Aligning Managers for Organizational Change
by Michael McInerney
A rapid alignment strategy that focuses on training middle management brings speed to the change-management process. In addition to allowing the organization to implement change, it also results in overall improved leadership skills.
In preparing for life post-recession, many companies are shifting modes from survival to success. Doing so requires rapid change and engaged employees. But, many organizations believe their workforces, which have been beaten down by the recession, are not capable of adapting to change.
This means change is slow, and slow is expensive. However, an emerging discipline called rapid alignment is bringing speed to the change-management process and is becoming a necessary standard practice for large organizations.
Leading from the Middle
Organizations can reap enormous rewards if they implement change faster. However, the big barrier to change is the failure to provide appropriate training to middle management.
The middle of the organization is where change is executed and institutionalized. This is the point of intersection where the comfortable idea of a "change program" becomes the uncomfortable reality of a new way of doing things.
But, at this layer and the layer below, understanding the reason for a strategic change and what employees are supposed to do about it gets fuzzy and diluted.
While top management may be looking outward at a changing market, mid-level managers are looking inward at the same day-to-day issues they always have. They don't overtly resist change, they just haven't been given enough opportunity to lead from the middle.
Each leader needs to figure out how change impacts his or her own operation, to learn new skills, and finally to adopt the new behaviors that will accelerate the new directions. If the hundreds or thousands of middle managers learn faster, the organization changes faster. The secret to rapid alignment is finding a way to deliver that learning.
What do organizations need from leadership development? In a survey of 30 leading companies, executives ranked the following priorities with respect to leadership development:
1. Applicability
2. Convenience
3. Consistency
4. Efficiency
5. Value
6. Measurability
7. Scalability
Whatever the method of leadership development, it must be judged against these seven tests. The traditional classroom approach to learning often falls short. Even with the help of a vendor, customized training programs rarely succeed in reaching the unique needs of individuals and can miss the mark in terms of high-impact timing opportunities.
Individual coaching is highly applicable, convenient and efficient. Often, an executive can get more value from 30 minutes of personal coaching than a full day in a classroom. But success is hard to measure and delivery can be inconsistent. If the shortcomings of coaching can be addressed, it is the learning tool needed for rapid alignment.
Delivering Coaching to Middle Managers
When seeking rapid alignment via coaching to large numbers of middle managers, one successful approach centers around Research, Evaluation, Alignment, and Learning and Measurement. These are the key components:
1. Research
a) Contextualize the learning.
b) Research the business and organizational context and the personal context of the individual leader.
2. Evaluation
a) Evaluate the strategy.
b) Create a tool for alignment, a scorecard showing how enterprise-wide change goals are stepped down to goals at each organizational level and ultimately translated into individual goals.
c) Use the scorecard as the basis for ongoing three-way dialogue among the coach, the individual leader and the leader's immediate boss.
d) Create a consistent process and customize it to match each individual's circumstances.
3. Alignment
a) Provide coaching on both a scheduled and just-in-time basis, bringing new perspectives, behaviors and skills close to the situation.
b) Make coaching scalable.
4. Learning and Measurement
a) Maintain a four-way dialogue among the coach, individual leader, leader's immediate boss and top management to uncover impediments to change and new opportunities.
b) Measure using self-assessment, current business goals and 360-degree surveys.
c) Give regular progress reports to determine if the coaching is generating the intended impact.
It is key for the whole group of managers to be working on change at the same time. Organizational change is real when the group as a whole changes direction. Each leader is working at an individual level, which compounds organizational efficiency. If everyone is working from the same scorecard, rapid alignment occurs.
When it comes to coaching middle management, an obvious question arises: Isn't coaching supposed to be provided by direct bosses? Or is it just that senior management needs to do a better job of coaching direct reports on the reasons for strategic change and how to implement it?
The shift to de-layered organizations steeped in communication technology has reduced the time leaders can spend guiding middle management.
Once, managers had time for lunches with subordinates. Now, they spend their hours consumed in an intense flurry of e-mails and conference calls, with increasing performance demands.
Also, to be frank, most managers are not very good coaches. They are mainly about getting results through problem solving, directing and organizing processes. Leadership development requires different skills.
Value and Progress
Rather than pressing managers to coach more, organizational design innovation is needed, specifically coaching by a coordinated team of expert coaches. Part of what makes rapid alignment cost effective is simply that it is delivered efficiently. A team of coaches works in a coordinated way to direct learning.
However, the value is not just in controlling costs. The greater value comes from achieving change rapidly. Before venturing into a rapid-alignment project, an organization should determine just how important speed is. How much more valuable is the change if it occurs in three months as opposed to six months?
It's when people actually see the value of speed, and recognize that speed is achievable, that they embrace the sense of urgency that makes rapid alignment work.
A third element of value arises because, at the same time the organization is implementing change, it is also improving individual leadership skills, thereby increasing the number of capable leaders. Having a greater number of capable leaders results in a deeper succession pool, more flexibility in deploying talent and the ability to take on more projects.
Structured and coordinated coaching is not only a solution for the organization, it's also a way to make the lives of hard-pressed middle managers better and more engaged. Focused and personalized coaching helps them become more comfortable in their critical role of taking concepts of strategic change and making them a day-to-day reality.
[About the Author: Michael McInerney is vice president of executive performance and rewards at Aon Consulting. He specializes in strategies to improve employee performance. Aon Consulting works with organizations to improve business performance and shape the workplace of the future through employee benefits, talent management and rewards strategies and solutions.]
