An Overdose of Change: Breaking Free from Fatigue and Chaos

Maartje van Krieken: Hi, thanks for tuning in. I'm glad you're back here. Today's topic is change overdose. It's one of my more popular subjects. So clearly very recognizable to many, and that's backed up by the numbers. So 73% of organizations report change saturation and 45% of employees experience fatigue from constant change. So that's almost half, 45% personally, from experience, I know that a change, overdose, too much change, perpetual change, too much. Change all at once, all the time, in any way, shape or form, is a huge contributor to business chaos. It's really something that clogs up the arteries of the system. Quickly. It takes down morale. It takes down productivity. There is increased resistance in humans with excessive uncertainty and ambiguity and increased resistance with the more change you pile on top of each other. So it's a real factor. It might not be the only factor that's derailing your business, but it's typically a major compounding factor, and it eats away at your resilience to deal with other factors or unexpected events that happen on top of it. So if you're already in change overload, and then you lose a key staff member, or you lose a key supplier, and your resources are already stretched thin, have kind of lost trust that you as an organization, know where you're heading, are frustrated, are an overwhelm, are not as engaged, then that effectively means that something small, much easier, can knock you out of whack. So to say so major contributor to businesses failing or landing in hot water, and hence, definitely an important subject on this podcast, and I doubt it will be the last time they'll address it. So let's get to it.

I first want to start with the definition of change. We've all heard these slogans and quotes that are supposed to be uplifting and explain why we all should want change in our organizations or even in our personal lives. And that is things like change is the wind in the sails of progress. And for those of you who know me a little longer, you know I love my sailing analogies, and of course, it's very true that changes the wind in the sails of progress. But personally, I can even I who lost change, can feel my neck hairs go up a little bit with some of these optimistic and positive quotes, because knowing that it's true and then suddenly liking change or understanding why it needs to happen when you you feel also that internal resistance are, of course, not the same thing. So how do we get out of that endless cycle? And particularly if you are in what water, and you do know you did, or you are realizing that it's too much and it's been too much, how do you break that cycle and get out? So one of the first things to really be aware of, and I think think about in this context, is that I feel many of us get stuck in the vocabulary, and that's important to look at the vocabulary and think critically about how we use that, because the whole term change in so many people has such a gut or visceral reaction, right? It's so negative that as soon as something is labeled change, it typically becomes a more negative thing. Whilst, in reality, if we go back to these positive slogans, then change is the win in the sales of progress. What we're really saying is we're trying to we have the choice or the chance, to chase after opportunities that will help us progress. So we could also substitute this word by the words growth, right? If you are looking at a lot of these change projects, what we're really looking at is going after the things that we're currently not doing, but that we have decided are the biggest levers to achieve our objectives and to achieve our goals and achieve the growth as an organization or a business that we're after. So to me, terminology is a is a real thing here, because by labeling all of it change. It becomes negative, and to me, that becomes a lot less helpful. All, and I'll get back to that time and time again.

In this story today, there are proactive and reactive changes. And yeah, reactive changes, to me, are typically more negative, because it suggests that, that it's a must, right, that you've identified a change you must make, hence you're deciding to do it reactively, but potentially it's also too late. However, if you do everything I'm going to talk about in this podcast, and then in this episode, and then become somebody who is reactive, because you're very or super selective with which changes you're taking on board and perusing proactively. And that means that there are times when you've missed it, but you've got the capability to then jump on it and make these changes, these reactive changes, quick and nimbly, great, then I think you're in a great space. But typically, reactive changes are kind of the worst. Very few organizations go too far in being proactive in change. So not entirely sure if these labels are very helpful, because by the time you've teed up your change project, I'm not entirely sure you're still really proactive, or you're addressing the change in the moment as and when it's needed. What to me, maybe is more helpful is whether you're looking at adaptive change, so switching in the moment versus transformative change. If you are doing adapting, I think change becomes an unhelpful label to me. If you as a business, have the focus and you know where you're going, adapting shouldn't feel like change if I'm in my routine, because I know where I'm going. My kids need to go to school. I need to go to the office. There's these other things in life that I'm doing. Then what's changing around me all day, every day, is the weather or a change in the normal school schedule, or I have a work trip, right? And it's still my normal job, but I'm going to be out of town, so I have a slight disruption to the routine for those things to those things will adapt all day, any day. And so I think that's a great analogy to look at it in the workplace, if you have clarity and focus around where you're going, then adaptive change should be totally manageable, and it shouldn't really feel like change. It should feel like minor course corrections that are quite logic and that most people in your organization feel empowered to make there and then, or even if they're slightly larger adaptations because of a project with several partners, and there is a change in deadlines, or there is a change happening. You're working with a government partner, and so there's some disruption to the schedule, because the elections are more difficult than you thought, or it takes them longer to put new people in departments, etc. It's a nuisance. But if your project team and your knows where they're doing and where they're going and what the other levers are on the project, then you can adapt. And I don't think it helps to call it change. Transformative. Change is definitely change, and I'm not arguing that stuff that sits in the category of culture change, process changes, imposed external events. So legislation changes, for instance, that impact the way you do certain things in your business. To me, these are transformative changes, and they're kind of the must do change projects, and you'll always have a few of those, and a it's important that you get to the smartest way and the most effective way of delivering these and that you really get smart about the must do element of it, right, what really all these things is paramount to your survival and the success of your business and remaining compliant with whoever you need to remain compliant with but let's not make these bigger than they need to be.

