Change is inevitable. It’s crucial to the success of your business. History is littered with examples of companies that failed to move with the times and vanished as a result. And the events of the last few years have provided even more examples. If the pandemic showed us anything, it’s that we need to be able to adapt rapidly in order to succeed and survive.
However, change takes a lot of work to manage effectively. It’s an internal communications minefield. Less than one in three planned changes is successful, with performance objectives often missed during the transformation process. Research from Gartner revealed that the success rate decreases with the size of the company, sinking to less than 19% for organisations with over 5,000 employees.
It’s common knowledge that communicating change to employees is a highly emotive subject. It sparks fear, resistance and irrational behaviour. This leads to reduced quality of work, missed targets and loss of production. But what is the root cause behind this unrest? Is it the change itself, or how change is communicated?
The role of internal communication is to help employees navigate a clear path through uncertain waters to a position of clarity and stability. This has never been more crucial, with the effects of the pandemic creating a volatile and unpredictable working environment. Changes have been coming thick and fast, often without warning. Communicating change effectively is now becoming a critical job.
This blog explores the do’s and don’ts of communicating change in organizations. We take a look at the reasons why communicating change in the workplace often fails. And then, we identify techniques for strategically communicating organisational change
that will work for you. Put these in place, and you’ll find that you can improve internal communication, put employees at ease, and ensure that necessary adjustments are implemented without disrupting your business operations.
Communicating Change: The Don’ts
Let’s start with what not to do. Communicating to employees about change often fails, and it’s usually down to three critical mistakes made time after time.
DON’T forget about company culture
Why communicating change fails: Employees don’t understand the new ‘invisible’ rules
When communicating change in the workplace, company culture needs to be foremost in your thoughts. So, what is culture, exactly? It’s a mostly invisible set of norms and rules that impact employee behaviour and decision-making. During a period of change, these cultural norms often come under pressure as expectations change. Communicating corporate change requires absolute clarity.
For example, an employee may be working to the invisible rule that quality takes priority over speed. She will put extra time and effort into the outcome of a project. This is her understanding of the company culture, and it has been rewarded in the past. But now, during the period of change, speed becomes prioritised. The project needs to be completed immediately, giving quality a back seat. This is when the stress levels rise, as new expectations conflict with the employee’s understanding of the ‘rules’.
These invisible norms and rules can take on many forms in the workplace:
- Quality vs. speed
- Commercial vs. people focus
- Efficiency vs. innovation
- Central vs. local focus
- Compliance vs. risk-taking
- Consistency vs. empowerment
- Unity vs. diversity
- Profit vs. purpose
- Productivity vs. well-being
In a steady-state environment, employees can use their intuition to work out the rules. They will be able to navigate competing priorities with confidence. But during times of significant organisational change, new expectations clash with embedded ways of working, and employees start to question whether they’re prioritising correctly.
DON’T fail to clarify the priorities
Why communicating change fails: Employees don’t know how to balance competing priorities
The transformation from old to new ways of working inevitably creates tension in the workplace. Change often creates more than one set of competing priorities that employees don’t know how to balance. Every internal communication strategy needs to address this potential conflict. Communicating the change vision means you need to specify the actions required in the most straightforward and precise manner possible.
The most common ‘invisible rule’ which comes into question is quality versus speed. Gartner revealed that nearly half of all employees going through a transformation will experience this conflict. Another frequently questioned rule is commercial versus people focus. For example, the company may choose to focus on financial goals, forgoing its previous prior commitment to customer care. Efficiency versus innovation is another area that often creates tensions as requirements change.
Communicating change to staff needs careful management to avoid this clash. The outcome is invariably negative: increased employee stress and reduced performance. As the number of tensions increases, so do the stress levels. Nearly half of employees experiencing a single conflict feel moderately stressed, and almost 30% report feeling highly stressed.
Comments you may hear from employees under this pressure:
- “Ever since this change, I have felt a sense of loss and confusion.”
- “My work environment is changing in an unpredictable manner.”
- “I’m emotionally drained from my work.”
- “I’m not sure what’s expected from me anymore.”
The internal communications process is a careful balancing act. To reduce conflict and confusion when communicating change to stakeholders and employees, you must tackle the conflicts with absolute clarity.
DON’T try to sugar-coat the message
Why communicating change fails: Change communications try to reassure rather than clarify
Business leaders often view the existing company culture as an impediment to change. They know the rules need to change for the transformation to succeed. Meanwhile, employees feel that the change is disrupting the culture they understand, so feel resistance towards it.
