The Way We Work 
An example of an approach to a project: Instituting Business Change
The following is provided as an example of our way of thinking and working
- Practical experience in approximately 15 major business change initiatives including integration, market repositioning, establishing new entities and joint ventures, acquisitions, mergers, divestments etc in both public and private sector has resulted in some key learning's that we believe are important to note when considering change.
- Some of the key factors leading to successful change include:
- leadership and on the ground presence by CEO and Executive team with endorsement from the Board
- ensure that all the initiatives have a clear purpose and are within an integrated framework
- create opportunities for leadership at all levels that results in innovation and achievement
- ensure a focus on customers is at the core of change and that the market positioning and service model is based on logic and research
- articulate clearly the imperatives for change within the business
- stress the emphasis of a strategy for growth and the opportunities that brings for customers and staff
- engage sufficient staff to get effective change cascading through the organisation
- recognise that not all those involved now will remain either in their current roles and in some cases the organisation
- deal with human resource issues in an open, transparent and fair way
- commit to a long term approach acknowledging at times progress appears to go two steps forward then one back
- recognise that very little change can be achieved without changing the processes and systems that create the culture or the way we do things around here.
- acknowledge integration is occurring to gain benefits from leverage and growth and not about resorting to the lowest common denominator approach
- dedicated resources are required in all stages from planning, designing, implementing and ongoing support
- The business planning frameworkwe would utilise to build the future for the integrated business will be on three platforms which are
- Positioning - refers to where the business positions itself within the market; what segments it occupies; what products it offers; what value does it offer to its customers; and what does its brand represent.
- People - means its resources to respond to its market positioning; how it organises itself to deliver its value proposition and services; what competencies it needs; how it recruits, trains, and develops; the way it operates, including culture, climate etc
- Processes - represents the business processes and supporting systems it operates in order to be efficient and effective; how it delivers its services to market; how it translates vision to operations; its communication and decision making framework
- The value of using a business planning framework is to ensure the focus is on the key components of its design rather than simply the hierarchy, format or nomenclature of its outputs eg vision, values, strategies etc.
- Accordingly all of the initiatives would be linked within this framework to ensure there was adequate focus and integration .In this way change management becomes the supporter and enabler of the business change initiatives, rather than being considered in isolation.
- The change management framework we would use to implement the agreed business approach is based on ensuring the key success factors mentioned earlier are covered. In summary it can be expressed as follows:
- Clarity -expressing clearly the direction of key objectives for the organisation and describing what success looks like with clear accountabilities for delivery
- Congruence -ensuring all effort and focus is untied with leadership at all levels being on the same agenda
- Capability -having the right people in the right jobs, organised to respond to the needs and relating with each other in a positive way
- Communication - messages and behaviours are clear, visible and consistent at all levels; feedback on performance is integral as is celebration of success
- There are many different change models and again the use of a model is valuable as an aid to ensuring that effort has a purpose and that the initiatives are integrated. The proposed model does have the capacity to apply not only to the overall programme but also to the individual projects.
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