Then there are other change project which often get labeled change projects, such as strategic or reorganizations or capitalizing on external opportunities. And to me, it's not always helpful to call these change projects, because to me, these things should be part and parcel of the normality of doing business. You're doing a strategic project, you're doing a reorganization, you're doing major adaptations to how you operate, or you're trying to cap. And external opportunities, because it's in line with where you're trying to go. So is in line with your overall corporate objectives. It's in line with your your vision and mission. And so these projects or these scopes shouldn't be labeled change. They can be labeled projects if they require a certain level of organization around them, but it should be very clear to everyone in your organization why these things need to happen. They should be quite logical, and yes, there's work in those to answer questions and fine tune directions. So there's some beverages and convergence needed to progress these ideas. They're not necessarily changed. They're the right thing to do change. I think we should reserve change for the projects and the scopes that are really kind of like you know, you need to really significantly turn the wheel to actually get a course force change on these subjects. And it's not going to be easy, right? It requires a certain level of for like the words force here, but it requires work to get to reinstate that force correction. And says, if you're a massive ship, it's not going to go fast and easy, and so there is real change work needed. You're not plotting a better or a different course, you're really plotting a change in direction. So that's a lot about the definition. We'll come back to the question you find yourself in just too much of it, right? This is all nice and clear or nice and vocabulary talk, but what to actually do about these situations? So typically, this is a contributing factor, so you might need to do some other stuff first to not jeopardize business continuity. And we've, we've talked plenty about that in some of the other episodes. So assuming you've addressed whatever is needed for business continuity or safety, and are now on to saying, okay, you know, we address the direct emergency, but the real big deal underneath all that is that we're just operating with too much change. You need to create a pause. You need to create breathing space. And really, yeah, pause all of your change goals, unless there are some that could cause harm to people if you don't keep them moving. But you need to create the space to take stock. And so effectively, I would challenge you that you need to reduce your list by 20% so I would go back to your vision and your mission and your goals. Where are you going as an organization? What are all the change initiatives or projects that you have on your plate? How do they contribute to the bottom line of where you need to go? What's driving these projects? So what are the must do scopes and must do should be things that you can't decide on, right? Just saying, must do scope, if you say, I must do this, because to stay ahead of the competition, there needs to be more behind this. There needs to be numbers, or there needs to be some good reasoning, and you should be able to explain that much better, because how are you otherwise going to rally your people behind it? So really be open and transparent and honest with yourself and with your organization and say,

