When Leaders Resist

In December I attended a workshop on Creating a Lean Culture. The focus of the discussion was on what Toyota has done to establish a culture of continuous improvement in its operations. While Toyota has developed a unique culture (despite the recent recalls), it is difficult to translate the Toyota Way into other organizational contexts. This is particularly true for the companies that are implementing Lean or Six Sigma concepts in existing, reasonably successful companies or operating units. Yet the question among the workshop attendees was often not “What should we be doing?” but rather, “What do you do when a leader resists?”

It often appears and it’s certainly conventional wisdom that whether the change in lean, six sigma, a new IT system, or a benefits change, some leaders and managers will resist the change. When it’s the successful, seasoned mid-level leaders, it can be extraordinarily difficult to bring them around. This article speaks to a few strategies that can prove useful in breaking down the resistance and inviting these leaders to join the change. While the example is a lean implementation, I encourage you to rewrite this story with the change that is underway in your organization.

Meet Larry. Larry is a plant manager. He’s been at this facility for 15 years, the last 7 as plant manager. He’s successfully managed or led the plant through capital projects, labor negotiations, environmental incidents, seasons of sold-out production and full line shutdowns. The plant safety scores are continuously improving and he regularly meets his cost reduction targets. Larry is well-respected at his plant, within in his community, by his peers and by the business head. Having outlived most of the corporate programs, he’s expecting to do it again with this change.

Larry’s a smart guy. He’s joined the tours to “best practice” facilities. He’s read the articles. He’s listened to the successes, challenges and failures of his colleagues who’ve moved forward with the changes. He doesn’t argue that it won’t work. He doesn’t block the consultants from running their workshops. He even gives one of his people, perhaps not one of his stars, the role of project lead, and dutifully reports at the quarterly reviews the work that is going on at the plant. Yet everyone knows that that little is actually happening.

Larry may be someone you know, or you may need to influence people like Larry. I invite you to read the rest of this article to identify some strategies for working with Larry. If none of its working for you, or you’ve lost patience, give me a call and we can talk about how I can I support you in developing new strategies, or I can work directly with Larry in moving through the change.

As mentioned before, Larry is smart guy and he’s seen and heard all of the evidence. Nonetheless, as organizations frequently made up of engineers and accountants, we fall back on trying to move him with either 1) evidence or 2) management “persuasion”. Consider how ineffective solid evidence is in changing many behaviors, such as, flossing, exercise, smoking, speeding, etc. While evidence of the value of a change is critically important, the most compelling evidence to a person if what they experience. Larry’s evidence is that he’s been successful, is successful, and believes that he knows how to continue to be successful. Furthermore, Larry knows that his past success has involved avoiding these “passing fads”.

Before considering useful strategies, we want to begin with recasting the resistance. In 1999, Dent and Goldberg in “Challenging A Resistance to Change” argue that accepting the conventional wisdom that people naturally resist change leads to counter-productive behaviors. Instead of looking at ways to overcome resistance (read more in my last newsletter) , we’ll explore ways to influence behavior.

1. It’s too big, too much or unclear. Look to the success stories to identify for the “vital behaviors” – the smallest set of behaviors that will have the greatest impact. These are not thoughts, values, or qualities, but the very few “must do’s” that done consistently and persistently will lead to change. For more on Vital Behaviors see Influencer by Patterson, Grenny, et al.
2. People resist loss, not change. In the SCARF model suggested by David Rock (Your Brain at Work), apparent resistant may come from feared changes in Status, Control, Autonomy, Relatedness, or Fairness. Explore and acknowledge what people may lose. Once the fears are identified, opportunities arise to address the fear, alter the change to minimize the impact, or allow the person to set aside the fear and proceed.
3. Unclear alignment with personal goals. Support people in uncovering their goals and how the change fits in with them. Perhaps Larry is motivated by seeing teams get energized – show how your change will make that happen. Maybe Larry wants to keep things quiet until retirement, so taking a risk and working hard isn’t motivating; can he see this as leaving a legacy? Spend time on the values, goal and purpose looking for the places of alignment.
4. “You’re not listening.” Ford and Ford in Harvard Business Review April 2009 remind us to look at resistance as feedback. Focus on the purpose of the change and invite discussion, engagement, involvement and even refusal as you refine the change effort.
5. Plan for a marathon, not a sprint. New behaviors are often not easy and take time to become comfortable. People will experience challenges from others and from existing systems, and so need ongoing support. Unexpected roadblocks will arise. Build support teams, provide regular communications, celebrate what’s working, and add fun into the change.