This leads to two competing perspectives that internal communications try to address. On the one hand, they want to promote the change in expected behaviours. On the other, they want to reassure employees that, fundamentally, things are staying the same. The result is mixed messages and confusion. Employees no longer understand what is expected from them or the new invisible rules they should be working to. Communicating change to employees examples show again and again that there’s no point focusing on reassurance alone.
When communicating change in organizations, the role of internal communications should be to clarify exactly what’s required of each individual. Trying to sugar-coat the core message of change will work against you. It’s better to bite the bullet, admit that significant adjustments are required and set out a straightforward path to help employees make those changes. After all, effective communication in the workplace is built on transparency.
Communicating Change: The Do’s
Now, let’s explore strategically communicating organisational change. There are a variety of techniques for communicating change in the workplace. Strong, unambiguous and measurable internal communications at this crucial time will help reduce the tensions arising from a change in the cultural norms of the company.
DO acknowledge the change
Successfully communicating change: Openly accept that the workplace is now very different
The first step is to acknowledge the tension employees feel due to competing priorities. Rather than attempting to hide it under platitudes that ‘everything is carrying on as normal’, concede that things are now different and the rules that everyone once understood no longer apply.
Although it is tempting to reassure and appease during times of change, it is not constructive for employee understanding. By putting the new requirements out in the open, you are eliminating any chance of confusion.
One of the key internal communication best practices is to speak with absolute clarity, and this is a scenario where transparency really counts.
DO provide clear priorities
Successfully communicating change: Provide unambiguous guidance on what’s important
Help employees understand how to make the new trade-offs between competing priorities. If the commercial focus is now more important than the touchy-feely people skills, explain how this will impact their approach to customer interactions. Communicating the change vision is all about clarity.
Wherever possible, organisations must offer well-defined guidance on what to prioritise. Internal communications departments can work with leaders to clarify organisational priorities, thus reducing the negative impact of cultural change on employees.
When communicating change to stakeholders, employees and customers, remember that internal and external communication should be speaking the same language, and passing on the same core message.
DO be specific about what you want
Successfully communicating change: Tell employees exactly how to apply the new values
Don’t be vague. It is vital to translate the new company ‘rules’ in specific work situations. Communicating change in the workplace is a precise art; nothing should be left open to speculation or interpretation.
Company values can often be broad and indistinct. Effective internal communication will show precisely how those values apply to everyday decision-making. Wherever possible, leaders should specify the exact actions employees should take.
By translating the top-level principles into specific work situations, you can help employees prioritise the right behaviours in their work. Clear, firm direction prevents employees from agonising over a decision or taking the ‘safe’ option.
DO get people talking
Successfully communicating change: Facilitate company conversations and open discussion
Help to build new ways of thinking by encouraging discussion within the business.
Interactive experiences can help staff practice and improve their judgement and have more confidence in their decision-making. Facilitate peer-to-peer discussions to build support and shared experiences. Communicating to employees about change is not just about giving instructions. It’s also about facilitating conversations.
The more you can increase your employees’ exposure to new perspectives, concepts and social connections, the better their understanding of the new cultural norms and how they should be implemented. Collaboration should be at the heart of communicating change management. Communicating change to stakeholders also benefits from inviting feedback and response.
An internal communications app is a simple way to put this into practice. By opening up new opportunities to interact, it will encourage staff to get involved and start talking. Conversation modules within an employee app will allow you to create social spaces for employees to meet, chat and share their experiences.
DO ask for feedback
Successfully communicating change: Share success and feedback across the company
Success stories are a powerful tool in applying values. Storytelling is a simple way to demonstrate how others in the company are applying the new ‘rules’ and navigating the trade-offs in priorities. Authentic, practical stories offer a real-life application of the required change. Storytelling could well turn out to be one of your most successful strategies for communicating change. It’s also one of the most effective strategies for communicating planned change to stakeholders.
It is essential to create feedback opportunities. By asking employees to give feedback on their decision-making in the new environment, you will help to accelerate their understanding of the new cultural norms. Internal communications metrics will help you improve and adapt your approach.
An internal communication app is an easy way to put feedback channels in place.
Whether you’re creating simple polls or an in-depth internal communication survey, your aim should be to ascertain whether staff really understand what’s being asked of them. Communicating change to employees is a complex business, and it’s vital to make sure that the message has been fully received and understood.
Communicating Change to Employees: In Summary
Ultimately, when communicating corporate change, you need to make it absolutely clear how the old ways of working need to change. This needs to be as specific as possible, demonstrated through explicit examples and practical stories. The new rules must be clarified and specified to the extent that no employee is left questioning their decision-making.
The importance of internal communication during this testing time should not be underestimated. It is important to be completely open about the organisational change that is happening and how you expect employees to adapt. Once employees are confidently making decisions on their own, you know you’ve succeeded.
