4 Steps to Transformation in an Organisation

Now that you have taken a decision that you need to think about this a little more, put your toe in the water and see how warm it is. Let me talk about possible ways you could think about implementing some of the organizational changes which I am talking about to move from a pyramid based organisation to more collaborative enterprise, which I call a Star.

In any transformation journey we have to learn from our past. I think philosophically I always believe that transformation should be caused through catalyst actions not mass changes, but catalyst actions which are small have huge impact on the organisation or on your teams.

While I walk you through the How of possible change from a pyramid organisation to a Star organisation, my advice is do not try to undertake a mass change. Don’t arrive in your office one day and call your team to say, you know what, I heard Vineet talk about this, I like it and I want to change. Don't do that. Think of small catalyst actions, and we will talk a bit more about that a bit later.

The first step to transformation I would believe is to go back in history and see how did Nelson Mandela, how did Gandhi, how did Martin Luther King - all these are my heroes achieve transformation. They took three simple steps, which are very interesting for us to learn from.

First they showed us the mirror and said that wherever you are, you are a slave, or you are not free and they created dissatisfaction with our current being today. We honestly looked at the mirror, we understood where we are, we felt unhappy with where we are, that’s the first step.

The second step which they took was they created a vision for tomorrow: That you can be free. The vision for tomorrow, of freedom or whatever that new vision is, so compelling that people start believing that their unhappiness with this current today and their happiness with the vision of future - what I call the romance of tomorrow - is so attractive is that they do want to go there. So you create the need for change by these two actions.

And then what you do (in the third step) is you connect the dots. These leaders connected these dots and led masses and masses of population towards their vision and everybody followed. So they led from behind by ideas and by creating dissatisfaction with today and a promise of tomorrow, which is what I call the romance of tomorrow.

Now that we have understood these three simple steps from a transformation point of view, what specific steps can you take in your organisation or your team to bring about this change? I think the steps are the same.

The first step is what I call is ‘Mirror Mirror’. The reason I call it a Mirror Mirror is exactly like these three leaders. You need to go back to your team and honestly communicate your current position, honestly communicate whether you are a leader or you have conveniently sliced and diced the data to make yourself a leader. And in ninety percent of cases, if you are honest, you will find that actually you have conveniently positioned yourself as a relative leader. But in absolute form, you know in your heart that there are miles to go.
I think creating the need for change through a Mirror Mirror exercise is very critical. Unless you are honest about where you are today, you will not change. So that’s the point A and then create Point B in terms of what is your vision, where do you want to go, what is the aspiration, where does your team want to go. Then get a sense - does the team buy into the argument that you are professing. So that’s your Mirror Mirror: Getting the point A and your point B together.

In my mind, the second step you need to take after creating the need for change is create a culture for change. Unfortunately in the environment which we are in today, with Lehman Brothers and a lot of organisations falling flat, the trust quotient between the employees and the management is at its lowest level and for the right reason. Most management behaviour was very aligned to stock markets and not aligned to employees or, for that matter, even customers. Therefore the trust quotient is very weak, and when you say trust me, I would say Why should I ? To create the culture of trust should be the second step. How do you create the culture of trust? I believe one way of creating trust is by pushing the envelope of transparency. The higher the degree of transparency you exhibit with your teams and organisation, the more trust you would create.

So we talked about creating a need for a change and then creating an environment or culture for change. Now you are ready for change.

The third step is what I call invert the pyramid. And the reason invert the pyramid is important is for the value reasons and value zones I talked about. How do you invert the pyramid? You invert the pyramid through small catalyst actions - we will talk about them - by making the management as accountable to the employees as the employees are accountable to the management. You start inverting by taking some small actions but philosophically believe that the management has to be accountable to employees as much as employees are accountable to the management. I will talk a bit more about how you can go about doing that.

The fourth step, which is very important is what I call destroy the office of manager or destroy the office of the CEO. What I mean to say is: Transfer the ownership of change, transfer the ownership of transformation, transfer the ownership of innovation back to the employees. If you do that then the true innovation, true value really gets created.

So I would say these four steps introduced in your teams into the organisation, using small catalyst ideas, are going to start doing wonderful things in your organisation, It has worked for me, I think you should also try it and it will work for you.