People get frustrated with the process of change, especially when they’re the one who wants the change to happen and they’re trying to get others on board.
There are a few things about progress, change, and evolution that are pretty consistent truths.
- Change is incremental more than it is ever sweeping and broad. It happens in tiny pieces over time, in a non-linear way.
- Resistance is only overcome over time, with consistent evidence, ongoing encouragement, and by presenting small, realistic steps that can be seen and felt in the short term even while working toward a long-term vision.
- Culture, mindset, and attitudinal change is some of the hardest and potentially most frustrating work there is. It’s also some of the most rewarding.
- Brute force doesn’t work. Even if you’re changing a process, the humans behind it have to do the work to make it happen. Humans are emotional creatures with egos, values, insecurities, irrational thought patterns, and pride. Those things shatter under the wrong kind of pressure. In short, you can only ever lead the horse.
- There is a point where you have to let go and realize that now might not be the time. No one can tell you what that point is.
The problem is that we hear these things, and we mostly accept that they’re true. We pay them lip service, we write blog posts about them and repeat them as soundbites in our speeches and on our Facebook pages or in our PowerPoint decks.
We convince each other that we’re more like crusaders than workers, that we’re undertaking grand missions of valor instead of messy, complicated work in the trenches.
Change is hard! Change is critical! You must stay the course, Agents of Change! This is the work of the brave, the mighty, the visionary!
And then we expect to go back to our organizations, defy all the odds, ignore everything we just said, and show everyone that we can turn our company and its leaders into the next case study for revolutionary change, overnight, because we’re smarter and savvier and more capable than everyone else.
It’s sexy to think of ourselves as “change agents”. As the ones who will go in, banner flying, colors blazing, and ignite the change that completely revolutionizes our business and our industry and catapults us into an era of innovation and brilliance like no one has ever seen.
It rarely works that way.
In fact, the people you think of when you think of “innovators” or “change agents” – the people who have really done things differently and whose work you admire – most likely have a large collection of battle scars.
From being laughed at. From feeling like they’re crazy and the only one to think the way they do. From being told no, from being pushed back on, from being fired for being too brazen, from being ignored completely and told to just be quiet and do as they’re told. From sticking to their guns, month after month after year even when it felt like they were spinning their wheels. From staying quiet many times when they wanted to holler and shout, knowing that patience was their greatest asset.
They have rolled up their sleeves and done work way above and beyond their job description without a lick of recognition, because no one adds “change stuff” to their list of responsibilities (nor does anyone pay them for it). They’ve questioned themselves a million times. They’ve probably given up more than once. They’ve fallen in the dirt, wondered why they’re bothering, thought about how much easier it would be to just do things the way everyone else does, collect their paycheck, and go home.
They’re often not the ones in the magazines or cited in all the case studies or featured on the company blog.
And they’re the ones who look back, years later, and don’t see a revolution so much as a long, winding road strewn with triumphs and heartbreak and lessons and tiny successes and lots and lots and lots of elbow grease.
The things they don’t do?
They don’t point fingers or assign blame.
And they aren’t martyrs, either.
Those who are advocating for change of some kind often get pretty convinced that we’re right. That we’re going about things the best way and that everything will be awesome once the people around us “see the light”. That our vision is the one true one that will fix everything, if only.
If you want to create effective, lasting change, you have got to check your ego at the door.
That means looking hard in the mirror once in a while to make sure that you are taking the approach that’s the best for everyone involved. It means being honest about whether your expectations are in line with the reality that suits your situation or organization. It means taking a hard look at whether you’ve gotten lazy or stubborn or yourself resistant to others’ ideas in the quest to realize the future you think is the best one.
It means being the guinea pig for your own experiments and being wiling to first ask if you can do something differently to help spark the progress you’re seeking. Being the change you want to see, instead of expecting everyone else to rally and do it for you.
I have to remind myself to do this all the time. It’s pretty harsh sometimes, actually. But it’s critical.
It’s true that change is hard.
So don’t just talk about that. Put down the self-help book, the empty motivational nonsense, the idea that your battle is harder than anyone else’s. Let go of the idea that this is anything but difficult, frustrating, methodical, constant work that will likely net you nothing more than personal pride and some self-knowledge that you made a difference, even if it was quiet.
Settle in, brace yourself, roll up your sleeves..and work at it.
Every single day.
Thanks Amber! it helps to know we’re not alone, someone else gets it, and it’s supposed to take time, be hard, be incremental. But damnit, I still want it to happen FASTER! sigh.
Here’s a question that helped me. Would it ever really be fast enough? Wouldn’t someone like you or me always find the *next* thing that needed changing? I think we would. Which means work like this is never really done, we’re never “there”. We’re just somewhere along the way.
Welcome to the human race. “Ouch.”
I very much needed to read this today. It also calls to mind other advice I have seen about “sitting on the same side of the table” as the people you’re trying to convince — doing the work to learn about those people and build those real relationships as we would personal friendships. It can be so incredibly hard to do that when information and ideas are firehosing us every day, but it is the most important element of all. Thanks for the reminder, Amber.
Thanks for the reminder of why I keep banging my head against the wall. Too often we (I) do let our (my) pride and frustration get in the way, but then I remember how change happened here – keep pushing to adopt things two steps ahead of the rest of the organization but let others pick up and begin/implement the small changes that lead to where you want the organization to be (in other words, let others who can effect change think that the idea for change was theirs). While this may not work as fast as you want it to, it does get the organization to where it may need to be. Is it frustrating? Sure. Do others get the credit? Almost always. Do you get to go home at night knowing that you are a change agent? Sure – as long as you don’t care about the “glory.”
This has been one of the best articles yet!
This offers a good perspective on change. It’s best experienced in increments, without forcibly trying to hasten the process.
Change is unavoidable.
It is the RATE and DIRECTION OF CHANGE that a change agent is trying to control or at least modify. That is in contrast to the constant incremental, random changes we always face. If a change agent cannot impact increase the rate of change at all, then they are not doing their job. That is especially true in ‘change averse’ companies or other organizations.
There’s a difference between leading change and managing change. Like a project, a managed change should have a start point and destination defined: the “As Is – To Be” approach. If you really understand where your stakeholders are now, and where you really need them to be (which is always less than the ideal), you have the advantage of a defined journey that you control.
Amber, I’m a little late to this conversation, but thought it was important enough to comment any way. This is an excellent and real life look at organizational change. I once had an agency business consultant pull me aside after his completing the agency evaluation. He told me that I was a true and effective agent of change and not to worry that he wouldn’t tell anyone about it. That’s because I had learned long ago that the one carrying the flag is the one to get shot. (S)he creates the initial momentum, but in the end,, passes the flag on the way down. I learned to work from within, building consensus one at a time by addressing each persons’ concerns (and insecurities). It’s much easier being a change agent if you are an invisible ninja. So, shhhhh. Don’t tell my secret!