OPTIMISM - Chronicles

1. When Thomas Edison invented the light bulb, he tried over 2000 experiments before he got it to work. A young reporter asked him how it felt to fail so many times. He said, "I never failed once. I invented the light bulb. It just happened to be a 2000-step process."

2. Wilma Rudolph was the 20th of 22 children. She was born prematurely and her survival was doubtful. When she was 4 years old, she contracted double pneumonia and scarlet fever, which left her with a paralyzed left leg. At age 9, she removed the metal leg brace she had been dependent on and began to walk without it. By 13 she had developed a rhythmic walk, which doctors said was a miracle. That same year she decided to become a runner. She entered a race and came in last. For the next few years every race she entered, she came in last. Everyone told her to quit, but she kept on running. One day she actually won race. And then another. From then on she won every race she entered. Eventually this little girl, who was told she would never walk again, went on to win three Olympic gold medals.

3. In 1962, four nervous young musicians played their first record audition for the executives of the Decca recording Company. The executives were not impressed. While turning down this group of musicians, one executive said, "We don't like their round. Groups of guitars are on the way out." The group was called The Beatles.

4. In 1944, Emmeline Snively, director of the Blue Book Modeling Agency, told modeling hopeful Norma Jean Baker, "You'd better learn secretarial work or else get married." She went on and became Marilyn Monroe.

5. In 1954, Jimmy Denny, manager of the Grand Ole Opry, fired a singer after one performance. He told him, "You ain't goin' nowhere....son. You ought to go back to drivin' a truck." He went on to become the most popular singer in America named Elvis Presley.

6. When Alexander Graham Bell invented the telephone in 1876, it did not ring off the hook with calls from potential backers. After making a demonstration call, President Rutherford Hayes said, "That's an amazing Invention, but who would ever want to use one of them?"

7. In the 1940s, another young inventor named Chester Carlson took his idea to 20 corporations, including some of the biggest in the country. They all turned him down. In 1947 - after seven long years of rejections! He finally got a tiny company in Rochester, New York, the Haloid Company, to purchase the rights to his invention an electrostatic paper-copying process. Haloid became Xerox Corporation we know today.

The Moral of the above Stories:

Character cannot be developed in ease and quiet. Only through experiences of trial and suffering can the soul be strengthened, vision cleared, ambition inspired and success achieved. You gain strength, experience and confidence by every experience where you really stop to look fear in the face.... You must do the thing you cannot do. And remember, the finest steel gets sent through the hottest furnace.

   

And even the GOLD is tested against fire.

A winner is not one who never fails, but one who NEVER QUITS!

We have no right to ask when sorrow comes, "Why did this happen to me?" unless we ask the same question for every moment of happiness that comes our way.

STEERING THE CHANGE - My Approach

Me standing over at my cubicle and addressing the team is a common sight at the workplace these days. I have sessions with the team about the recent developments in the organisation and also about the road ahead for all of us as a team. The anxiety that prevails within the team is an obvious function of the CHANGE. 

In the coarse of managing a young and big team in the times of the change, I realized that the best way to bring about change is to first gain the support of the people who will be affected by it and the people whose support you need to implement it.

I scratched my head in an effort to realize the best way (whatever extent possible) to manage and bring about the change in an organisation. One question that kept coming to me as a manager of change was that, " What factors should any CHANGE MANAGEMENT SYSTEM have to make it successful?"

It came up that an ideal system should have following factors which can ensure that the brought about change is successful and meets its objectives. 

I have tried to define it as a 4-tier process:

• Guidance
• Communication
• Empowerment
• Culture

I will make an attempt to describe the above factors in context to Change Management in any typical services organisation of today.

GUIDANCE:

People ought to follow leaders who have the ability to guide them to the final goal / destination. The leaders of the change ought to ensure that they are directing the people in the right direction and everyone is aligned to the cause. When the people are aligned, the decision making is lot more easier and effective.

COMMUNICATION:

This is one of the most important factor contributing in the success or failure of change. With lack of communication, even the best of change management initiatives might turn out to be complete disaster. Communication can have many forms, carried out in many phases, have many levels to it; still it is very important to continuously keep spreading the right information to people, customers, vendors and the business world.

EMPOWERMENT:

In CHANGING systems, the major anxiety people have is about delegation of authority - whether they will be empowered to take decisions the way they use to earlier? 

An ideal system should empower people at the lowest possible level, which increases the productivity and motivation of the employees. It also develops the next layer of managers who can work independently and pull of things in crisis situations with help of innovation.

CULTURE:

A common set of values, beliefs, language and perspective helps people with diverse backgrounds to work together in harmony. The same people working under different cultures - even in the same organization - can act in very different ways. Change culture, and you change the way people act!!

A common thread of culture binds people together and facilitates achieving the organisational goals.

Let's try to understand further how above 4-tier approach can help in devising an ideal Change Management system.

Guidance: 

• To clearly define Where we are and where we have to go
• Map the current process and systems
• Concentrate on people
• Define the strategy with clear scope and expected results
• Device clear parameters for measurement
• Sustain the current best practices

Communication:   

• Share with the stakeholders about what is happening
• Daily and Monthly meetings
• Frequent/periodic descriptive mails from leaders
• Sharing of remarkable data and information
• Open door policy
• More time on work floor than cabin

Empowerment:

• Confidence to employees that they can do what they need to do
• Delegation of authority to sub-ordinates
• Involvement of supervisors/managers in system development
• Direct access to superiors
• Assigning responsibilities as well as functional authority to employees

Culture:

• Clearly demarcate how to do things around in the organisation!
• Plans for individual, team and organisational growth
• Encourage MBO (Management By Objective)
• Device effective training & development programmes
• Hold confrontation meetings
• Linkage of salary to performance and productivity
• Employee Surveys
• Rewards & Recognition

Many organisations have implemented some or all of the above initiatives to ensure effective Change Management processes in the past. In my understanding, an effective system not only assists in effective change management rather it helps in positive transformation of the organisation and facilitates the growth.

My organisation; Vertex Software is integrating with 5 other subsidiaries in India and start operating as one brand - NTT Data, which is a 16Bn dollar organisation and also the 7th largest IT Company in the world.
Refer the links below for more information:
http://americas.nttdata.com/news/2012/press-releases-31-jan-2012.aspx