The death of change management

Are you still managing change? If so, you probably have a cultural problem. The era of change management is over.

As proof, these startups that inspire us don’t manage change. They create it, impose it and dictate the rhythm, a new rhythm. They are creative, learners, constantly reinventing and questioning, with no emotional attachment to their ways of doing things.

Conversely, companies that manage change do so reactively and often too slowly. These organizations are sometimes blinded by current results that are good, or not bad enough to create a sense of urgency.

From Everest to the Sahara, my sporting career embodies transformation. Today, whether wearing a jacket or spikes, I work with around fifty companies every year, helping them to facilitate their transformation.

Here are some ideas for organizations wishing to remain relevant and successful in markets undergoing continuous transformation:

Curb corporate nostalgia
The most successful organizations don’t wait for bad results before reinventing themselves. They know how to let go of processes, products, services and ways of doing things quickly, without emotional attachment to them.

Cultivate an optimistic sense of urgency
A culture inhabited by an optimistic sense of urgency tends to question its future. This reflection generates innovation and enables the organization to make history by transforming its industry.

This sense of urgency is positive, constructive and a spur to action. Here, the enemy is not failure, but inaction. If you’re not transforming your industry, your competitors are probably busy doing it.

Choose the right words
Change is a word to avoid. So that your team understands that change is a process and that it is constant, use the words evolution, transformation and agility instead. Your culture doesn’t change, it evolves.

Decentralize power to cultivate agility
In the mountains, you need to be able to identify threats and react quickly. God knows that at high altitude, the environment can change in a matter of minutes. In our organizations, the challenge is not to know that we need to adapt, but to be able to do so quickly.

This is a challenge for large organizations, which tend to be a little more paralyzed by their administrative structures. Decentralization and power-sharing increase the agility and therefore the performance of our major companies. What’s more, this sharing of power has the effect of boosting commitment, by intensifying employees’ sense of usefulness, and thus enabling them to achieve their full potential.

Start hiring
Looking for the right fit? Culture fit is good, but culture add is better. Hiring is the perfect opportunity to build an agile culture, adding expertise, perspective and attitude that were previously missing from the team.

Hire with humility, choose candidates who will challenge you.

Don’t add anything to your teams’ plate
A comment often heard from executives: “My teams have been through a lot of change, and they’re tired.”

Transformation doesn’t mean adding tasks. This means aligning new actions with new objectives. Let’s take a leaf out of Netflix’s Stop-Start-Continue recipe. So, three questions to think about frequently: “What should we stop doing, what should we keep doing, and what should we start doing?”

Develop a learning culture
Organizations that know how to adapt know how to experiment. They experiment and learn constantly, without waiting for a crisis, in order to prepare for the future and maintain their leadership position. Make learning the ultimate goal.

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“Change is a process, not an event”.

This phrase was made famous by John Kotter… 25 years ago. More than ever, it makes sense. In the new economy, we’re no longer talking about change, but about perpetual motion, the pace of which will only accelerate. It’s an exciting challenge that pushes us to validate our relevance on a daily basis.

To be successful, you have to welcome this waltz, and not see it as an obstacle to be overcome. We need to build agile cultures and ensure that our people understand that change is not a project to be completed, but the DNA of the organization.

Good luck!