Business Change Manager Video Series: Change Players - What are they?
We are all Change Players, but what type of Change Player are we?
We use the term to identify and classify what type of person someone is when they interact with a change, how they take on board different information, and how receptive they are to this.
Various organisations and frameworks use different labels for this, but in our experience, it helps to keep this simple and broad, classifying people into 3 groups:
Positive:
These are your enthusiasts and can be visionaries, immediately can seeing the benefits of a change and buy into it. They are your champions and sponsors who want the change, who encourage and push for it.
This group is instrumental in driving and engaging their colleagues, so you must identify them quickly and provide them with the information they need in terms of training, marketing material or Q & A support.
Neutral:
Dependent on the change that’s occurring, most people identify with this group. (If the majority are negative you have a significant barrier to the success of your project).
They are typically people who follow the lead of those around them, however, they need to understand what’s in it for them, and be communicated with accordingly so they’re aware of how their roles may change and benefit from the coming change.
As a group, you need to get in front of them repeatedly and communicate with them to ensure they get the messaging that corresponds with their persona and resulting in the understanding of what’s in it for them.
Negative:
This group can be quite passive-aggressive and are sometimes known as saboteurs, sometimes unfairly, sometimes not, these types of people are all about resisting change.
Often, they are negative about a project, but once convinced that a change is necessary, can become one of the strongest supporters of a project.
For example, we once held a workshop where a negative person came in, sat down arms-crossed, and it was clear he was completely against the project and almost hostile in his approach. After giving him an overview, listening to him, and allowing him to ask all his questions and answering them in a positive, constructive manner he became extremely enthusiastic. So much in fact that he became a champion in his area for the project.
As Business Change Managers, we must understand people in this category, so we can understand why they feel this way. It can highlight issues that need special attention and serve as a spotlight as to where problems and resistance might be.
Given this, the negative group can often be very useful to a Business Change Manager, as they are an excellent feedback mechanism for the wider group. They will almost certainly take on any known issues the group has to a change and be the flag bearers in raising these or resisting the change because of them.
To bring about a successful change it is imperative to any change adoption project to move people from the negative, or neutral camps to the positive camp.
How do you do this?
Apart from using a variety of assessments and tools we will introduce later, there are fundamentals you can address to help this process forward by:
Knowing who they are. This is often overlooked, just knowing who is in which category is extremely useful information. It allows you to target and focus your attention as appropriate.
Understanding why they feel that way.Before someone can be convinced to change their opinion, you need to understand what they believe and why they feel the way they do. Once that is achieved you can prepare appropriate information to convince them as to why they need to come along with a change, and how they will benefit.
Communicating with them in a way that they’re receptive to.People take on information in a variety of different ways and knowing which way to use when and to whom, is crucial to making an impact.Entire companies can ignore a change if they are not communicated with appropriately, so it is vital that you understand your audience and how they take on board information.
Listening to people and taking on board their feedback. Almost certainly the people involved in a change happening within a company know more about the company, and its processes and ways of working then you do.As such their feedback is vital to you as it allows you to cater to them addressing their concerns and showing them, you are engaging with them. This alone is often enough to convince people to get more involved.
Understanding the social fabric of an organisation.This is an overlooked option which you should take full advantage of to influence people through Champions, Connectors, and Hubs. Understanding who surrounds people allows us to educate them and in an indirect way influence people to move them into the positive camp.
By leveraging all this knowledge and exciting the right people in the right way you can focus your energies on key individuals and decrease resistance to a change, and so convince large groups of people to get behind a change, learn about it, and massively improve your chance of bringing your people along on the change journey.
If you would like to learn more, please listen to the podcast here:
https://simplifychange.podbean.com/e/change-players-%e2%80%93-what-are-they/ or watch the video above.
Listen to Nicola talk all about the Change Players on her podcast: Tales from the Trenches of Change Management.
(Click the image to access the podcast)