Two-hour Executive Briefing on Change

The first requirement for successfully leading organization-wide change is helping executives gain insight on the change process and how to lead people through change.  Without this key knowledge on the part of an organization’s leaders, change efforts are more likely to fail.

The Executive Briefing can be used as an initial strategy for developing critical knowledge and awareness in key leaders, including executives and any group that is defining needed changes and seeking to drive them through an organization or one of its units.

Objectives:

• Identify the reasons for initiating a change
• Introduce the Journey Through Change Model and its applications
• Understand how our attitudes and habits effect our response to change opportunities
• Recognize the impact that change has on the organization, employees, customers, and other stakeholders
• Understand the importance of a clear change vision or crystallized goal
• Develop a thoughtful strategy for effective change implementation and sustaining commitment to change.

Workshops for Managers and Supervisors

Successful change initiatives depend upon managers and supervisors taking an active role in introducing the change and then guiding people through the emotional journey in response to change.  Without effective leadership from those to whom they look for guidance, direction, support, and feedback, employees of an organization going through change are likely to be perplexed, confused, angry, frustrated, and openly resistant to new ways of doing business.  That’s why this workshop for managers and supervisors is so important.  Without strong managerial and supervisory leadership, employee commitment to the change will take longer to achieve or may fail to take hold at all.

The one-day workshop helps managers and supervisors develop critical knowledge and skills concerning their responsibilities for leading change for their departments, teams, or organizational units.  An additional half-day workshop is offered as an option to help integrate, reinforce, and enhance participant learning approximately six to nine weeks after the original one-day workshop.

Typical Objectives for One-Day Workshop:

• Recognize the impact that change has on employees and how it might effect customers and other stakeholders
• Identify the actions that leaders and staff take to enable the most healthy response to change
• Describe the forces behind organizational change and the implications for the organization
• Develop resilience in those effected by the change
• Develop a plan for guiding people through the change.

Typical Objectives for Half-Day Follow-Up:

• Review the integrated model for leading change
• Answer questions about the integrated model
• Discuss the progress the participants are making in helping people through organizational change
• Identify additional steps participants can take to enhance their change leadership abilities.

Workshops for Employees

The people who most often are affected by change and those who end up having to implement change are an organization’s employees.  These are the people who contribute their ideas, energy, and labor to create value for the organization every day.  For this reason, any successful organizational change strategy must develop employee competencies that involve an understanding of the forces that are causing change, a knowledge of the emotional impact of change on themselves and others, and an awareness of the qualities of personal resilience in the face of organizational change.

The one-day workshop helps develop these critical employee understandings and skills.  It seeks to help employees not only to realize a positive result through an organizational change but also to enable them to offer constructive ideas and suggestions that can contribute to improving the change itself.  An additional half-day workshop is offered to help integrate, reinforce, and enhance participant learning from the one-day workshop.  Managers and supervisors are also strongly encouraged to attend and participate in the follow-up session, both to hear employee issues and concerns regarding the proposed changes and to participate in the discussion of employee ideas for improving the change plan and strategy.  Ground rules are established at the beginning of the session to ensure a safe environment for communication and learning.

Typical Objectives for One-Day Workshop:

• Recognize the impact that change has on employees and how it might affect customers and other stakeholders
• Identify the actions people can take to enable a healthy response to change
• Describe the forces causing organizational change and the implications for the organization
• Identify the losses and hidden opportunities created by the change
• Develop resilience in those affected by the change.

Typical Objectives for Half-Day Follow-Up:

• To discuss progress the participants are making in responding to the change
• To identify employee suggestions for proactively improving the change ideas and the implementation strategy and plan.