But any change in the workplace can face resistance and make people nervous. This checklist shows you the steps to take, writes Rebecca Bonnington, CEO of consultancy Tricres. (4 June 2024)
- Identify where you are now, focusing on the key areas of people, strategy and revenues, and including culture in your assessment.
- Carry out benchmarking activities to help you understand where your firm sits in the market.
- If you haven’t got a positive, identifiable culture, with a clear purpose, vision and values, invest time into securing this — to avoid making changes that don’t fit with who you are
- Create a vision of where you’d like to be in ten years. This is about setting a clear ‘North Star’ to aim for, aligned with your culture.
“Partners, particularly any who are nearing retirement, can resist change fiercely. They may need to be convinced that change is essential for the firm’s future – and that their own personal interests lie in supporting this.”
Joanna Gaudoin, managing director, Inside Out Image
- Now you know who you are as a business, what you stand for, and the behaviours you expect in line with your values, identify the areas for change.
- Work backwards from your ten-year vision in two-year increments to record where you want to be at each stage, still focusing on people, strategy and revenues.
- Plan the first two years of your change programme in quarters, with key milestones.
- Then identify the top three priorities for change in year one.
- Select one person who will be responsible and accountable for driving that change and set clear, measurable quarterly goals.
- Schedule short meetings every two weeks to measure progress.
- Review goals at the end of each quarter and set new ones for the following quarter.
- Take baby steps, with a maximum of one to three changes at a time, to avoid overwhelming people.
- Communicate the changes as you go. Over-communication of change is better than lack of communication.
“Make sure the partnership buys into any change program from the outset. There’s nothing more disheartening than when someone from outside the project team jumps in halfway through to move the goalposts.”
Rachel Fowler, legal sector director, Lloyds Bank
- Leadership and the drive for change must come from the top of the firm. The partners must demonstrate that they are fully committed to the change and ‘walk the talk’.
- Be open to feedback and suggestions from your teams. This is a learning experience, not a competition.
- Generate and trumpet short-term wins, clearly relating them to the change effort.
- When monitoring progress against the plan, tackle problems as soon as they arise.
- Identify and deliver any training needed. Help people through hands-on demonstrations of new systems.
- Reinforce the change; point out the benefits that it has delivered.
- Continue to look for further opportunities for change.
Painting a picture
When managing change, communicating the change vision is often where firms fall down, writes Richard Burcher, managing director of Virtual Pricing Director.
Those who are key to driving the pricing change must communicate the goals and direction to everyone directly involved – and ideally to everyone in the whole firm – or you risk resistance and scepticism.
Success is achieved by the simplicity and brevity of the message, avoiding management-speak. It can help to ‘paint a picture’ using metaphor, analogy and examples.
For example: “Within 12 months we will have established ourselves as a ‘go-to’ firm for the dentistry sector, with coverage in both leading dentistry magazines and retainers with two of the ten UK dental groups with turnover of £5 - 50 million – with pricing commensurate with that reputation.”
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