Have you ever had an employee who has made it clear that they will risk everything (even their job) rather than comply with a new work procedure? You have probably tried to explain how much better off they would be by doing so, but they just don’t get the message. Chances are that they are resisting because you are challenging deeply held beliefs and values.
Why cultural change is difficult
In civilised societies, people constantly and unconsciously comply with the values and beliefs of a common culture and it is this compliance that maintains the society. We don’t need to be told not to steal from our friend or hurt our neighbour; we just know that it is wrong. And, if somebody were to try and make us do either, naturally we would refuse. Organizations similarly develop cultures made up of values and beliefs about how people should behave. Employees associate these values and beliefs with the organisation’s success and don’t need to be told what to do or what not to do to comply with the culture. As long as the culture remains relevant, the organisation benefits – managers are relieved of much of the work associated with controlling or directing staff. However, if the environment in which the organisation is operating changes, the culture can become dysfunctional.
Employees in a dysfunctional culture will then persist in applying old (and irrelevant) strategies to new problems, denying their obsolescence and blaming external causes and individuals for their failure, rather than violate the culture. Left unchecked, this behaviour can continue until the culture causes the organisation to die rather than adapt.
Cultural change therefore will not occur as a result of an educative, counselling approach. Rather, it involves the creation of a new system of values and beliefs that allow the organisation to perform.
Many organisations are re-designed or restructured, on the assumption that this is all that is needed to achieve major change. If the organisation has a dysfunctional culture, and the culture is left unchecked, a phenomenon known as ‘spring-back’ occurs – that is, that people simply continue to act as they had under the old structure, regardless of their new titles and reporting lines.
However, once a culture is successfully changed, the new volunteer mindset it creates relieves management of a piecemeal struggle to reform possibly hundreds of management and/or work practices. This represents an enormous saving of valuable resources.
Transformational leadership
A transformational leader brings about cultural change by ‘leading the organisation toward a new, broader view of the world’. What distinguishes these ‘transformational’ leaders from others is their use of symbolic management to relieve the anxiety that makes employees cling to the irrelevant strategies of the culture. The leader's role in doing so is more akin to that of an evangelist than it is to an educator. The key to their success is their passionate commitment to a new vision of the organisation’s future and their ability to share that vision with all employees. While we cannot all become transformational leaders overnight, these leaders have been studied closely so the good news is that managers can now learn and practise the skills that have enabled these leaders to bring about change.
The cultural change process
Before the change process can occur, there must be a 'felt need for change' by key leaders in the organisation to stir the organisation out of complacency. Where the culture is heavily entrenched, destabilisation may be needed to shake employees out of their complacency and ‘feel’ the need for change. This destabilisation generates resistance to change. The transformational leader overcomes this resistance largely by the process described below:
Initially they identify and develop the organisation's distinctive competencies and channel resources to where they can be most effective. This identification of competencies also allows the organisation to focus on its new markets and the organisational changes required to serve those markets. The organisation is often redesigned (or restructured) during this stage.
As the change progresses the leader mobilises commitment to the change by assisting staff through the painful process of letting go of the old and adopting the new. He/she does this by:
- Engaging staff by involving them in the development of change strategies,
- Demonstrating how the new vision will meet their individual needs (e.g. for job security or professional development),
- Modelling the new behaviours he/she needs them to adopt, and,
- Using early successes in some parts of the organisation to reinforce further change.
Symbolic gestures such as public statements about the change, awards or parties to celebrate or launch a new strategy can also be helpful at this stage.
Finally the change is institutionalised by building it in to the management processes, structure and reward systems of the organisation.
Line managers and cultural change
Although the most publicised cases of cultural change attribute much to the leadership shown by the organisation’s Chief Executive, line managers also play a very significant role in leading change.
There is now strong research supporting the fact that employees are more strongly influenced by their direct manager than by senior managers or executives. I have often noted that very different cultures can exist across Business Units within a larger organisation. On investigation, I have invariably found that this difference is due to the values and attitudes of each Unit Manager. In my experience, a line manager always influences the culture of his/her unit. What must be recognised is that employees will copy his or her behaviour whether that behaviour is functional or dysfunctional.
I have also found that despite the common claim that cultural change is not possible unless the CEO exhibits all the traits of a transformational leader, this is plainly not the case. The Vision Statement in most organisations that I have dealt with has not come from the CEO alone but from a team of managers who are at least as equally committed to its realisation. True, a charismatic CEO walking the talk does make it easier, but as long as the CEO is not acting inconsistently with the vision, much of the leadership role can be taken over by managers in the organisation.
Line managers should note that all of the behaviours of transformational leaders listed above could be implemented just as well within a business unit as across the whole organisation.
Transformational leadership versus planning and performance management
I have often been asked to compare the effectiveness of transformational leadership and planning and performance management in bringing about change. My response is that both have an important role to play.
Transformational leadership generates an emotional response to change; employees change their behaviour because they want the change to succeed.
Planning and Performance Management plays a vital role in institutionalising the change: Strategic Planning ensures that Strategic Goals recognise further environmental change and Business and Individual Performance Planning and Reporting align the efforts of each staff member to support their achievement.