Transcript
Ray Spadoni (0:00)
Foreign welcome to Leading Organizations that Matter, a podcast about leadership, organizational culture and how we find meaning and purpose in our work. I'm your host Ray Spadoni, and today's topic is Capabilities versus Commitment during Times of Change. First, a quick word going, I guess behind the scenes. I've thoroughly enjoyed conducting interviews in the expanded format of this podcast, and the very nice increase in subscribers seems to suggest that many of you do as well. So I'd like to say thank you. Thank you for listening, for subscribing, and for your reviews. They're all quite helpful, but I've also received some feedback that many of you miss the essay episodes as well. In the words of one person who commented, please go back to the short and snappy ones, so I'll start mixing those types in as well. Here's to short and snappy. On with the show, I write, speak and preach about organizational change. In my book I describe the many reasons that organizations fall into a pattern of continuing decline and then I go through a number of ways to change the trajectory toward a more positive future. I also work with leaders who are facing the need to manage a change agenda, both as a consultant and as a coach, which are two very different roles. Maybe I'll do an episode on that topic sometime soon, but in any event, I work with leaders and leadership groups that need to change course, and sometimes that's hard. I like to break the initial discussion down into two major categories of actions. The first is best described as capabilities and the second as commitment. Capabilities has to do with the assets and resources available to manage the change to conduct it. This includes things like management talent and financial reserves and technology, and it is important for these leaders to have a sense of what it's going to take in order to manage the change and then whether they have the right horses, so to speak, the ones that are necessary to power the change. I'd characterize these as the hard assets, but then there are of course the soft assets. These are, I would say, best described as commitment. Here you need to make sure that your leaders understand and are fully committed to to whatever it will take to develop and manage the change. This also has to do with organizational culture and so when a leader or team is considering the commitment level within their organization, they have to take a hard look in the mirror and assess their decision making framework, communication, style and effectiveness, and whether there is sufficient trust in that organization to withstand the coming rapids. In my experience, inventorying capabilities is far easier than commitment, but both are quite important. Also, beefing up each requires very different approaches, skill sets, comfort levels, and performance indicators. In my book on this topic, Saving Organizations that Matter, and on this podcast I have described the notion of running through a tunnel of fire. A high level and probably pretty incomplete summary of that is that some organizations are able to do the near impossible that is run through a perilous tunnel of fire. Why? How can some organizations do something so difficult while others fail? I talk about the fact that there are two critical characteristics of the successful organizations first, a compelling and highly motivating vision, and second, a significant level of trust among those who are running through the tunnel. Together. The vision pertains to creating a sense that whatever lies on the other side of the tunnel is worth running toward. And the trust has to do with co workers feeling as though the risk is lessened because the people running with them have their backs. As I said, this is a quick and incomplete description of the metaphor, but I include it here because anyone wondering about the commitment level in their organization for change must ask themselves first, is our vision well articulated, compelling and motivating? And second, do we possess the kind of leadership and broader organizational culture that fosters respect, trust and mutuality? If the answer to either or both of these questions is not really, then you may find yourself with all the capabilities in the world to conduct a major organizational transformation, but lacking the necessary commitment. And that will prove to be a showstopper. Thanks for listening. I hope you'll consider leaving a five star review on Apple Podcasts or your platform of choice that will help others find us here. My mission is to help empower organizations that matter by supporting those who lead them. Feel free to learn more about me and my work@redsaleadvisors.com.