Simply thinking about ‘change’ is intellectually lazy.
We’ve all accepted, by now, that change is inevitable. That’s a tired point, and we need to move beyond that.
There are many different forms of change, and one is highly differentiated from the other. They have a different tone, a different outcome, a different approach that’s needed, and a different skill set needed to deliver them.
And, probably most importantly, a different style of CEOship. Most leadership failure is not resistance to change. It is a misdiagnosis of the transition.
‘Transition’ is a better term for change. This way, as the CEO, you are keenly aware of the now -> then journey that a business needs to travel.
At Lockstep, we think about business transitions in highly specific ways. We’ve done this work because we know that business transitions are inevitable. In fact, they are permanently taking place – whether these transitions are seen/acknowledged or not – they are happening. Businesses are alive, dynamic, swirling balls of energy and so it stands to reason that they are never ‘still’.
Any CEO who is interested in whole-system performance needs to be aware of this and move beyond simple awareness toward harnessing this dynamic energy and constantly directing it in the most useful direction possible.
Let’s get specific about these transitions. We’ve boiled them down to six in order to make the change process user-friendly.
I’ve seen many of these transitions take place, and I’m always surprised by how the task of the CEO differs for each particular transition the CEO is leading. The broad nature of the capabilities required to lead a transition makes this quite complex for the CEO, who has to fully embody these capabilities.
Some CEOs need to be gentle, some need to be forceful.
Some CEOs need to look broadly into the market, some need intense internal focus.
Some CEOs need big, loud emotions, and some need to be quietly reassuring.
It’s like being the lead actor in a play that the entire script revolves around, and ‘becoming this character’ is something that requires a lot of thought and curation on the part of the CEO.
This breaks the required CEOship down a bit more clearly:
So my counsel is to get very specific about the transition your business is going through, because it’s almost certain that it’s happening already. These transitions, when named specifically, are actually a lot more fun than merely ‘managing change’, which – at least for me – promises very little upside and lots of complexity and hard work.
A transition has a beginning and an end, with a very specific outcome to target. Solving the ‘riddle’ that brings about a safe and successful transition is, in fact, a highly enjoyable pursuit.
Transcendent businesses (This video explains what they are: https://youtu.be/ahgHjRodRSA) don’t “manage change”; they understand the living transitions they are in and respond accordingly.
This is a CEO skill set that simply has to be mastered. It’s the number 1 skill on my CEO list because it’s simply inescapable, and so much hinges on being able to transition a business well.