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The Art of the Excuse

 

I don’t know about you, but when I hear my friends or coworkers using excuses, it really grinds my gears. This is especially true when they are some of the more classic excuses we know. Things like:

·       That won’t work here

·       We’ve always been doing it this way

·       There is too much risk to make that decision

·       Its impossible or it can’t be done

When I hear people saying these things, my first reaction is generally being flabbergasted at how people so smart could act so foolish. However, if we know anything about human nature is that sometimes it just doesn’t make sense. But I can’t really fault them too much because there was a time when I used these excuses. It was a long time ago and prior to me really having an understanding on who I was and what I and those around me are capable of. It took a lot of practice, but I was able to get myself out of that mindset by practicing the power of positivity.

To overcome these negative thoughts and to stop using excuses like these when trying to implement change, my suggestion for you is to remember the human elements. What I mean by the human elements is simply a reminder that you’re dealing with people and you must tread carefully. Change typically creates a conflict between the business side of an organization and its human side (Brown, 2011, p. 147). You must consider the human factor or elements when attempting to make a change in their environment. Leading change is about bringing together both the business and human components of the change (Brown, 2011, p. 147). Afterall, humans are the ones using the aforenoted excuses! Some of the ways you can navigate through the human element and counter the resistance to change is to understand the driving forces. Driving forces are anything that increases the inclination of an organization to implement a proposed change program (Brown, 2011, p. 149). Brown (2011) tells us there are many factors such as external pressures toward change, momentum, motivation, fear of the unknown, disruption of routine, threats to security, power and to the norms and culture of the organization. Diving deeper into what you can do to avoid these factors, leaders must possess the ability to effectively communicate with employees to give a clear vision of the change and what is in it for them. Leaders must also delegate and engage employees as part of the decision-making processes. The participation of the employees is critical and should be placed as a primary objective of the change process. Whether or not your organization can negotiate new profit sharing or pay-for-performance type reward systems could dictate how well your change goes. The trend toward more flexible reward systems and employee ownership plans will probably continue (Brown, 2011, p. 157).

I recently watched the TedX video (2009) with Seth Godwin in which he talks about change being driven by tribes of people that are connected through ideas to create a movement. I agree with his analogy of change bring driven by these connected tribes and see that ideas which create movement are hard to stop. When a collection of employees can join forces and work in harmony towards a common goal or objective, it is indeed much like that of a tribe of people with a common belief looking out for one another as a family, pack or pod would do in the wild.

When I think about sustaining a successful change, especially in the workplace, many things come to mind. I ask myself if we’ve established a clear vision that is championed by an influential person. I ask myself if we’ve engaged employees in the decision-making process and look at which groups are positioning themselves as the “out-group”. Does that group pose a threat to our change and what are we doing to listen to their complaints, suggestions, or chatter to understand what they are also seeing? I now also think about our team as a tribe trying to advance our cause for the good of the group and organization. If these changes are not morally, ethically or illegal, and they will make our business better, then I don’t see a reason why we wouldn’t want to make our tribe into the best one around.

References

Brown, D. R. (2011). An Experimental Approach to Organization Development. Upper Saddle River: Pearson Education, Inc.

TedX. (2009, February). The tribes we lead. [Video file]. Retrieved from https://www.ted.com/talks/seth_godin_the_tribes_we_lead?language=en

 

 

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