What needs to be considered when creating a change process?Change 2/3
- 30. January 2017
- Posted by: Ralf Juhre
- Categories:
No change is possible without the involvement of those involved – Lewin already recognized this. Those affected must understand why change is necessary and what the benefits of change are. This is the only way to promote the realization that change makes sense and that the current situation cannot be sustained.
For this, you first have to “unfreezing“, i.e. defrost. Nobody throws a frozen dish directly into the pan and turns to maximum flame. It is just as wrong to simply enforce a process and expect those affected to make friends with fait accompli. It must be made clear to those involved why the situation is being changed. The key role here is clear and transparent communication with the aim of spreading the goals and benefits of the change project.
Bad news serves the necessary destabilization.
It is also important to deal correctly with the resistance, which must not be fought. Those responsible must give those affected time, take their fears seriously and make the risks of persistence and the chances of change clear in discussions. The change is only ripe when the system performance decreases and the affected people themselves ask for change.
Once the state has thawed out, the movement can begin. Now it is possible to change yourself and the system. New concepts can be tried out, new attitudes can be adopted. As a rule, the system performance decreases somewhat during this period, as new processes have to be learned. Once the desired changes have been implemented, the state must be frozen again. This re-freezing process is important to convert changes into permanent solutions. At this point, the innovations can unfold their potential.