The State of Organizations 2023 - Flipbook - Page 54
to coach, and the organization will need to establish
new processes and structures for individuals and
teams who will be working in shorter cycles.
The CEO can then work with senior leaders to commit
the resources (finances, people, time, and assets)
needed to create a robust leadership development
engine that addresses the organization’s needs.
To sustain the changes, the CEO and other senior
leaders should measure the impact of the leadership
development efforts: How did leaders’ behaviors
change? How did employees’ behaviors change?
How has the culture changed?
Changing behavior at scale
To unleash the full potential of organizations, CEOs
will likely need to make changes that affect company
health and performance. As anyone who has ever
led or worked in an organization understands, at
scale change can be difficult to accomplish and even
harder to sustain, especially now. Leaders’ messages
don’t always break through to employees who may
be working outside of an office, thinking differently
about the nature of workplace relationships, and
already feeling overwhelmed by the idea of yet
another business transformation.
Changing
behaviors and
underlying
mindsets requires
changing the
context in which
employees
operate.
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The State of Organizations 2023
Change becomes more manageable, however, when
CEOs adopt a human-focused approach to it and
break it down to its essentials. If organizations need
different behaviors (the patterns and practices of how
employers work), they need to encourage different
mindsets (what employees feel, think, and value). And
to foster those new mindsets, leaders need to change
the system (the set of the experiences that influence
mindsets). CEOs must engage employees’ hearts, as
well as their hands and heads.
CEOs will need to act in all three of those areas and,
perhaps most important, commit to inspiring others
by sharing their own personal change stories. In our
experience in working with a range of organizations
across all industries and regions, at scale change
really does need to start from the top. If a CEO
acts in a deliberate way and publicly demonstrates
support for change, there can be a multiplier
effect across the organization. Conversely, change
efforts can stall if leaders’ words and deeds don’t
match. Four key change principles—setting bold
aspirations, looking for role models everywhere,
doubling down on institutional capability building,
and making change personal—can help break down
the transformation challenge.
Set bold aspirations
Using benchmarks and fact-based targets, CEOs
should craft and communicate a bold change story
that clarifies both performance goals and associated
cultural behaviors—for instance, “We are going to be
number one in our market, based on TSR, and we are
going to be an organization that leverages the talent
of every employee.” A corollary to this principle would
be “change; don’t add!”
Purposeful communication is a skill and an art. To
achieve it, leaders, managers, and influencers will
need to be prepared to craft and deliver authentic
messages that show vulnerability and empathy. Many
transformations fall short when CEOs and other
business leaders cast them as special projects rather
than opportunities to change systems and behaviors
for the longer term. If an organization is shifting to a
new reporting system, for instance, it isn’t enough
to offer employees a onetime bonus for using the
system. Rewards and incentives should reflect the
company’s longer-term goal of changing how the
business approaches the reporting task overall.