How Leaders Introduce Changes Successfully to Their Businesses

Leaders understand that in most businesses, communication tends to closely follow the laws of gravity. It is a lot easier job to push down than it is to lift up.

Someone once said that information deteriorates upwards to the leader. Good news gets embellished and acquires many parents. Bad news gets diluted and becomes an orphan. This has the effect of preventing learning and growing within the organization and the smart leader often bypasses the hierarchy and listens to people at ground level.

The leader has to clearly understand the current situation prior to any attempt to introduce change. Within each organization there are variations of this basic situation but generally speaking the principle is still the same. Recognition for the need to change comes from your ability to pick up cues and signals from a variety of sources that have not yet interpreted or put their personal slant on the information.

Some of the very best sources of internal and external signals come from people who are in service roles within the organization. For example, drivers in the distribution part of the business often pick up valuable pieces of information. The key people are the ones that constantly cross the boundaries between the organization and the customers. They provide an anecdotal alternative to the more formal information sources such as market surveys, staff surveys, focus groups, customer complaints or information from other organizations in the same market.

This process of collecting information and analyzing perceptions that exist about your business is a vital part of the preparation for change. Knowing this information enables you as the leader to chart the direction of the change that is necessary for future progress. A key component of the whole process is the ability to practice "Active Listening." This is a difficult concept to describe but it is a lot more than just "not talking." It means hearing the message and working hard to clarify and make sense of it and then translating the implications to the business.

"Active Listening" is a vital leadership skill that can only be developed through practice and application. It is the ability to ask good questions, without presuming to answer them yourself. "Active Listening" is the art of asking how, why, when, what, and then learning to keep your mouth shut. Use your eyes and your ears and you will be surprised how much you learn. You can try at home first of all before you practice at work.

Without this skill, you will find it very difficult to introduce change which is meaningful and relevant. Of course, you have to be very careful that you are able to understand and accept information about your business which may be unpleasant and at odds with what you personally believe.