It often seems like most people are not wired for change; yet the reality is that we are marvelously equipped to accept, adapt to and adopt change. It is a reality of all elements of our lives – in our homes, in our family life, in our education, in our careers, in our economics, in our jobs. We may not always respond rationally to a change, but then doesn’t that in itself, give us clues on what strategies may begin to influence behavior.

For help working with leaders who are (apparently) resisting change, send me an email at Sherry@ReadSolutionsGroup.com or leave a comment on the posting.

Four Rooms of Change

I had the opportunity to listen to Kenny Moore, the Monk from "The CEO and the Monk" speak. He introduced the "Four Rooms of Change Theory" developed by Claes Janssen. While similar to other change models, this one offers some imagery that may be useful in conversations with managers. As with all models, it has some limitations.

The premise is that all systems - individuals, teams, communities, organizations - live in a within a space of four rooms; often referred to as a 4 room apartment. The rooms within this apartment are Contentment, Denial, Confusion and Renewal. According to Moore, people move from one room to the next when 1) they are ready, 2) life invites them, and 3) reality kicks them.

When we look at this model in the context of organizational change, its very simplicity enables its use with management teams. It is easy to relate each room to life experiences, as Janssen and his collaborators have done.

What makes the model interesting for these discussions is the premise that people move of their own accord. As leaders, we can not push, pull, threaten or entice people from one room to the next. We can, however, work to "keep the doors open".

As we look more deeply at this model, we begin to notice the following questions:
1. How do people behave in each room?
2. What are the most effective leadership tools aligned with the behaviors each room?
3. If every room is a necessary part of the change, what is the value of each room?
4. Is there a way to "decorate" or light each room that makes it a safe place?
5. How do we keep the doors open? Are there different strategies for different rooms?
6. What organizational systems and structures keep doors open? Which ones shut doors?
7. Is it true that the best thing that leaders can do is keep the doors open, and not push, pull, threaten or entice?

If you've used this model, I invite your comments and thoughts. I'll use future blog posts to delve into my questions.

People resist loss, not change

So much is written about why employees resist change. Yet it takes little time to find research supporting the concept that resistance is an interpretation of the situation from the eyes of the change agent. In fact, most people recognize that change is inevitable - a reality of life.

What people might resist is loss - loss of status, loss of certainty, loss of control, etc. Or perhaps they are mistrustful - whether of the message or the messenger.

What will the change agent see when they expect resistance to change? What will they miss when they focus their efforts on overcoming resistance to change?

Creating Catalysts

Would you like to see your leaders creating breakthrough shifts in how the work is done? Would you like to see them consistently and naturally drawing together teams from all parts of the business to develop new and creative solutions? Would you like to see your leaders developing new ways for people to work together? Would you like to see your leaders routinely evaluating their own assumptions and working to understand the work through differing perspectives?
Leaders who operate in these modes are Catalysts … catalysts for change. Whether driving LEAN manufacturing through an organization, moving into new markets, or integrating acquisitions, Catalysts have grown beyond the Achievers in their ability to bring people together to move a vision into reality.

In the preceding postings, we have been exploring a competency model for leadership outlined by Joiner and Josephs in their recent book “Leadership Agility”. This newsletter will look at the implementation of Lean manufacturing system to point out the differences in how Achievers and Catalysts might approach the same work. We’ll end by identifying development opportunities that can be used to support competency development to the Catalyst level.

Consider the premise that there is always a way “to create more value with less work.” That is the basis of the process management philosophy exemplified by the Toyota Production System and now described simply as Lean (reference http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lean_manufacturing). Let’s see if we can contrast how Lloyd, an Achiever, and Susan, a Catalyst might proceed in leading a Lean implementation.

Lloyd is energized by the opportunity to lead the Lean transformation team for his organization. He believes strongly its philosophies and practices. He’s got a proven track record of being able to diagnose and resolve problems with innovative solutions. He knows that the key to his success will be in persuading others that Lean is a key to the future of his organization.

Susan is fascinated by the successes some companies have achieved with Lean. She’s also been exploring what sets apart the best from those that aren’t succeeding. She knows that the tools and structures are important, but has recognized that the key to success is in establishing a clear vision and then getting people from all levels of the organization involved. Susan has seen that if she can create a new way of working together, people will feel excited, empowered and energized. But she also knows that there will be a lot of different opinions on the value of lean and how to implement it. She is looking forward to getting the conflicts out on the table so that the best solutions arise.

Three months into the project Lloyd is noticing that the Purchasing group is routinely not following through on their team commitment. He knows that his conversation with the Purchasing Director will be pivotal. Before the meeting, Lloyd meets with his coach to prepare for this conversation. Lloyd’s coach helps him get clear on the outcomes he is seeking and the relationship he wants to have with the Purchasing Director. In the meeting, he is able to gain a better perspective on the challenges in Purchasing, while reminding the Purchasing Director of the management attention this project is getting. He leaves with agreement to Purchasing will live up to their commitments.

