It is fascinating how, as humans, we resist change. Change brings uncertainty, and we don’tlike uncertainty.
ICP2 focuses on change management and implementation, and so it feelsvery different from ICP1, which was more about market and industry analysis.
You can learn all you like in class about change management, and the 5-or the 7- or the 10-step change management process, but try applying that of areal life situation. That muchbecame amply clear on the very first day of the ICP.
As we interviewed person after person in the client organisation, we sawhow different their perceptions of the same issue were. And I guess that is what makes usdifferent and unique as humans, and that we have opinions on almost everything.
One of the things this MBA also teaches us is prioritising. I couldn’t help but think, and this ispurely my personal opinion, that in order to effect any change, it cannot be anythingbut the very top priority on management’s agenda. If it isn’t, people will just not believe that it is aserious issue and it would be almost impossible to institutionalise the change.
But even when the management does that, it must recognise thatindividuals are different, and have different motivations, fears and anxieties. One way to get over this would be tohave an organisation where everyone is a clone of each other and lose therichness of ideas, views, contexts and performance that is driven by diversity. Another is to try to understand thesemotivations and address the individual value systems to effect the change witheveryone’s buy-in.
And that is the challenge facing all of our ICP2 teams this month. Talk about throwing down the gauntlet!
Aman