Everything You Would Ever Need To Know About Organizational Change - Aditya Yadav

1. *
“Running an Agile Fortune 500 Company”
Aditya Yadav, aditya.yadav@gmail.com
in.linkedin.com/in/adityayadav76

2. * A Typical Global Company
* Fortune 500/1000
* 200 Divisions
* 40 Countries
* 25000 Employees
*

3. *
@ Acme Inc.

4. * Original Question “Shouldn‟t we hire the top
Strategy Consulting Companies to Drive Change in
Our Organization? Isn‟t that what everyone does?”
* The Correct Question - “Please don‟t tell me you
think Change is NOT your Core Competency and
hence you will Outsource it. Lets learn everything
there is to about Change. Hopefully you will
understand why your organization needs to do it
yourself, and yes maybe with some Guidance! But
NOT Outsourcing of The Entire Change Process.”
*

5. *
And The Philosophy Behind The Answer

6. * Changing Organizational Cultures – Trice & Bayer ‟93
* Six Change Approaches – Kotter & Schlesinger „79
* Theory of Planned Behavior – Ajzen „88
* Dimensions of Change – Pettigrew & Whipp „91
* Change Equation – Beckhard & Harris ‟87
* Change Management Iceberg – Kruger „96
* Change Phases – John Kotter ‟90
*…
*

7. * I honestly couldn‟t derive my theory from any single
or combination of any existing change theories
* But my collection of presentations would be
incomplete without a Change Framework/Theory
* I would humbly like to make a quantum jump to a
completely new perspective of Organizational
Change
* I will also be deriving the theory from a dynamic
model for your benefit, in the end
*

8. *

9. * Change(s) HAVE to be INCREMENTAL
* R‟ber we talked about dynamic complex systems with Quasi Stable states…. Blah Blah Blah???
* The counter argument people make is that Incremental Change prolongs the process, increasing costs
and chances of failure
* Actually on the contrary Incremental, Sequential, Pipelined Change(s) sometimes are not even felt, not
even resisted, failure is extremely low
* The theory of complex systems is an overriding principle. Too many changes to complex systems at the
same time makes everything go Haywire and Unpredictable. The system WILL CRASH AND BURN!!! You
will have no time to take corrective measures or even think before everything comes crashing down.
* Rule: Boosting Time doesn‟t mean just sitting back and doing nothing. It basically means ONE CHANGE
AT A TIME. Hence we introduce the concepts of Incremental Change and Pipelining
* Example:
* In India companies used to cut costs and Fire 5000 people at one go. But that was long ago
* Now companies fire 10-50 people every week from each location. Not even people within the same
company realise whats happening. Let alone the media or analysts.
* Until finally in March the Top Companies announce there will be no Bonus‟s or Promotions …
* That‟s when everyone realises o O last year was an year of heavy recession in our Industry!
*

10. * Basically The Path has to be clear at a high level e.g.
* Everyone should know where we are going with this.
* And they should know The Why?
* And they should know What If? Something doesn‟t work (Because a lot of things wont
work as planned) What is the broad overall consensus on backtracking, falling back or
the so called Plan „B‟ of every incremental change
* 1st March – We will change from Supplier 1 to Supplier 2
* Sometime 3-6 weeks after that we will increase our Warehouse Capacity 2x
* Sometime 4-6 weeks after that Team A & Team B will combine and merge
* Sometime 5-6 weeks after that we will start the Phasing out System „X‟
* …
* Very high level. Nothing tactical.
* Rule: Clarity & Transparency. No Surprises!!!
*

11. * But wait …
* Emails, and
* Sharepoint Posts don‟t count…
* Rule: In your face!!!
*

12. * Rule: Build a Strong Support System!!!
* You can read about Coaching & Mentoring in my
earlier slide decks.
*

13. * Make the Highest Assurance of everyone‟s
Survival
* Don‟t confuse driving change with Turnaround
and Organizational Survival, that‟s a different
scenario
* Golden Rule: No change works when Survival of
those involved is at Stake
* Don‟t Chew More Than You Can Bite.
*

14. * Give the Highest Assurance to everyone that there is
absolutely no Risk of Failure for them
* Everyone should try their best
* Even promise things like
* No Appraisals this year. Just focus on a Successful
Change
* We will share whatever be the Bonus Budget in a
weighed average fashion.
*…
* I‟m just giving some silly examples but you get the
picture!
*

15. * Never Assume You Know Best. You don‟t know much sitting at
the Top Of the Mountain.
* You might be the Change Initiator
* But you don‟t know everything that‟s involved
* Encourage Honest Discussions and Idea‟s
* Ref: My Deck on Leadership Mindset & Structured Discussions
& Decision Making
* Within the context of the above
* Discussions and Debates should be welcome. If they are not
happening you should be worried.
* Stay away from unstructured nonsense
* Rule: You are dealing with a Complex Dynamic Chaotic
System you don‟t know anything (much!!!)
*

