Changing the Way You Communicate Change
So much has been written about change management and, specifically, communicating in times of change. As a leader of change, you’ve probably dutifully studied classics such as Kotter’s 8 Steps and the Kublür-Ross Change Curve. And still, you face resistance or slow uptake.
You’re not alone. Many leaders are stymied by their employees' negative reactions to organizational change. From a biological perspective, “resistance” is curious, because the human brain is hardwired for change and growth. So it's not that people hate change, they hate the way changes are implemented – and, specifically – communicated. You can break through by elevating your communication to recognize and leverage change as an inherently human process that, when properly positioned, can fulfil the two basic human needs of acceptance and achievement. Here are three ways you can go beyond the basics to bring people along instead of bringing them to despair.
Inspire Instead of Instilling Fear
Traditional Guidance: Manifest a burning platform to create a sense of urgency
What’s the issue: When you communicate danger, you’re pointing your employees’ minds eyes towards the negative. When we as humans focus on the negative, we block out the positive. In other words, you’ve blocked out their optimism and confidence. Your words have provoked uncertainty and fear, activating everyone’s amygdala - the primitive part of the brain that can only react with fight, flight or playing dead. So you’ll see pushback (fight), active disengagement (flight) or passivity (playing dead). People don’t feel safe to take risks on new ways of working. And, since you’re the messenger, they don’t feel safe around YOU as a leader.
Your Elevated Opportunity: Understand and appeal to how the human mind works. Actively shift their focus towards the positive by inspiring with a burning AMBITION aligned with an inspiring purpose. Set out a vision that invokes collective achievement. In this way, your words will contribute to those two basic human needs of achievement and acceptance (in the form of belonging). You’ll also be engaging different parts of the brain where logic and compassion live, and so while you may instigate a dialogue, it is less likely to be a fight about all the reasons why the change won’t work. Above all, you’ll be constructing a container of safety in which people will be more likely to trust you and take a leap in the direction of the change you seek.
Create True Relevance for Others
Traditional Guidance: Tell people what's in it for them
What’s the Issue: “What’s in it for them” most often comes after what’s in it for the organization, for the shareholders, for the team, and for the customers. Rarely does corporate change truly stem from a desire to make employees’ lives better, and our communication often follows our own thought process. It’s such an afterthought that leaders tend to abbreviate it (WIFT) and tick the box. Plus, leaders are often off base, making assumptions based on their own experience, needs and desires rather than truly seeking to understand and acknowledge the experience of others. People don’t respond well to being told what’s important to them.
Your Elevated Opportunity: Start your communications by creating deep relevance for your listeners – your followers. Reflect a deep understanding of their needs and desires BEFORE you lay out what's in it for stakeholders. In order to build that deep understanding, you’ll need to actually listen to them by having 1:1 or small group conversations in which you ask really good, open questions and go beyond paraphrasing (which can often feel like mechanical talk-back “parrot-phrasing”) to true acknowledgement of their experience. Not only will you really understand what’s important to them, what’s worrying to them, and what could be inspiring to them – you’ll also build trust and a sense of safety because these people will feel seen and heard (aka that basic human need for acceptance). You'll also start to create what Kotter called “an army of volunteers” – ambassadors who will eagerly tell others how you “get it.”
Speak to Whole Person
Traditional Guidance: Present a logical argument with data, facts & metrics for success (ie, have a complete slide deck)
What’s the Issue: Your logical, fact-based argument and measurable plan ignores that humans make decisions about what they will and will not commit to with both their head and their heart. In an uncertain situation, the heart always wins. Also, the slide deck approach ignores that the speaker - YOU - is a human going through change, too. You’re asking yourself to shut off your own humanity and become a transactional machine - further distancing yourself from them and their experience.
Your Elevated Opportunity: Step into your own humanity by owning, acknowledging and sharing your own stories and repeating those you’ve been honored to hear as you’ve listened. These stories complement, punctuate and bookend the facts & data you want to present. Good stories – those with sensory details, a sense of beginning-middle-end, and a clear point – activate parts of the brain that generate memory and feeling, thus inviting hearts into the conversation. Stories bring humans together (we’re back to that sense of acceptance through belonging). When combined with a logical path towards achievement (that other basic human need), your stories will develop full-human to full-human connection, opening a door to a sense of community where it’s safe to take risks on change.
Engaging people in change isn't impossible. It simply starts by seeing, honoring – and even leveraging – those people as full human beings who simply want to be accepted and achieve, just as you do. From that foundation, you can learn skills and change the way you communicate change.