Okay, which of these are ours to choose, which one must be done and what drives their timelines? 8020, totally applies. You're better off working also on a fewer initiatives and really delivering that well, no than working too many parallel. Your decision makers are not able to cope with it, you're going to get interface issues. You're working on things on too many sides of the business, with too many people getting totally engrossed in their own process, and hence not being well enough aware of what may be happening elsewhere, and hence not being able to speak up about the little things that may matter for their part of the business. So doing more of them in parallel is also really going to reduce the quality. Don't continue whilst you're doing this reassessment. It shouldn't take 100 years. If you hire an external facilitator and you bring in the people who are working these projects, we'd all need very elaborate details. It's a conversation, right? It's sitting two days around the table, or maybe only an afternoon around the table, and flesh out what we know about these projects and put them in a manner that we can compare them, and we can have the debate about the trade offs and the conversations. And that might then mean that we leave that meeting with a few action. Points to quantify some things and make not all the decisions there and then, but then we should be able to come back 24 or 48 hours later and make the decisions. You should be able to pause these scopes that long. Don't continue on the low burn and drag this out, because you're just burning more energy that people already don't have whilst they know that you might not continue these projects, right if you're doing if you're making decisions on continue or stop, that decision making should be fast, and if you cannot do it fast, and you should put the people who are working these initiatives. You should put them on what is it that they need to provide you so that you can make the decision, rather than letting them run on the low burn, go as you are. But in parallel, we're making decisions on whether we want your project to happen at all. Not helpful, and if you do, then you better help that specific team. If there is exceptions to that rule, you better be able to very explicitly explained to the team, while you still think it's sensible for them to continue working at a change initiative while you are making your decisions, and one of the few places where I could see that makes sense if you're having portfolio level investment decisions and that involves lots of other partners, yeah, but Then the answer might be to the project team, we know that this opportunity doesn't lie great with what our partners in this project have, what else they have in their portfolio. So we know they are not as enthusiastic, but we really believe in this project, and when we finally meet with them, we're going to bat for it. And on that basis, we want you to continue as you are, because we believe in this, so that the people who are working it have that trust and know that this is what the business, or anyone's and what's best for the business from for their part of the business or that they work in. And they'll still be frustrated, and if there's a different change in decision, but they'll feel better about the work that they did in that continuum, and might also make some different choices or proposals in prioritizing what they then work on, for instance, on stuff that may be more relevant to the partners, so that you can argue the case better, and maybe they'll rejig things for you a little bit, so that you're not investing in a new piece of work a week before the decision, when it's maybe possible to stall that a little bit without major schedule impact till the week after the decision, for instance. That brings me to the role of leadership, and I've alluded to it before.

Change overload also typically happens when there is not enough clarity and focus on where the business is going, or it's been diluted, or the goals are maybe clear at the very high level, but there is a larger organizations, and it's not really clear how the organizations, the different bits and pieces of the organization, contribute to that overall goal. It's not clear how the decisions were made that these changes are needed, or how they contribute to the overall success of the company. So the why is very important, and it may be that you need to do work to strengthen your goals and your vision and your mission, and to take the time to make a better breakdown as to where the different parts sit in this. And I would assume that if you actually create a pause and go through your list and try to bring it down to 20% and pause the rest that you'll find out if you have lack of clarity, because if you cannot decide, or you're in in perpetual disagreement which projects are more important to the business, then it means that there's lack of alignment of what that goal really means, or there is too much room for differentiating interpretation, which not helpful. And so you should go back to the leadership and say we need more clarity to actually make these decisions, AND, OR, AND, OR if you the leaders, you should also accept that you might need to take charge and spend some time on that scope. Because what I want you to do once you've hit the pause button and try to call down your list is that you actually would create a change register, except that I don't want you to call it a change register, in my head, it should be an opportunity register, because it reflects choices. It reflects choices on all matter of scopes that you could do to improve how you operate, to improve your efficiency, or to deliver growth, or to capitalize on external opportunities that are coming around. And you need to prioritize therein. You can go back to Episode Five. You need to prioritize therein, which are the biggest lever, and go after that. So having these projects that you're now going to pause because they didn't make it in. 20% they need to go back in that register. They may need better or more or different level of definition, so they might need some work before they make it on that list, so that you can actually periodically have a quality debate about what is on that list and make clear decision, saying, Okay, once we finish this one, we're going to kick off this one, or we're going to pursue that one, if it's a must for survival of the business. Again, it's not change, and it shouldn't be difficult to sell. It's a project to remain compliant, and it could be a change project, but it's still a project, and it's not a choice. So it should have very clear it shouldn't be hard to rally your staff and your organization about behind the need to do this. So they should not necessarily be on this project, on these lists, but I do think that you need to resource load your overview and have also a sensible balance between where does all the change sit. Then you need to create a habit of revisiting this periodical and think really about the wording. Go back to the wording. What these are? Are these really changes, or is it culture process? Is it really going to be work to turn the wheel and change course or and those need more attention. Are harder. You probably also want to get some third party support to drive these scopes. There is very few people who have experience delivering these kind of things successfully. You probably have plenty of resources in house who are more than capable to do the projects that we shouldn't be calling change that are chasing after opportunities and around are around the divergent and convergence on, how do we capitalize on these opportunities to facilitate our growth so restructuring to be better tailored in line with that strategic adaptation, external opportunities, etc, you probably have plenty of resources internally to move to work these so, yeah, an opportunity register which is really your project, and change scopes with clarity on what they would deliver and where they sit, some quantification, clear definition of success. All these things are important to have in there.

