bring data to the table

In the wry words of N.R. Narayana Murthy, former chairman of Infosys, “In God we Trust; everybody  else brings data to the table.” Managing the program dynamically depends on good data. You have to be clear from day to day how much progress you’ve made against your plans. That means regularly measuring the impact of your change program on at least four key dimensions:

1. Initiative progress. Track progress not just in terms of time (milestones) and budget (money spent versus planned), but also against key operational performance indicators (e.g., cycle time, waste, wait times, quality). 

2. Health impact. Are management practices and their underlying mindsets and behaviors shifting to support the improvements in performance that you want to see? Targeted analytics, surveys, focus groups, and observation can give you a good read.... 

3. Performance impact. Measure key business outcomes such as revenue, cost, and risk to confirm that improvements are happening where you expect and not causing unforeseen consequences elsewhere in the organization. 

4. Value creation. Keep a constant eye on the ultimate outcome that matters. In large-scale company-wide change programs, this measure is shareholder value creation…. It is vital to have a clear-eyed view of the ultimate outcome that maters most amidst all of the other data. 

Scott Keller and Bill Schaninger

Beyond Performance 2.0: A Proven Approach to Leading Large-Scale Change. John Wiley & Sons, Inc. 2019

the correct attitude of mind

Until the mid-1950s, the four-minute mile was regarded as beyond human achievement. Even medical journals judged it unattainable. Yet, in May 1954, a medical student named Roger Bannister smashed through the barrier with a time of 3 minutes, 59.4 seconds. In his memoir, Bannister explained he did what was once thought impossible by spending as much time conditioning his mind as his body. He wrote, “The mental approach is all-important… energy can be harnessed by the correct attitude of mind.”

What is perhaps more amazing is that two months later, the four-minute barrier was broken again, by Australian John Landy. Within three years, 16 runners had followed suit. So, what happened here? Was it a sudden spurt in human evolution? A new super-race or genetically engineered runners? Of course not. It was the same physical equipment, but with a different mindset: one that said. “This can be done.” No doubt there are some “four-minute mile”-like mindsets sitting beneath the behaviors you see in your organization that, if broken trough, will unlock a whole new level of performance in a similar manner to Bannister's effect on the running community. 

Scott Keller and Bill Schaninger

Beyond Performance 2.0: A Proven Approach to Leading Large-Scale Change. John Wiley & Sons, Inc. 2019

no one knows how to use them

In Scott Keller's book Leading Organizations: Ten Timeless Truths, co-written without colleague, Mary Meaney, he recounted a travel experience that is particularly salient on the topic of skill-sets. Scott was fortunate enough to visit East Timor some five years after it had become a fully independent country. He was disheartened to find that the country was riddled with poverty, in part due to its poor infrastructure, especially in light of the significant reconstruction investment that it and many other nations had made on independence. He wondered why things hadn’t changed.

As he was traveling through the country, he came across a field full of bulldozers, compactors, jaws, and all manner of heavy construction equipment ideal for road-making. The field was overgrown, the metal was rusting, and a few local kids were climbing on the equipment as if they were in a giant playground. “What’s all this?,” Scott asked. “Donations from China from when we declared independence,” came the response from his local guide. “What’s wrong with them?,” Scott asked. His guide replied, “Nothing, but no one knows how to use them.”

The aspiration of many countries, including China, to help East Timor develop as a nation was clearly bold and well-intentioned. The desired change, however, fell apart because the skill-set requirements to deliver the aspiration hadn’t been assessed or addressed. This example may seem extreme, but to us it’s emblematic of what we often see in failed change programs. Organizations make East Timor-like big investments in changing structures, systems, or processes without ensuring the skills are built to enable them to work the way they are intended. Our research backs up the premise: organizations that explicitly assess their current skill requirements against those required to fulfill their performance aspirations are 6.6 times more likely to succeed in their change efforts.

Scott Keller and Bill Schaninger

Beyond Performance 2.0: A Proven Approach to Leading Large-Scale Change. John Wiley & Sons, Inc. 2019

when we’re personally involved

Daniel Kahneman performed an experiment involving a lottery run with a twist. Half the participants were randomly assigned a numbered lottery ticket. The remaining half were given a blank ticket and a pen and asked to choose their own lottery number. Just before drawing the winning number, the researchers offered to buy back all the tickets. They wanted to find out how much they would have to pay people who wrote their own number compared with people who were handed a random number. 

The rational expectation would be that there should be no difference. After all, a lottery is pure chance. Every number, whether chosen or assigned, should have the same value. An even more savvy answer would be that you should have to pay the people  who write their own number ever so slightly less, because of the possibility that there will now be duplicate numbers that, if chosen, would mean the size of the price would be cut in half. 

Neither of these turned out to be the right answer. Regardless of nationality or demographic group, people who wrote their own number always demanded at least five times more for their ticket. This reveals an important truth about human nature. When we’re personally involved in “authoring” an outcome, we are far more committed to it because we feel we own it. The underlying psychology relates to our need for control, which is a deep-rooted survival instinct.

…The lesson for change leaders? If you want to increase the motivation for (and therefore, speed of) the implementation of change, it pays to involve others in creating the aspiration, even when the answer may already be clear in the mind of the leader…. Change programs whose aspirations phase is characterized by an organization-wide, collaborative effort are 1.6 times more likely to succeed. 

Scott Keller and Bill Schaninger

Beyond Performance 2.0: A Proven Approach to Leading Large-Scale Change. John Wiley & Sons, Inc. 2019

profoundly simple

Understanding evolves through three phases: simplistic, complex, and profoundly simple.

William Schutz

As quoted in Beyond Performance 2.0: A Proven Approach to Leading Large-Scale Change. John Wiley & Sons, Inc. 2019 by Scott Keller and Bill Schaninger