While initially engaged in the work, Susan is noticing that the production planning group is resisting some of the initiatives. In reflecting on an earlier conversation with the Production Planning Manager, she realizes that neither of them really opened up about their differing priorities and there was no real commitment; in fact, the conversation created more distrust. Susan knows that she needs to lead the Lean implementation – it’s not negotiable – but that she needs to be looking for collaboration in the solution. Susan has learned that in the upcoming conversation that she’ll need to be explicit with her key priorities and assumptions throughout the conversation, and that she’ll need to be asking the questions to learn about the priorities and assumptions in Production Planning. With awareness of her own intent and behavior throughout the conversation, Susan was able to find opportunities for joint problem solving.

Lloyd is pleased to get some feedback from his management and HR that he’s really grown into his role as a manager. His team meetings are well attended and include a comfortable balance of information sharing and problem-solving. He’s finding that he can back away from troubleshooting specific problems and spend most of his time motivating his team members, providing support, breaking down barriers, and keeping everyone moving together.

Susan believes that the best solutions come from exploring a variety of perspectives, but is concerned that her participative approach will be seen as too “soft”. With the encouragement of her coach, she has begun to experiment with her team meetings in order to find a balanced power style. She works at encouraging discussion that examines issues from different perspectives. Her team is learning that sometimes she is looking to strengthen her idea, sometimes she is looking for new ideas, sometimes she negotiate a compromise within the team to keep things moving forward, and sometimes she lets her team have their way. She is realizing that valuing input is not the same as giving up her authority to decide the direction. She also finding ways to delegate leadership to people within her team and seeing this is accelerating their development.

Reflect on the stories of Lloyd and Susan. Who would you rather have working for you? Who would you rather have as a boss? Which organization will achieve the greatest transformation?

The Catalyst level is a natural extension of the Achiever. The Achiever can be counted on to deliver results with a focus on solving the current problems and involving others through persuasion. The Catalyst is at a stage in his career when he sees the personal and organizational value in stepping out of the old ways of doing business, in building a participative team, and in finding creative ways to develop his direct reports.

To develop an Achiever to the Catalyst level, coaching will focus on the following areas:

1. Deepening awareness of beliefs, values, and assumptions about yourself and others
2. Discovering the interest in and value for helping others succeed
3. Finding out what’s important to other people and connecting with it to make a difference for them
4. Shifting from motivating and directing others to coaching and training
5. Involving others in collaborative problem solving
6. Increasing self-awareness in the moment, and learning how to adjust feelings and behaviors throughout interpersonal interactions
7. Seeking and incorporating feedback into personal development

For more information on how Sherry L. Read, Principal and Executive Coach, Read Solutions Group works with developing and senior leaders to raise their competencies, contact Sherry at Sherry@ReadSolutionsGroup.com.

The Achievers

The last posting described the Expert Leader in the following way:

The Expert Leader is a strong, tactical problem-solver; someone you love to have
on your team. You can depend on them to get the job done day after day. Yet the
Expert Leader is often so focused on being seen as right that they forget to
look at the bigger picture, or to bring other people along with them.

The Achiever combines leadership with technical capabilities in order to play on a bigger field. Let’s follow Mary from the last newsletter, on her career path to Regional Sales Manager. A few months into the job, Mary feels as though she has never worked harder in her life. There seem to be challenges with every client, personnel issues that are not being addressed, and errors being with the customer accounts. She says that she has no problem with delegation, yet it seems as though nothing is ever quite good enough for her. She wants to have real team meetings, but can barely find the time to get the work done. While Mary has been promoted, at this stage, her leadership skills remain at the Expert level.

Believing in Mary’s potential, her boss hires an executive coach. In reflecting on her desires for her leadership style, Mary tells her coach that she wants to create an environment where her team is both challenged and motivated, and where she can work on broader issues. With the support of her coach, Mary begins to schedule biweekly team meetings with the agenda focused on the key projects she has identified that will support sales throughout the region. She is seeing opportunities to use her team’s initiatives to change the sales process for the division. Mary is disciplining herself to listen more, use more questions than answers, and to choose the times when she makes the decision. Mary is making the shift to Achiever Level Leadership.

At the Achiever Level, leaders spend an increasing time delivering organizational outcomes versus solving discrete problems. They see their priority as delivering on the mandates of senior leadership and other stakeholders. The Achiever motivates his team by focusing on the larger objectives, inviting discussion, creative and healthy debate. He shifts his emphasis from managing tasks to managing people. This latter shift requires the Achiever to become more skillful and comfortable engaging in crucial conversations.