And then you probably also want to put some level of the how tough these scopes are to deliver, right? So what is give yourself some assessment of your ability to deliver these successfully, and I think a relative ranking of, you know, pretty easy, harder, hardest and likelihood of success, low, medium, high. Not saying don't go after the high projects, but if then the projects or the scopes that you choose to progress are all in the difficult and High Scope, you might want to reassess by whether you really want to deliver all those in parallel, because it's again, unlikely that your energy levels will stay where they need to be in the organization. That you can build trust that you're really going to do it differently by chewing off that much in one go. And yeah, the chances that you will deliver and really achieve all those successes in parallel is severely diminished by stretching yourself sitting then inevitably, you're gonna have some change projects that you did start and that are 80% through or 60% through, and then you're gonna say, Yeah, March, I hear you, we try to reduce to 20% we're hopeful we can do that in the future. But we've also started some things and invested in things and and now they're half finished. So what do we do with these half baked have baked cookies and so, yeah, adding those require some difficult conversations. I definitely think if you are in change overdose, and you really have a portfolio scope and a larger organization, and you need to sort this out that you want an external facilitator. You don't need somebody for weeks or months and ends. You need somebody who will challenge you there and then in the meetings, to keep things even keeled, to challenge you around the why, and you know, Bucha a little bit again and again, to make sure that you strip things really back to what's needed. Because the reason you're also there is that you've been telling yourself for a long, long time that all. All of these things need doing, right and so challenging you a little bit on your thinking around this, because it's so, yeah, it's a change from where you are on all these scopes. It really benefits from a fresh pair of eyes and ears and also somebody who can really help you to remember to look externally at all your stakeholders. Chances are that if you find yourself in a situation you're very inward focused, and become more and more inward looking, because there were so many moving parts and variables internally that you had to keep track of, you might have lost sight of some other stuff that's also happening. So I would bring in an external person, and then that person can also help you have a look at your stalled projects, so to speak, is a little bit on a case by case basis. But I would imagine that if you invested significantly in changing out your financial system, for instance, right? And you've done that, and you somehow the consultants already gone, and it's supposed to be live, but too few people are actually comfortable with it, and so you're running daily into issues. You're you're not yet getting all the reports out of it that you need, and you, for sure, are not having all the benefits that the new system had promised. Then, yeah, that might be a scope where you say, I would love to drop it, but it needs finishing first. So what then needs to happen is a good conversation, and again, some help from somebody who's been through this, who's managed to get unstuck projects unstuck, to really say, okay, because this happens everywhere, everywhere, right? So there is plenty of case studies.