16. * Punish Sabotage
* And absolutely nothing else. & Never Punish
Failure!
*

17. * We discussed Incentives in an earlier
Presentation
* We said that Incentives were Temporal and to
be used ONLY TO Drive Change
* So now would be a good time to use incentives
*

18. * Nobody Should Decide Who Stays and Who Leaves… or who‟s a Top Performer and who‟s replaceable (what do you
even know)
* Please don‟t tell me you will look at appraisals and bonuses to find that out. (Spare me!!!)
* Rule: It‟s a free world
* People decide for themselves whether they stay or leave
* Your job is to Outplace them in the timeframe They Decide, your job is to train them for their next jobs, make
recommendations ;-)
* Oh but a Manager would say: We need to put a time frame on voluntary exits. I say – Hell No! Any employee can
quit at any time because you are not into Slave Trading. Any imposition of a Time Frame for exits is Arbitrary and
will have distorted ecosystem effects.
* Your job is to make sure those who are leaving succeed in their future and the people who stay will make sure that
you succeed in your change. Don‟t harp on some nonsense about Loyalty or some trash like that. You sincerely help
people succeed and they will help you succeed. The more sincere you are the more sincere they will be.
* Don‟t try some nuisance like hiring Strategy Consultants to decide who goes and who stays. Or trying to give Old
Timers “Voluntary Retirement” (!@$#@%$#@$#%^%$)
* Oh wait “It will cost money!!!”
* What the hell are you optimizing on? “Success” or “Cost”
* Money is the Cost of Change and Success.
* Deprioritize the money, prioritize success.
* Golden Rule: Never ever Violate the Free World principle!!!
* “If you let us know if you plan on leaving we will try to help you succeed in your next job. We understand even if
you don‟t tell us you are leaving you can leave at anytime which is fine conceptually”
*

19. * That‟s only because you are confusing my
Organizational Change Framework with the situation
of a Turnaround when The Organizational Survival is at
stake
* Delete every mention of the word Turnaround in your
mind. Trust me you are thinking –”Oh but we need to
cut costs by $30m”, “Oh but we need to fire 600
people” I will address that in the last slide. For now
leave those thoughts out to understand the
framework.
* And then everything will not just make sense,
everything will fit in and will seem consistent.
*** Turnaround/Downsizing is for another day!
*

20. * This is not an Adhoc or Empirical collection of ideas unlike almost all other Change
Frameworks
* We start with the Assertion that to Succeed and Change Successfully we need Time,
Money, Ideas and People
* We then we do everything to keep people constant
* And then we use the paradigm of Dynamic Models of Time Money & Ideas (Chaotic
Systems)
* And then we Boost all three of Time Money and Ideas
* And we support the above with everything else that‟s needed to prevent failure.
* This Maximizes Success & Successful Change
* The model doesn‟t hold true in the case of a turnaround or downsizing because the
assumptions of the model don‟t hold because you are probably cutting costs, letting
people go, compressing time and suppressing all ideation.
* Hence I said don‟t confuse this Change Model w/ Turnaround or Downsizing Situations
* This model unlike all others is based on extremely sound theoretical foundations
*

21. * Using this approach… what is the …
* Level of Consensus?
* Level of Motivation?
* Level of Conflict?
* Level of Resistance?
* Chances of Success?
* Do you see your Velocity of Change(s) increasing
Exponentially?
* Incremental Roadmap & Pipelining ensures you make
relatively consistent Quasi Stable State Jumps
* You will be Surprised!!!
*

22. * We don‟t ask how we manage resistance to change? And why people resist?
* We don‟t discuss Retention strategies
* We don‟t discuss Dimensions, Factors or Phases
* Why? Because we are not Managers we are Leaders. We don‟t attempt to control and
manage change which works very well when you are maintaining the Status Quo. We
optimize for Change and Success within the context of a Dynamic Chaotic System
* We start with discussing things like
* What can we hold constant between People, Money, Time and Idea‟s?
* How can we make sure we don‟t encounter a Thermo Nuclear Explosion? (Ans: we stay
below the threshold of critical mass for a out of control chain reaction)
* What kind of things do we need to support above Two?
* What is the Natural Velocity of Change in our Organization? At any time during the
Change Roadmap (Ans: We start by boosting time but sooner than later Change starts
accelerating exponentially)
* We use a Chaotic Systems model to Drive (???) actually Trigger!!! Change
* We can now extend the model to situations of Downsizing and Turnarounds. But that‟s
for another day
*

23. * Fcuk Costs!!! Optimize For Success!!!
* Money is the easiest thing you have in the
model of People, Time, Money and Idea‟s
*

24. Aditya!!!
*