Coaching at the Achiever Level

Build self-awareness and intent: Challenge the developing achiever to explore their experiences and strengths. Ask for reflections on personal growth – “How are you changing? How are you still the same as in earlier periods of your life?” Ask the Achiever to investigate how their actions reflect their values and beliefs. Inquire into the discrepancies between stated values and observable behaviors. Support the Achiever in building a coherent set of values and beliefs that will support their development as leaders.

Develop a breadth of perspective: The Achiever develops the ability to look at problems through an adjustable lens - zooming in and out on problems – looking forward and back, over short and long intervals. Invite the Achiever to envision a range of possibilities, to be open to “a right answer” rather than “the right answer”. Encourage the Achiever to analyze situations for patterns and to use this learning to find new ways to solve old problems. Notice that the Achiever, while aware of bias and error, will still depend heavily on their own sources of data and experience, and can become quickly closed to other perspectives.

Use your team: The Achiever focuses more energy around motivating others, rather than giving orders. Question the Achiever on how she is using team meetings. – are they being used to gain buy-in and test their own ideas, or is the Achiever using the meetings to cast a wide net for new ideas? Is the team truly supportive of the leader’s direction or are there concerns and opportunities being left unsaid?

Tackle the crucial conversations: Coach the Achiever to explore the areas where they are holding back. The authors of Crucial Conversations tell us that these are conversations where the stakes are high, emotions may be high and there is an expectation of opposing opinions. Learning and practicing skills, employing them with all stakeholders, and growing with each experience is key to developing through this level.

Achievers are the key to leadership at many organizations today. They are strong at outlining their vision for an organization, at rallying the troops and executing on outcomes. They explore the landscape for changes in strategy, let go of the day-to-day, and are motivated by the success of the organization. Focusing on the behaviors above will enhance the success of the Achiever.

The Expert Leader

Mary is a sales manager responsible for leading a team to develop and maintain at key accounts. She has garnered the respect of her team and her leadership through her keen ability to resolve issues with the customers. When there’s a problem, she analyzes the situation, thinks through options, defends her position and takes pride in working through to a successful conclusion.

Mary is typical of leadership at the Expert Level. She is a strong problem-solver who had developed an ability to think independently, to analyze the situation and to take a stand when she knows she’s right. With a focus on the steps to be taken and the desired outcomes, she leads her team through implementations of the solutions. She works hard to develop, support and defend her team, making sure that she is always pushing them for further growth. She thrives on being seen as the expert who understands the business and the customers.

Expert Leaders build strong relationships within their organization and with their management, yet tend to put little energy into building relationships with other units. The Expert Leader’s focus on analysis and tactics frequently leads them to focusing more on the “rightness” of their position, rather than buy-in, from their own group or from other key stakeholders. They frequently overlook the impact of stakeholder’s views on the ultimate effectiveness of a solution. Driving to solve problems, the Expert Leader deals with each issue as a discrete problem, often losing the opportunity to step back and find a broader, innovative solution.

The Expert Leader is unlikely to seek feedback from her team or peers. This plays out in different ways, depending on the natural style of the individual. With an assertive style, she will frequently overlook or dismiss options that suggest she’s less than fully correct. With an accommodating style, he’ll frequently overload himself with work, correcting other’s work to his standards, and limiting his availability to give feedback and coaching. A key development challenge for the Expert Leader is finding a style that opens them up to giving and receiving feedback.

Within her organizational unit, an Expert Leader is likely to function more as a supervisor than a manager. Problem-solving and direction-setting discussions are typically held one-on-one, with group meetings relegated to information sharing. In fact, the direct reports of an Expert Leader are likely to function as a group, at best, and rarely as the team that might arise if the Expert Leader were more open to other opinions and options.

Developing the Expert Leader

1. Define the leadership ideal. The Expert Leader is working towards an ideal of being smart, efficient, capable, and looked to as the Expert. Challenge the Expert Leader to observe the style of leaders they admire, and to notice how they look to and motivate others to make more strategic changes.
   
2. Learn to seek feedback. The Expert Leader finds it faster and more efficient to advocate for their position. Seeking feedback requires the Expert Leader to find a balance between efficiency and effectiveness. Feedback can start with understanding the impact of their style through a 360 assessment. In addition, the Expert Leader can be challenged to notice when input from a broader group resulted in a better outcome. The Expert Leader is often unaware of how their biases, beliefs and standards may blind them to alternatives; place the Expert Leader into situations where their existing frameworks cannot be taken for granted.
   