So getting some help in somebody who will figure out in your case, okay, you might need to get the specialist, contractor or the the systems owner back in, but you don't want to sign a blanket check and get them in for months again, you want to bring them in with extremely clear agreements on what it is then they're still going to do. You also want to hold yourself accountable and define success very clearly. What is it that needs to happen for these projects to be declared finished and have delivered on their promise? And is all of that still feasible? Or are you saying, Okay, we're going to take this as a regret, but this piece of it does need delivering and actually finishing, because otherwise we've end up with nothing or dysfunction, and that in itself, is not helpful for business continuity. So I understand there's clearly going to be change initiatives or projects that need finishing, and maybe initially you're not able to reduce that list down to 20% but be careful if you really want to show your organization that is going to be different, you're not going to get five chances. You're probably not even going to get three chances, and you might get two at best. So the trust is gone. People have experienced this for a long time, and so you're doing a whole exercise of saying, we're going to cut it down to only doing those scopes, and then say, Oh yeah, but we're also going to do all these loose ends and fix that, and then after that, it will be better, particularly if some of these are not fixed within a few weeks, but take a few months, then people are going to be very wary that after those few months, you've forgotten what you told everybody today, and are going to be back into the swing of doing too many things all at once. So that's where it really requires some major conversation and dialog and a lot of prioritization working the trade offs to really and clarity and communication why you're making the decisions you're making, and following through with periodic updates to that so that when things start to drag again, or when it looks as if things are not changing, that people also see that. That you see that, right? So if the example of the financial system, you've chosen the projects that you're going to push, the rest is stalled and you but then you said on top of that, we're going to change the financial system stuff, and that's going to take another three and a half months. And then three and a half months becomes four and a half months. For whatever reason, we need to communicate say, okay, that's that's a setback. This is why we still believe that we are are changing. And hopefully, if you're then three months in and need to tell everybody that it's going to be instead of another two weeks, another six weeks or something, people have also seen changes by then in the different way, in how you operate. Which brings me to the last, but not the least place this, of course, needs to be systemic. You need to somehow figure out a way to to really stick to not doing too many projects at the same time. You definitely need to do.

Change vocabulary with tools like decision making, having an opportunity register, having very clear metrics and clear definitions and clear framing of your projects. What are they supposed to deliver? What are the outcomes we're looking for? What is the signs of success that these projects and opportunities are actually delivering what we set out to do, and only then do we chew off new bytes. You need to learn to say no, you need to resource load. And I'm not saying that everybody needs to put in place a whole continuous improvement organization, but you do want to become agile instead of change leading. And by that I mean, and it brings me back to where I started, around the vocabulary, if you have clarity and focus on where you're going, and you're working a few major initiatives on top of regular business, because they're facilitating growth, and they help you go after the opportunities that will deliver your business's goals and vision. It should be really clear for people why these projects need to be pursued, and people should be happy working those because they've got clarity. And if there's then change coming at them that might mean course correction to their day to day jobs. It should feel like the weather, right? It should feel like, okay, we're gonna have a storm warming for the next three days, and so I might need to prepare that my kids get home from school. I sent home from school where, you know, and have a storm day off. People can accommodate that. A little bit of a gripping about it, but there should what changes coming at you? The adaptive change should feel doable and should be within people's remit and empowerment, and they should feel that they can deal with that themselves. And then when you have some of these real change course corrective projects, right around culture, around processes, around external must do compliance factors, then those have become fewer and with clear definition and clear articulation, why you choose to do them by having them resource by not having also nine Other projects that require your attention. In parallel, going on by having them focused and resourced and in place with clear definitions and clear discipline in how you run them, they'll still won't be great and nobody's going to love them, but they stand a so much better chance of success. So in short change, overdose is very normal and happens everywhere, all the time. Unfortunately, you really need to do active work and deploy active change. Unfortunately, that is the word this falls into the definition of change. A must do change. You really need to put in the work to get to a course correction list. And the course correctional this is creating the breathing space. Bring in the external help. Bring in somebody who's done this, who knows what this looks like, who comes with a fresh pair of ears and eyes, who doesn't bring the luggage, who can play back to you what you're saying, and these conflicts that you no longer see because you've been in the same space for so long, the conflicting priorities, or the unclarity on how you articulate it and how it comes out in other parts of you. Or is it all that the whole communication piece and the whole structuring piece for alignment, what these scopes are and are not, bring in an external resource to help you with that. It shouldn't be a long term commitment. The right management consultant can really help you out effectively and quite quickly. With this, you need clarity and focus on where you're going, and you need to transfer this wild growth of scopes back to a central register, or a central decision making point where it's all the proposals for stuff to go after are put on a pile and assess periodically to only chase a few in parallel and actually deliver on them and then chew off The next bite. So and you can be quite agile in that, and you can course correct and change also in that. I understand that this, as I also started, all of this is a popular topic, not because people love it, but because so many people experience this and recognize this. I'd love to talk more about this. There is much more to say and do in this space.

So if you have feedback, if you have requests on which specific challenges you would like me to address or hear more about, then I would love that, and I will definitely take it on board and make sure that whatever we address in future episodes. Those around this subject is tailored to what you as a listener would like to hear most. So thank you for tuning in today, and I hope you all found at least some nuggets to start crawling your way out of change overdose today. Thank you.