How To Drive Organisational & Cultural Change To Be Accepted At All Levels
How quickly can an individual change?
How quickly can a company change?
How quickly can the culture of a company change?
Naturally, there are elements of change evolution at every level.
It’s easier to change one person than it is to get a whole company to shift perspectives.
But how do we change the organisational culture of a whole company?
Culture change is based at the roots of progress, and there are many examples of success and failure in the attempts of change at this level.
Psychology expert Arthur Camazzi works with leaders around the world and has ideas on organisational change that have been adopted successfully by many companies.
He purports that there are five pillars that helped company DCI to go through their corporate culture change.
We can learn from this transformation and apply it in our own companies.
By personalising them, they become the foundations for overall change that drives performance.
Here are the five pillars:
Create a Greater Purpose
This creates ownership and commitment to change at the organisation level, as well at the individual level.
By having something that drives toward a bigger picture, having a purpose that inspires and excites brings about change within hearts as well as minds.
Understanding your own purpose, vision, mission and values helps you create momentum in changing the culture of the business.
This gives people clarity in the direction they need to go.
Having a method that makes it possible
It’s no good identifying a purpose if there’s no way of actually achieving it.
Having a method to achieve it is important for morale and to gain buy-in for the direction the business will be going in the future.
Speaking a common language
Communication is the glue that keeps a company performing at its peak.
A common language is needed to drive organisational change so everyone has a clear understanding of first of all ‘why’ the change is taking place, then how it needs to be implemented.
This communication has to deliver the greater purpose within the company.
A unified identity
Identity is what makes a person or a company different from all others.
It drives the overall characteristics that diversifies one entity from another.
This pillar brings unity to a company through harmonious transformation of culture, the roots that hold a company together
Supportive environment
Carmazzi talks about a level of expectation that people have when change occurs, and they want to feel there is a supportive atmosphere produced when any organisational change is being driven forward.
The environment people work in has to be supporting the change that occurs, or there will not be the buy-in necessary to make it succeed.
Without the support needed to make it work, people will be reluctant to take the action needed to ensure the change becomes a natural way of behaving.
By management supporting their key workers during the changes, it will become embedded in the way people work, and they will see the overall benefits to themselves, their department and the whole company.
These five pillars support a change initiative at the foundation level, and will drive cultural progress that will be accepted by team members, driven by the mindset that it will work at all levels, and create a force of change at the very core of the organisation.
By building these pillars first, you’ll see the recognition and approval of the processes needed to change from everyone who will be affected.
