What change management lessons does #farmlawsrepealed hold for HR/OD professionals?

 

Yes, there are two Indias today drawing on the vocabulary of Vir Das, one mourning the demise of a ‘progressive’ legislation and ‘supremacy’ of aggressive minority over the power of parliament; and the other, celebrating victory of ‘democracy’ over an ‘arrogant’ PM. Having co-authored a book on managing change with Dr. H N Arora, it was only natural for me to see this event from a wider perspective. Without trying to get into rhetoric and taking sides, I share my takes:

1.   1. There is a biblical saying, road to hell is paved with good intentions. Being right and wrong is less important than end result. Trumpeting good intentions may give one a sense of righteousness, which may be seen as arrogance, by those not in sync. Did the party in power get into this trap? What are the lessons for change managers in organizations?

2.  2. Every change may be opposed by those who feel threatened by a real or imagined loss of power or privileges, or simply a comfort zone. And, the bigger the change, the bigger the resistance. Four things are necessary to counter this. 

a.  Effective, widespread, regular, even over-communication in the language of the target audiences. Here, definition of target audience is very critical. All stakeholders are to be considered. Here we found that activists had a better grip on who can be stakeholders and even rented international activists. Even a PM of a supposedly friendly country took side of those on the other side. The result was a lot a consternation and disquiet even amongst India’s friends, even though largely based on misinformation. 

     It was also obvious even to a lay person that the matter would go to court sooner or later. Did the government sound and cultivate judiciary even before passing the law? Even in parliament, the govt. was hamstrung in getting progressive legislation passed for a long time due to absence of required numbers in Rajya Sabha. Did the govt. ramrod farm laws the moment it realized it could muster the numbers? 

Managing change is anything but a sprint. A change manager must, amongst other things, clearly define all the stakeholders and craft appropriate communication strategy for each. Ignoring fishermen on the East Coast was a costly mistake that BP is still recovering from, even after a decade. 

b.    Building a powerful dominant coalition of the likeminded influencers. What were the options in this case? Who were the experts having credibility with the farmers and were supporting govt view? How were they leveraged in mass communication? Given the heavy cost of rice farming in Punjab amidst depleting water table, could the environmentalists have been onboarded even before the announcement of the bills? 

Have we aligned all/most influencers (including front line supervisors) while planning a change? If we are undertaking or going to undertake change that are likely to have repercussions even outside the company, particularly if it fails, have we taken on board regulatory and social influencers?

c.    Did the govt provide enough psychological safety to naysayers even within the govt and party apparatus to voice dissent, or overtly or covertly promoted yes-man-ship? In organizations, Columbia space shuttle disaster is a famous case of conformism gone wrong. How do we promote psychological safety to doubters and dissenters? They are the early warning signals. 

d. There is no substitute to a proactive intelligence gathering system as a key ingredient of any change strategy. Did the govt have an advance intelligence gathering mechanism regarding 26 January events, or incidences of rape/murder at protest sites? Or for that matter, did Maruti have an inkling of impending attack on a HR general manager? 

How many HR heads are alive to the necessity of having an intelligence/pulse gathering system? 

Do we have the courage and ‘cunning’ to turn the fallout of such incidents in our favor, or do such incidents paralyze us? Krishna gives a scintillating example of taking all means necessary, even controversial, for a just cause, in Mahabharata.

3.  3. One thing redeeming in the saga is PM coming forward to own up the failure instead of passing the buck or allowing a junior official or minister to give bad news. Leadership is also about courage to own up failures.