3. Build team leadership skills. The Expert Leader can be coached to use meetings to generate and listen to ideas, to leverage the skills of the team members and to build group understanding and buy-in to a direction. The Expert Leader may need to retain ultimate decision-making authority; yet schooled in curiosity and inquiry, the Expert Leader can learn how to develop a team.

In the next posting, we’ll contrast the Expert Leader with the Achiever in how they view leadership, how they manage pivotal conversations, and their agility in leading teams.

A Model for Leadership Agility

At the International Coach Federation Conference in November 2008, I was introduced to a new leadership competency model. A model focused on enabling leadership in a rapidly changing world. I invite the reader of my blog to join with me on a journey through the book. By summarizing the work of the authors in these writings, I process the information for myself, and hopefully encourage you to look more deeply into this insightful book, and into your own development as a leader.

A competency is defined as a measurable characteristic of a person related to success at work. It can be a skill, an attribute, or an attitude. Competency models can span the range from what it takes to be a successful professional – Action-orientation, Interpersonal Communication, Integrity – to senior-level positions – Managing Vision, Strategic Thinking, Dealing with Paradox. Yet if, as columnist Eric Dezenhall of BusinessWeek suggests, crises are the rule, not the exception, for Obama, as the leader of the United States, what then faces the business leader in this world of globalization, economic crises, requirements for rapid change, uncertainty and new competition - a paradoxical place of diversity and connectedness. While traditional competency models remain valid and informative, the question is do they go far enough to address the agility needed to keep pace, or lead, in this complex world.

Joiner and Josephs posit a competency model for leaders exploring levels of agility in four key areas – context-setting, stakeholder, creativity, and self-leadership in their book Leadership Agility: Five Levels of Mastery for Anticipating and Initiating Change.

• Context-setting agility involves scanning the situation, evaluating the changes taking place and considering the best initiatives in light of your purpose.
• Stakeholder agility requires the ability to understand the perspectives and realities of those people and organizations that have a stake in, or will be impacted by your initiatives, and to consider how best to engage them.
• Creative agility involves learning from past experiences as well as seeking new and different ways of solving complex problems.
• Self-leadership agility requires discipline and skill in self-awareness of thoughts, feeling and behaviors, and the motivation to continue to develop and grow.

Joiner and Josephs define five levels in each in of these areas which when combined are named Expert, Achiever, Catalyst, Co-Creator and Synergist. At each of these levels, they define the typical set of behaviors that would be seen in how leadership is viewed, pivotal conversations, agility in leading teams, and organizational change leadership. Let’s look briefly at how these five levels might vary by looking a leader new into his or her role.

Expert: When the expert steps into a new role with energy, drive and leadership, they jump right in. Meetings are held everyone, reports and data are combed through, conclusions are drawn, new directions are set and communicated and the Expert leads the organization in solving the key problems.

Achiever: The achiever arrives with a clear understanding of her mandate. She spends a lot of time getting to know her team, being visible, and creating a consistent message of the direction of the organization. She brings her team together to outline the strategy, and works with them to evaluate whether the right structure and people are in place to reach the goals.

Catalyst: The catalyst looks beyond the mandate to how to achieve the objectives and create a sustainable high performance organization. He’s met with thought leaders throughout the organization and encouraged his team to do so as well. He’s engaged three levels and more in an interactive strategic planning process. When he finds resistance in the organization, he seeks creative solutions that support execution of the developing plans.

Co-Creator: The co-creator knows that she will need to achieve the desired business outcomes and develop a high performance organization, but she additionally sets her sights on how to be an industry leader in corporate responsibility. She outlines her short-, near-, and long-term vision for the organization; she engages people inside and outside the firm in questions of how to strengthen relationships, and she models and coaches her team on collaboration and broad accountability. The co-creator drives the ongoing message of how profitability and social responsibility go hand-in-hand.

Synergist: The synergist builds on all of his competencies in building collaborative teams, delivering results and driving organizational change. He creates a leadership team that can collective drive the vision with the organization, freeing the synergist to focus on building unique, varied, and ground-shifting partnerships, collaborations. The synergist asks the questions about how to deliver the results in the right way, with the right people and bring about positive change in the world at large.

Each level builds on the skills, experiences and competencies of the prior levels. Each requires more of the leader in terms of context-setting, stakeholder engagement, creativity and self-leadership. The question to ask is which level would you like to have as your leader, and at which level are you demonstrating leadership?

In subsequent postings, we’ll explore each of these five levels in more detail and look at how to develop the competencies in how leadership is viewed, pivotal conversations, agility in leading teams, and organizational change that move leaders up the levels.