So how one makes the change, if he/she feels strong that this change is a must?
Well, one of the obstacles is awareness of the problem that the change needs to address. After years of doing things certain way many people might become blind to the root cause of problems they constantly facing and assume that these problems are inevitable. This leads to attempts of patching the current processes and creating new processes, often adding significant overheads but not addressing the core problems. Surprisingly (or not so…), this approach is usually acceptable by most stakeholders as it is associated with much lower risks than the complete makeover.
First step in any change initiative is raising the awareness of the problem and the urgency for a change. Now, no one will ever bless a change initiative if the sole reason for the change is making the change. Unfortunately, in many occasions a “systematic failure” needs to occur for everyone else to see that they way things are being done now cannot scale and for the company to thrive, change must happen. At that point people might not know what exactly needs to be changed, but they already know that they cannot continue doing business as usual. For the change evangelist this creates an opportunity not to be missed.
If not successful otherwise, use the momentum of the “systematic failure” to raise the awareness of the problem and urgency of a change. Your management will gladly let you lead the task force charged with analysis of the current methods and proposal for the change.
