The LAST Word on Change (LWOC) emerged as a summary of learnings from a career spent leading change. In 2007, Todd A. VanNest, the founder of NEXT SUMMIT (http://www.thenextsummit.com/) made a new service commitment--to translate these learnings into guidance that can be shared and tools that can be used by any change leader seeking to crack the code on managing change and realizing business transformation.
Like many change partners, LWOC provides coaching and consulting services. Our commitment to helping people crack the code and succeed with change management, however, must go further. Rather than replicate available guidance, we've targeted the content in LWOC on the secrets to breaking the cycles of frustration with transformation and change.
These ANSWERS do not lie in promoting some new, proprietary change model or repackaging the same insights that are repeated in almost all published change models and service offerings. LWOC began with a powerful, but simple foundation: using research and experience-based insight to help companies (even those who have invested millions in change consulting, methods, and tool-kits and remain frustrated) to break recurring cycles of frustration with change.
Frankly, I've rationalized results to a Board of Directors, stayed hush on the real state of things when an initiative was waivering, and force fed methodology and a new language on participants in change. Granted, this was years ago, now, but in leading our research, I discovered that more and more struggling or failed initiatives have change leaders living that reality. Today, I can help leadership teams and Change Leaders understand that this state is unacceptable, and completely avoidable. The secrets lie in seeing the traps, understanding that it is the Change Leader (not a population of "natural born resistors") who is the key human element to be accounted for in managing change, and creating a REAL DISCIPLINE that drives unprecedented stakeholder and measurement focus.
Todd A. VanNest, Ph.D. (Founder, NEXT SUMMIT; Creator, LAST Word on Change).
If you are like most change leaders, you have shelves of books, acquire piles of articles on how to manage change, and have access to the training and consulting that now crowd the marketplace. So...this raises two questions:
1-Do we REALLY need one more "expert" source on this topic?
and...
2-Can you REALLY say anything is, "The LAST Word?"
Watch our brief slideshow
"The Audacity of The LAST Word"
Nearly 70% of all change efforts fail. Holding change teams accountable for the full impact projected in the business cases presented at the beginning of transformation and change initiatives will most certainly produce an even more jaded view of success.
If your company is not in that hard-to-identify minority for which every change effort yields projected business transformation results, you are in the majority of change leaders who are open to new ideas and share our commitment to cracking the code on change, or...
"Finding that place where change meets execution!"
Click on title above to view Case Study.
If you are committed to finding the secrets to this connection, read on...
Really?...Something New in Change?
Is it possible that SOMETHING NEW can be said about MANAGING CHANGE?
Have the "CHANGE GURUs" MISLED US in some ways (or moved us to place focus on the wrong things)?
Is there a way to understand where CHANGE meets EXECUTION?
Is it possible to KNOW that we'll deliver expected results?
Can we adopt a NEW DISCIPLINE without spending more on consulting and (RE)teaching our teams the change/project methods we've adopted?
No doubt, change is complex, BUT is it possible to install a NEW DISCIPLINE within a change team IN ONE DAY?
IN A WORD...YES!
Many companies have learned tough lessons and "had it" with the inability to capture the value promised by their transformation efforts and capital projects. Still, most initiatives fail to capture the benefits promised in the business cases upon which they were launched. This investment is NOT misguided, but many change leaders have come to realize that the most measurable outcomes produced through such investment are NOT greater results. Rather, predictably, they include a dramatic increase in consulting fees, hours of training, and production of elaborate, yet one-way communications.
There is no doubt that tapping consultants for expertise and a method they promote as trusted and "proprietary" may help. However, examining their fee structure (motivation), models, and their wares (deliverables) reveals little or no ownership of, or focus on, results. Since the overwhelming focus on their guidance and tools is not focused on producing results, the gurus and their models are NOT a logical source for guidance on EXECUTION.
Click here to link to our Blog Posting on 5 Ways Change Management Models are Incomplete!
Our research on transformation success and failure has revealed that while method and outside perspective can facilitate change, nearly all change guidance simply repackages the same core ideas. Fighting over method and control is costly and distracts from execution. Teams that adopt a linear and mechanical "implementation" mind-set rather than driving full and complete adoption of new practices are doomed to fail. Winning companies don't reinforce the finger-pointing and rationalization of results that mark failed transformations...LWOC is based on research indicating that change leaders in successfully transforming companies activate a different path - one that includes the following:
*Focusing on LEADING INDICATORS of CHANGE; and
*ADAPTING TO FEEDBACK with a discipline that typically
wanes in change projects after the launch phase.
At LWOC, we teach leaders to help their organizations bring together change
and execution--putting in place a new discipline in place and achieving their
transformation goals. Let us share the simple, frame-breaking disciplines that will move your change leaders to:
__ LAUNCH & INSPIRE project teams;
__ SECURE unparalleled top management support;
__ GET results with the change methods & tools you already have;
__ RE-ENERGIZE and RE-FOCUS active change teams; and
__ BRING together change and execution.
The LAST Word on ChangeTM is our proprietary insight about this new discipline that will help your team link execution and change. We would be pleased to share this insight with you and your change teams and business transformation champions.
Click here to contact us learn more about the Secrets to Re-Igniting and REcovering Change Success!