What can a sheep teach you about leading change?

By Mark Vincent

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If you’ve ever tried implementing big changes in the corporate world, you’ll know it can be a highly challenging and stressful experience demanding every ounce of your personal attention…and some!

So how can you make the business change easier and less stressful both for you and those involved in or impacted by it?

Well firstly, this is not a new problem…Niccolò Machiavelli wrote in The Prince, published in 1532:

There is nothing more difficult to take in hand, more perilous to conduct, or more uncertain in its success, than to take the lead in the introduction of a new order of things.

Studies consistently show real success rates for business change between 10 and 30%, depending on your definition of success. This can place a real toll on leaders, trying to keep things moving forward so that the time and money invested yields the expected returns, whether it’s new technology, streamlining, or reorganising.

Leaders often find themselves investing a huge amount of time in meetings, one-to-ones, resolving differences, dealing with issues, and generally troubleshooting to ensure progress is made. For many, the meetings alone can be overwhelming, with little time in between to even reflect or follow up properly on the actions.

Alongside that they are battling other demands from above or around them, conflicting priorities and other drains on their time and that of their staff, including those who need to be focused on delivering the change.

Sound familiar?

All of this is rooted in the lack of a common cause or desire for change.

The simple fact is that the more people want a change and know the path to get there, the easier it becomes for the person leading it. And yet this is mostly lost in the day to day rush for quick results.

One of my best changes (where we delivered the seemingly impossible against a deadline none of us knew how we were going to hit) was also the easiest and least stressful. It was fun and energising for all of us involved, despite being very high profile and with high stakes and potential reputational damage if it went wrong.

I even had a major operation right in the middle of it and was literally overseeing operations from my recovery bed. Full disclosure…that was only really me wanting to show support and stroke my own ego because I knew the team had it covered.

I’ve found this link between the level of desire and the ease of outcome to be a repeating theme throughout my career and with the leaders I coach.

 

Don’t push!

One of the most significant stressors in leading change is dealing with resistance or lack of engagement from team members. When people aren’t fully on board, the entire process can suffer. It’s well known that employee resistance is a key factor in project delays, budget overruns, as well as high levels of stress, anxiety, and burnout among staff.

And the response, more often that not, is to push people using “strong governance” or other means because it feels quicker…and yes I’ve done it too!

Resistance (low adoption, slow pace, conflicting priorities are also symptoms of resistance by the way) is a sign that people feel pushed to do something they don’t really want… or at least don’t want enough to prioritise over other things on their to-do list.

That means you haven’t done the pre-work well enough of selling the change.

People will get behind an idea when they really believe in it and will achieve extraordinary things. We have plenty of examples from history such as the Civil Rights Movement, Women’s Liberation Movement, Environmental Changes, and LGBTQ+ Rights. More recently, we saw the creation of a new vaccine in just 12 months, less than 10% of the normal time taken…that happened because many people believed in it and got behind it, removing the normal barriers and constraints to make it happen.

 

Sell the emotional case for change

The examples from history and the projects that do go well are showing us the way if you look closely enough.

Sell both the need for change and the future vision in a way that really gets people emotionally. Allow them to see the human cost or cost to them of not taking action and paint a picture of the future that really excites them and creates a real sense of optimism.

In other words, ensure they really feel the need to move and have a compelling place to move to. One that’s worth the time, effort, and risk involved in changing.

I used to live next to a farm. My kids were quite young at the time and I noticed that the sheep had been lambing, so I took my kids around for a closer look at the cute lambs. My neighbour, Tim, said, “Great that you’re here, I need help getting this one into the barn because she’s struggling and needs assistance.”

So we all lined up to act like sheepdogs…

..a complete disaster, of course, and that sheep made fools of all of us. After having spent longer with that futile approach than we should have, I happened to remember something I’d seen Tim do before and said to him, “Let’s try rattling the food bucket next to the barn door?” I think you can guess what happened next…she ran straight in through the door on her own!

Many projects and changes end up being more like chasing that sheep around and needlessly so. If you want to make change easier and less stressful, start by positioning it from the point of view of those you need on board, whether it’s employees,

directors, shareholders, or other stakeholders such as unions or suppliers.

If you start with what they want and what really matters to them, you may find they walk there on their own and your job then gets so much easier.

I’d love to hear about your experiences of leading change and how you plan to use the time saved in meetings, resolving detailed issues or chasing to keep on top of things. Leave a comment below and share your insights.

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