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• PITOC Overview
• Why do we need professional change managers and leaders?
• Seven signs that your Company is struggling to implement change
• Why do organisations need to transform and change?
• Benefits Management - 'A Strategic Business Skill for all Seasons'.
• The challenge of creating positive working environments
• A summary of Professor John Kotters 8 step change process
• Leadership challenges in the Public Service
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Seven signs that your Company is struggling to implement change

When business change is going well it can be the catalyst for future success, positive growth and long periods of stability. It can lead to higher staff moral and retention, improved customer satisfaction, less waste and greater profits.

Unfortunately the majority of change programmes fail to deliver as they are not always run well and end up costing the organisation dearly. Indeed, in our experience it takes a special individual with very specific skills and the support of the senior management team in any organisation to succeed. This is the best way to actually bring about lasting strategic transformation change.

Over and above having the right change leader at the helm, here are our thoughts on the seven signs that signal to us there is high likely hood that your organisation might need some help. These are in no particular order and we often find that there are a combination of factors such as these causing major concerns and issues:

1) Spending lots of time trying to motivate and train staff in an attempt to improve performance and moral.

Often we see organisations running regular pep talks, launch programmes, motivational seminars for staff and managers. In addition, misguided skills development and team building programmes all causes more harm than good.

2) Rapid turnover of Chief Executives or Organisational Heads.

In organisations where change is not going well, attracting and retaining the right people at the top of the organisation is often a struggle. Regular replacement of the Chief Executive or other organisational heads with new external hires in the hope that the next to arrive will bring the magic formula or big personality required to ensure future success. This is a sure fire sign that change is not going well.

3) Attempting to break into ‘new’ highly competitive markets.

Industry is littered with stories of organisations straying from their ‘knitting’ and getting burned badly. Change going badly, organisations clutching at straws attempt to break into markets where they have no history or experience in the belief that they can dislodge and take market share from already well-established competitors.

4) Switching between one strategy and the next.

Change challenged companies often find themselves switching and changing strategies in the hope that they stumble upon a golden bullet answer or single stroke solution to solve all their issues – when in reality there is no such solution.

5) Engaging the services of a large and expensive team of ‘Corporate Change Consultants’

Companies locked in a change going badly cycle find themselves swamped and even over whelmed by teams of external ‘change agents’ from the large consulting firms. Their approach is to impose a new culture and way of working by simply overpowering the organisations own management and staff. In our experience this approach builds even deeper resistance to change, resentment of staff and is probably the single most telling sign of trouble.

6) Making failing acquisitions that are a poor match to corporate strategy

Industry is littered with the remnants of bad acquisitions that were initiated to drive growth at all cost, substituting short term positive fluctuations in share price for long term stability and sustainable strategic growth.

7) Have lost their way and are in need of re-orientation back to the path that brought them success.

Organisations that are change challenged have typically failed to identify their economic drivers, their core business advantage and true passion; the organisation has gone stale, is either in a long slow painful decline or is an economic crash just waiting to happen.

When these warning signs are present in combination, their effect is multiplied. The solution is to face up to these issues. Realistically assess your organisation’s ability to implement change. Engage carefully-chosen help. If your organisation would benefit from expert help, Ascot Barclay Group can guide you through the gateway to successful business change, and the rewards that brings.

For further information about how Ascot Barclay can enhance your business or project:

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