture assessment revealed that the employees had seen the company become much more market focused, driven by the management team. Employee perceptions were that Leadership had improved quite significantly, and communications had improved slightly. What was highly significant was that the employees had less commitment towards the company than eighteen months earlier, and found the company a less sociable place to work.
One conclusion that could be drawn from this is that it is not surprising that the employees find the company a less sociable place to work, as they are the long-serving employees, which some may refer to as 'dyed in the wool', and as a result their commitment to the company had fallen.
However, as in most cultural assessments, it is necessary to conduct a thorough analysis, to avoid making 'snap' judgements. Upon further investigation, it was found that employee turnover had accelerated over the past three years to the point that only 40% of the original workforce remained.
What had actually happened, in our view, since the changes were first implemented was that the management team had 'bulldozed' some changes through, and with others, the momentum had petered-out. As a result, employees felt less and less involved, somewhat confused, and less committed to the company, despite seeing it become a more market-focused organisation. In summary, the management team had left the employees behind on the change journey.
2. Creating & Executing a change plan - which way should we proceed?
DEF Co operated from three separate, but interdependent sites. The owner of this private company had seen profits eroded by competition, into a loss situation, and wanted the organisation to become more efficient, to save costs, and to resore profits. He had some ideas of his own as how this might be achieved, but was undecided. As he is a person who is very considered in his decision-making, this ambiguity didn't sit well with him.
We conducted an organisational culture assessment of the entire organisation, site, by site, and presented back our findings and proposals to the owner, and the site directors.
Each of the sites, not surprisingly, had separate cultures. What was interesting though, was the degree of difference between them, and how these differences were a source of organisational conflict. Each site had 'stories' which they told about each of the other sites. Communications were seen as being quite poor, and ambiguous. Apart from the geographical differences, which were a source of inefficiency (transport costs and delays), cultural differences were compounding this. Each site had its own 'vocabulary' and own agenda, these being a source of communications problems between the sites, which further led to distrust, delays, and extended lead times.
The findings of the cultural assessment crystallized the owner's thoughts. The three sites were consolidated onto one. During a recent conversation, we have been told that the company is back on track.
3. Sustaining the changes
GHI Co implemented LEAN Continuous Improvement (C.I.) techniques early in 2003. After training in the tools & techniques of Lean, the office-based team leaders had been encouraged to run C.I. meetings with their teams. This they did with a high degree of initial enthusiasm, from what we understand.
After about 6 months, it became apparent that most of the improvements that the team leaders had instigated, with the participation of their teams, had failed to 'stick'. The senior management team felt that the reason for the lack of progress was that the team leaders weren't fully conversant with the tools and techniques of Lean, and that they needed retraining.
Ambiance Consulting was invited to propose a solution. We were familiar with the situation; the early successes of continuous improvements not being sustained, or worse still, evaporating altogether. Although we recognised that the team leaders would benefit from some retraining in the LEAN tools and techniques, we were pretty certain that it was more about managing change at the team, or work-group level. We submitted a proposal to deliver a two-day workshop that focussed on the interpersonal aspects of managing the implementation of C.I. This included role-play, where the team leaders could practise the necessary people management techniques, in conjunction with the C.I. tools and techniques in a safe and risk-free environment.
Our proposal was accepted and we delivered the training workshop in March 2004. Feedback from the team leaders about the workshop:
"I felt the workshop went well, interactive and very relevant to personal development."
"Two very useful days gaining experience to deal with people and problems."
"It reinforced my confidence...."
"Gave me more tools to work with the team."
We are now in discussions with GHI Co concerning an on-going programme to continue to support the team leaders, helping them get over the obstacles that they will inevitably encounter in the future.