Key Components of Creating Change

13 Oct 2015

There is no easy way to drive change, but there are some core components that we think are essential to designing and delivering a change programme, whether you are promoting more sustainable behaviours in the community, or developing a new organisational culture.

clarity

It might feel like you want to sugar coat organisational changes, but recognising the true drivers behind a desired outcome is important to creating a campaign that has some integrity.  Employees respond to campaigns in two ways - as an employee and as an individual.  It's important to convey messages in a way that reaches both.  Many campaigns tackle just one, and don't bring the two worlds together, risking that you'll end up with a campaign driven entirely by the bottom line, or one driven entirely by emotion. It is possible to design a campaign that appeals to both but first you need clarity over the drivers. 

insight

Working with your people, whether they are customers, staff or suppliers, to help shape your plans for change. Insight sessions run in the concept development stages help you to understand possible barriers, incentives and motivations.  They also help lead naturally to co-creation sessions to build on their experiences.  This co-creation will help establish buy in from the earliest possible stages, and enable you to honestly convey a solution that has been designed by those that will be delivering it. 

what if?

Asking what if? Change requires a departure from the norm, and that means asking questions that get people to consider alternatives and possible outcomes.  Get key stakeholders in one room and present polarised outcomes for key areas, and asked them to position current state of play, and where they want the company to be.  The visual spectrum of possibilities for their organisation, and the inevitable disparity between where each stakeholder places means the question 'what if? 'begins to come from those internally rather than from our external voice, adding weight to the discussions. 

but why?

It's vital to challenge people's natural tendency to bolster the status quo, but to do this mindfully.  There needs to be a balance between recognising the role of the current way at the time of it's creation; communicating the benefits of an alternative and recognising the need for change from the current model or behaviour. We always try to ensure the communication road maps we create strike the right balance and you can answer 'but why?

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