Ideas enough

 

 

 

Ideas enough, but how do you make them work?
 
 
We often know very well that something needs to be changed in our organization. With a little extra effort we can even think of WHAT needs to be changed, who needs to work differently, what is the “other” ultimate aim that we wish to achieve, but all the time the question arises: “How are we going to do this; how are we getting our ideas to work?”
 
In the past few months we often encountered this problem: Apparently many mangers struggle with the issue of change. We have discussed widely with many fellow-managers and have analyzed a number of concrete situations.
 
  • The need for change often results from strategic considerations: the surroundings of the organization changes: therefore the organization must change along. Out of necessity or because new opportunities and possibilities occur and one wants to react to them. The client requirements may change, or the type of client, or new products require a new approach. Etcetera.
  • Another necessity for change is the realization that business is not as good as it should be. The day to day functioning of the company is insufficient, at least in certain parts. Therefore change is required.
  • The need for change is often sensed throughout the whole organization.
  • The decision to take measures and effectuate changes are mostly discussed in a management team. The chairman of the team then takes the decision that “something needs to be done”.
  • In many cases there is even an idea of WHAT needs to be changed, what is necessary and who is involved. But still, at this point many ideas for change die a silent death. Ultimately nothing happens.
 
How is this possible? How can this be changed?
 
We are talking about the role of the tactical management: the manager who transforms strategic decisions into operational functioning. The manager who includes change management in his responsibilities: always looking for improvements, minute changes of direction, towards “working smarter”. And then also the manager that guarantees the new approach and therefore makes sure that a reversal to the old ways does not happen.
 
Recently we advised a number of companies to ask each member of their management team to include this tactical role in their daily duties: every member gets a change assignment which is being managed as a project and of which the progress is monitored within the management team. The rules of project management are strictly adhered to.
 
 
Therefore each project has:
 
  • A beginning and an end
  • A limited running time that has been determined in advance
  • A target to be reached. (what is done when it is done?)
  • A budget (in money and time)
 
We studied quit a lot of companies in their capability to change and it’s obvious that many organizations just fail. It’s very confronting to see in which miserable ways we managers sometimes do – or do not do – our work. Hopefully this article offers a sugestion how we can improve our change attitude.
 
Let’s focus on: ‘How do we make it work?’
 
 
 
Jan Boeren
 

  • tactical management: a forgotten domain

  • the rules of project management

  • take responsability for change and for result

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Documents in English

Diez iez Vietnam

This book is about the story of life of prof. Adrie van Gelderen. I met him on one of my PUM missions where he was a local representative of PUM. Adrie told me he had a manuscript of his story of life and asked me my opinion about publishing it. I promised to read it and give my comments. And indeed I did: I told him that his book would not be a profitable cash cow, however, publishing your own literary thoughts will give tremendous satisfaction, it's fun to do and it's not expensive at all.

Now Adrie was seriously ill at that time and unfortunately he passed away before we could take his book into production. So we, being Adrie's friends, decided to publish the book posthumously and donate all the refunds to his 'affiliate-foundation'.

'Diez iez Vietnam!'  is written in English. A copy can be ordered by clicking the link.