The Emotional Side to Facilitating Change
(1) CommentTo the cognition of the brain must be added the experience of the soul.” —Arnold Bennett
A great deal of emotional investment is necessary to achieve the desired outcome of strategic initiatives, yet most change endeavors lean heavily toward the intellectual components (data reviews, critical activities and milestones, logical presentations, rational decision-making, etc.). Several factors contribute to this, one being that intellectual commitment typically precedes emotional commitment and thus, in some ways, is easier to come by. That is, people may quickly grasp the implications of a change at a rational level but then find that they need more time and effort to make the necessary emotional adjustments.
When emotional accommodation is too far behind the logical acceptance of change, dual—often contradictory—signals are sent by the person facing the transition. This kind of split-level commitment can produce confusion, mixed signals, and ambiguous communication for all involved. People may think that they have accepted a recent approach or policy shift only to find more
ChangeThinking.net
©2012 Conner Partners, Inc.
www.connerpartners.com
Harness the Momentum of Synergy to Realize Change Goals
This is the last post in my series on developing synergistic work teams. I have been describing a four-phase model that includes Interacting, Appreciative Understanding, Integrating, and Implementing.
Phase IV: Implementing
Finally, all the hard work of communicating, and appreciating and merging divergent views begins to pay off. The synergy process I’ve been describing has many benefits: more
ChangeThinking.net
©2012 Conner Partners, Inc.
www.connerpartners.com
Four Ways Communication Can Build Synergy in Work Teams
In this series, I’m discussing what I’ve learned about fostering synergy during major transformational initiatives.
If people have the willingness to forge their diverse perspectives into a synergistic alliance, the following sequence can be used to describe how they can work together to realize change. The four phases outlined are Interacting, Appreciative Understanding, Integrating, and Implementing.
Phase I: Interacting
A basic condition for synergy is that the key players must effectively interact with each other. If iron and nickel are never brought into contact with each other, the process of making steel is impossible. The same is true for people. For sponsors, agents, and targets; or practitioners and their clients to work synergistically, they must be able to communicate effectively.
People who attempt to work together, but who have little or no opportunity to interact, often generate a cyclically degenerating climate more
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©2011 Conner Partners, Inc.
www.connerpartners.com
Use Ethical Ploys to Change the World
In this series, I’ve been discussing the use of ethical ploys by practitioners to add value where it is needed, but not solicited. I define an ethical ploy as a “noble ruse” that guides someone toward seeing a point of view he or she might not have otherwise been open to.
In this post, I’d like to present two examples of ethical ploys that highlight the concept of enticing people, in an honorable way, to see more than they asked for or expected from a situation. As you will see, the results of either can have benefits far beyond the realization of the change goals. more
ChangeThinking.net
©2011 Conner Partners, Inc.
www.connerpartners.com
3 Elements of Empowered Relationships
In this series, I have discussed several aspects of empowered relationships—what they are and what they are not—so that you can use this concept/perspective to help your sponsor achieve success. In this last post, I’ll cover three basic yet powerful elements that combine to form empowerment-based relationships—beliefs, motivations, and actions. more
ChangeThinking.net
©2011 Conner Partners, Inc.
www.connerpartners.com
Lessons Learned About Building Commitment to Change
After three-and-a-half decades of being a professional change practitioner, I’ve seen my share of successful and unsuccessful attempts to generate enough commitment to reach full realization. If there is one thing I’m sure of it’s that the necessary momentum and critical mass of commitment toward desired outcomes is not easy to come by. Below are some of the more important lessons that have affected my practice.
1. The commitment process unfolds at both intellectual and emotional levels.
Usually, intellectual commitment precedes emotional commitment. Most people can grasp the implications of a change at a cognitive level fairly quickly. However, they often find that they need more time to make the necessary emotional adjustments.
This split-level commitment can produce confusion, mixed signals, and more
ChangeThinking.net
©2011 Conner Partners, Inc.
www.connerpartners.com
Tactics for Building Commitment
In my last post, I described the eight stages of building commitment. Applied properly, I have found them to be helpful in generating the momentum and critical mass needed during various engagements. At each stage, there are potential barriers to success, and for each barrier, there are actions that can be taken to move people to the next stage as well as indicators that can be used to mark progress. more
ChangeThinking.net
©2011 Conner Partners, Inc.
www.connerpartners.com
The Eight Stages of Building Commitment
(2) CommentsIn the early ’80s, while involved in research to identify patterns of change-related success and failure, I learned that the winners and losers in this arena demonstrated very different levels of resolve. As a result, I developed the following model, which describes how and when people become committed to major new organizational requirements. (Click here to download a printable worksheet of the Commitment Model to help you identify a person’s or group’s level of commitment.) more
ChangeThinking.net
©2011 Conner Partners, Inc.
www.connerpartners.com
The Importance of Commitment in Change
(1) Comment“There’s a difference between interest and commitment. When you’re interested in doing something, you do it only when circumstances permit. When you’re committed to something, you accept no excuses, only results.” ~Author Unknown
There are so many aspects to being a professional change practitioner that it’s easy to lose sight of the fundamentals that comprise our role. It’s OK to add all the bells and whistles we want, but at the same time, we must deliver on the basics. One way to think about the bottom line of our function is that, as change facilitators, more
ChangeThinking.net
©2011 Conner Partners, Inc.
www.connerpartners.com
Momentum and Critical Mass
In my last post, I talked about redirecting energy during a transformational change from protecting “the way things are” toward addressing the ambiguities and confusion that occur in the shift. In this context, momentum refers to the forward motion of energy through the role sequence (advocate to initiating sponsor to primary sustaining sponsors to local sustaining sponsors to targets) toward realization of the change. Regardless of which roles are involved in the energy transfer at any given time, the presence of strong momentum dramatically increases the chances for realization results. Alternatively, transfers that produce no more than moderate momentum can stall initiatives or compromise installation outcomes.
Energy transfers can result in a strong, moderate, or weak momentum exchange, which means that merely passing energy through the role sequence is not enough. Momentum must reach a certain magnitude within each person in the chain to provide the level of energy needed to ultimately achieve true realization results. When we achieve this degree of energy strength, it means the person on the receiving end of the transfer has become fully committed to the endeavor’s success. more
ChangeThinking.net
©2011 Conner Partners, Inc.
www.connerpartners.com
