Question

Is there a difference between working the overall change process and finding short-term wins to h...

Is there a difference between working the overall change process and finding short-term wins to help motivate leaders, staff, and colleagues by applying change that is easy to complete--to finding political short-term wins to make it appear that the process is moving forward successfully by satisfying a few to get them off your back?

  1. What is the danger of finding “political” short-term wins? (Or is there a danger?)
  2. How can political short-term wins be avoided?
  3. Have you ever had an experience like this?
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Answer #1

Solution –

The overall change is a slow movement and requires a lot of patience and effort. Working on an overall change requires a lot of push – backs to be handled and a continuous persistent effort. Usually in large organizations while trying to keep the employees, leaders and other stakeholders motivated towards the change some short wins are required. A point to be noted here is that a short – term win is not a gimmick but a considerable process improvement. Working on an overall change will require implementation at all levels and vertically as well as horizontally throughout. But for a short – term win the change prototype can be applied in a particular independent cluster in an organization. Short – Term Political wins are sometimes followed to –

  1. Keep the organization engaged towards the change
  2. Influence people to work on the change by just seeing quick results
  3. Keep the leaders interested so that more resources can be allocated
  4. Keep the critics silent
  5. Give a perception of movement so that time can be sought to tackle constraints

Dangers of these Short - Term Political Wins

Following are the dangers of these short – term wins –

  1. The false perception gives rise to unusual expectations
  2. The allocation of extra resources seeing short – term success gives rise to costs and the return on investments get affected
  3. The short – term wins method gives rise to the tendency to apply them frequently which derails the overall change process
  4. Short – term wins allow for a reason to avoid the core issues which can lead to bigger constraints in later part of the overall process.

Ways to avoid the political short – term wins –

  1. Present a bigger picture with definite milestones
  2. Be ready with examples where this change was applied outside the organization and the impact
  3. Do not give in to the tendency to apply short fixes
  4. Highlight the core issues to the leaders
  5. Always prepare the map of progress
  6. Be realistic with the changes – sometimes it is necessary to let go of an effort which is not giving the desired results.

All the above methods give the change leaders a chance to not give in for short – term political wins. The realistic approach towards the change is the best way.

Personal Experience

In one of my previous organization a team of six – sigma leaders were formed to lead certain six – sigma projects in our organization. One such process improvement project was initiated across the organization – Break Buster. The intent of the project was to handle breaks at all levels in the process life cycle. After about 8 months when no considerable results were visible the team concentrated on one department and made some process changes to increase efficiencies. This led to flying results for that department and some critical resources that were being demanded by the change team were allocated on the pretext that these short results were promising but due to the interdependent linkages these short fixes in the process exerted pressure on other departments which led to some lags in the downstream. Instead of deliveries speeding up, there were certain delays which led to another set of short fixes. What resulted was that the change team avoided the core issues and gave in to the tendency of applying these short –term fixes. This resulted in bigger issues and finally the team had to step down and over the next couple of months the changes were reversed to get back the normal efficiencies. In my view had the team concentrated on the core issues and had not presented a false perception to the management then perhaps this project for change would have gone through with a revised scope.

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