Why organizations must change

People might like those roles. That group needs to be convinced and that becomes the challenge of the organizations: how do I get that group to buy in to what we need to do next? April 29, Q: What are the keys to making a successful organizational change? Q: What are the biggest obstacles to change? Looking for more insights? Sign up to get our top stories by email. Thanks for signing up. In just a few months, the technology that an organization uses on an everyday basis may be outdated and replaced.

That means an organization needs to be responsive to advances in the technological environment; its employees' work skills must evolve as technology evolves. Organizations that refuse to adapt are likely to be the ones that won't be around in a few short years. If an organization wants to survive and prosper, its managers must continually innovate and adapt to new situations. Take, for example, the case of an Australasian manufacturing company that had planned a set of 40 projects as part of a program to improve profitability.

The group went through each project, debating its DICE score and identifying the problem areas. After listing all the scores and issues, the general manager walked to a whiteboard and circled the five most important projects.

What do we have to do to achieve that? The general manager walked to a whiteboard and circled the five most important projects. The group began thinking and acting right away. It moved people around on teams, reconfigured some projects, and identified those that senior managers should pay more attention to—all of which helped raise DICE scores before implementation began.

The most important projects were set up for resounding success while most of the remaining ones managed to get into the Win Zone. The group left some projects in the Worry Zone, but it agreed to track them closely to ensure that their scores improved.

Transformations should entail fundamental changes that stretch an organization. When different executives calculate DICE scores for the same project, the results can vary widely. The difference in scores is particularly important in terms of the dialogue it triggers.

Prejudices, differences in perspectives, and a reluctance or inability to speak up can block effective debates. By using the DICE framework, companies can create a common language and force the right discussions. Sometimes, companies hold workshops to review floundering projects.

At those two- to four-hour sessions, groups of eight to 15 senior and middle managers, along with the project team and the project sponsors, hold a candid dialogue. The workshops bring diverse opinions to light, which often can be combined into innovative solutions. Consider, for example, the manner in which DICE workshops helped a telecommunications service provider that had planned a major transformation effort.

Consisting of five strategic initiatives and 50 subprojects that needed to be up and running quickly, the program confronted some serious obstacles. There were delays in approving business cases, a dearth of rigor and focus in planning and identifying milestones, and a shortage of resources.

There were leadership issues, too. For example, executive-level shortcomings had resulted in poor coordination of projects and a misjudgment of risks.

The Project Management Office arranged a series of workshops to analyze issues and decide future steps. One workshop, for example, was devoted to three new product development projects, two of which had landed in the Woe Zone and one in the Worry Zone. They eventually agreed on three remedial actions: holding a conflict-resolution meeting between the directors in charge of technology and those responsible for the core business; making sure senior leadership paid immediate attention to the resource issues; and bringing together the project team and the line-of-business head to formalize project objectives.

With the project sponsor committed to those actions, the three projects had improved their DICE scores and thus their chances of success at the time this article went to press. Conversations about DICE scores are particularly useful for large-scale transformations that cut across business units, functions, and locations.

In such change efforts, it is critical to find the right balance between centralized oversight, which ensures that everyone in the organization takes the effort seriously and understands the goals, and the autonomy that various initiatives need. Teams must have the flexibility and incentive to produce customized solutions for their markets, functions, and competitive environments. The balance is difficult to achieve without an explicit consideration of the DICE variables.

Take the case of a leading global beverage company that needed to increase operational efficiency and focus on the most promising brands and markets. The company also sought to make key processes such as consumer demand development and customer fulfillment more innovative.

Top management faced enormous challenges in structuring the effort and in spawning projects that focused on the right issues. Executives knew that this was a multiyear effort, yet without tight schedules and oversight of individual projects, there was a risk that projects would take far too long to be completed and the results would taper off.

To mitigate the risks, senior managers decided to analyze each project at several levels of the organization. Using the DICE framework, they reviewed each effort every month until they felt confident that it was on track.

After that, reviews occurred when projects met major milestones. No more than two months elapsed between reviews, even in the later stages of the program. The time between reviews at the project-team level was even shorter: Team leaders reviewed progress biweekly throughout the transformation.

Some of the best people joined the effort full time. The human resources department took an active role in recruiting team members, thereby creating a virtuous cycle in which the best people began to seek involvement in various initiatives.

During the course of the transformation, the company promoted several team members to line- and functional leadership positions because of their performance. Its once-stagnant brands began to grow, it cracked open new markets such as China, and sales and promotion activities were aligned with the fastest-growing channels. There were many moments during the process when inertia in the organization threatened to derail the change efforts. By providing a common language for change, the DICE framework allows companies to tap into the insight and experience of their employees.

A great deal has been said about middle managers who want to block change. We find that most middle managers are prepared to support change efforts even if doing so involves additional work and uncertainty and puts their jobs at risk. Too often, they lack the tools, the language, and the forums in which to express legitimate concerns about the design and implementation of change projects.

By enabling frank conversations at all levels within organizations, the DICE framework helps people do the right thing by change. You have 1 free article s left this month. You are reading your last free article for this month. Subscribe for unlimited access. Create an account to read 2 more. Change management. The Hard Side of Change Management. Sirkin, Perry Keenan, and Alan Jackson.

The essential hard elements? The Idea in Practice Conducting a DICE Assessment Your project has the greatest chance of success if the following hard elements are in place: Duration A long project reviewed frequently stands a far better chance of succeeding than a short project reviewed infrequently.

Using the DICE Framework Conducting a DICE assessment fosters successful change by sparking valuable senior leadership debate about project strategy It also improves change effectiveness by enabling companies to manage large portfolios of projects. Example: A manufacturing company planned 40 projects as part of a profitability-improvement program. These factors determine the outcome of any transformation initiative. We find that the following questions and scoring guidelines allow executives to rate transformation initiatives effectively: Duration [D] Ask: Do formal project reviews occur regularly?

Score: If the time between project reviews is less than two months, you should give the project 1 point. Integrity of Performance [I] Ask: Is the team leader capable? Senior Management Commitment [C1] Ask: Do senior executives regularly communicate the reason for the change and the importance of its success?

Score: If senior management has, through actions and words, clearly communicated the need for change, you must give the project 1 point. Score: If employees are eager to take on the change initiative, you can give the project 1 point, and if they are just willing, 2 points. Effort [E] Ask: What is the percentage of increased effort that employees must make to implement the change effort? Our data show a clear distribution of scores: Scores between 7 and The project is very likely to succeed.

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Tags: Change Management Robert W. Swaim Peter Drucker culture change. Robert W. Why organizations change Organizations change for a number of different reasons, so they can either react to these reasons or be ahead of them.

These reasons include: Crisis: Obviously September 11, is the most dramatic example of a crisis which caused countless organizations and even industries such as airlines and travel to change. The financial crisis obviously created many changes in the financial services industry as organizations attempted to survive.

Performance gaps: This occurs when an organization's goals and objectives are not being met or other organizational needs are not being satisfied. Changes are required to close these gaps. New technology : The identification of new technology can lead to more efficient and economical methods to perform work. Identification of opportunities: Opportunities are identified in the market place that the organization needs to pursue in order to increase its competitiveness.