Leading Change

Barbara Holland & Judith Ramaley

Why is Change so Hard?• Focus on solo scholars and disciplines• Emphasis on theory over other knowledge

uses• Lack of awareness of global change in

knowledge production• Standard reward and promotion policies focus

on uniformity over innovation• Some disciplines and people value

“detachment”• Academics tend to teach the way they were

taught and work in the model of their mentors• Successful traditions reduce motivation to

consider new ideas and methods – focus on grants over relationships

Assumptions about what change will mean

• All change in academic practice is bad. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.

• Strategies that built the institutions we most admire are the strategies for us.

• Change will hurt “my work” – individual.

• Traditional research is the only thing that matters here.

• You will make us all do this and I don’t see how I could change my approach to teaching Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales.

Tests to apply to a proposed project(adapted from Rogers 1995)

• Relative advantage: Is this way better?• Compatibility: Is this consistent with the

values, experiences and needs of people who will use it?

• Complexity: Is this easy to understand?• Scalability: Can you start small and grow?• Observability: Are the result visible and

compelling?• Adaptability: Can this way be adjusted to

different settings, disciplines/perspectives and situations?

Building Your Action Plan: Steps in the Cycle of Change

• Creating a clear focus for the plan• Setting meaningful, measurable

goals• Identifying and using available

capacity• Making connections that reinforce

and expand the effort and its impact

• Learning from the experience• Applying what you have learned as

the next phase begins…– Select the next target

Selecting the first target and setting meaningful goals

Think about your action plan: What might be your first small step to gain early momentum and buy-in? Is there already a goal or effort underway

(other conversations, strategies, initiatives) that you can use as leverage?

Can you identify and recruit people who already embrace this agenda (the “committed”)? How would you involve them as advocates?

How will you measure your progress?

Promoting Deep Organizational Change

adapted from Rogers 1995The innovation-diffusion process is the pattern through which an individual or a group of people move– From first knowledge of an innovation or

idea– To forming an attitude about that

innovation– To deciding whether to adopt it or reject it– To implementing the new idea and perhaps

adapting it to their particular situation or challenges

– To confirming their decision and building it into their repertoire of practices and habits.

Getting to Critical MassThe Power of the Bell-shaped Curve

Resisters [1] Skeptics [2] Cautious [3] Committed

[1] Management of criticism and resistance

[2] Culture of Evidence Barrier

[3] Lowering the Energy Barrier: Need for infrastructure

Recruiting People: Use the Bell Shaped Curve!

• Move from right to left and do not be drawn into the depths of the far left.

• You only need to convince about 25% of the people.

• There are strategies available to lower or remove the barriers between the cautious and the committed.

• Skeptics demand evidence that the new way is valid. The status quo should also be judged through evidence. Hold yourself and your detractors to a high standard of proof. Change is a scholarly act!

Identifying and using available capacity

Who are the early adopters at your institution and what sustains their efforts?

What kinds of evidence or arguments might help you recruit the “cautious” to your agenda?

Who should you recruit first from the” cautious” group?

In the context of your mission, what activities and contributions are most valued?

What do you hope to accomplish using engagement strategies? Who cares the most about those goals?

Building a collaborative culture and capacity for engagement

Are there conversations, strategies, initiatives that you can use as leverage?

Are there relationships and projects that illustrate what cross-sector collaboration means?

Can you identify and recruit people who already embrace this agenda? How would you involve them as advocates? Have they a strong voice on campus?

How will you measure your progress and expand the effort and impact?

How will you tell the story of collaboration and its impact on the campus community and beyond?

Campus-community interactions

• Routine: clinical placements, internships, commissioned data reports, student teaching, law clinics, continuing education

• Strategic: collaborations for property development, neighborhood restoration

• Transformative: integration of research, education and practice to lay a foundation to reinvent organizations and professions in order to restructure economic, social and environmental profiles of communities

What Kinds of Partnership Will Work Best?Answer: It depends.

• Service relationship – fixed time, fixed task• Exchange relationship – exchange info, get

access for mutual benefit, specific project• Cooperative relationship – joint planning and

shared responsibilities, long-term, multiple projects

• System and Transformative relationship – shared decision-making/operations/evaluation intended to strengthen each organization and promote changes in a larger multifaceted problem; now called collective impactHugh Sockett, 1998

Managing the responses to your action plan

• Who may oppose your plans and what can you do to win them over, or, at least, keep them from derailing your efforts?

• How do reactions unfold at your institution and what can you do to help people adapt to the “new reality” that your plan represents?

• Are there other projects or changes going on that you can use to clear a path for your engagement agenda?

How can you build support for your plan?

• Who assembled your team or asked you to attend this Academy? How influential is your sponsor?

• What other priorities are competing with yours?

• Who do you need to influence? To whom do they listen?

• Who else already buys into this agenda? Who does not? Why not?

• Discussion Q: Who will be important new advocates for your action plan ideas? Identify a person (by role) you want to recruit to this agenda and why.

Things to keep in mind if you are leading change in challenging times.

Community Engagement need not always require new funding, but can be implemented by doing current activities differently – in an engaged mode!

Be clear about your strategy and goals and link your actions to that agenda.

Take time to learn about the process of change itself. Hold yourself to high standards of proof and conduct.

Listen to how people talk about what is happening and be ready to respond to rumors and confusion. Be open, be clear, communicate frequently.

Learning from the ExperienceWhat you may encounter along the

way • Identifying the traditions that can be barriers.• Responding to assumptions about what change

will mean• Developing a compelling answer to the

question:”Why should I care about this?”• Addressing misunderstandings about what

engagement is and when using engagement strategies makes sense.

• Using partnership models that fit the challenge well.

Do’s and Don’ts• Work with the willing!• Don’t begin with P&T. The bigger

issues are institutional goals and academic values.

• Do identify good models of engagement – new strategies will emerge from lived experience

• Do involve community partners and students in engagement design, work, and measurement of engagement

• Don’t get lost in “language wars.”• Do promote ‘informed’ conversations• Do aim for quality more than quantity

The Basics!• Build a wide understanding of the proven

principles of community engagement– Mutually beneficial– Reciprocal– Exchange of knowledge – Partnership relationships

• Change as a Scholarly Act – all ideas and assumptions can be tested; use evidence to trump unexamined opinion

• Strategies to grow/sustain engagement will need to change as partnerships and internal/external issues evolve

• Focus on actions and strategies to inform and involve the cautious

A Parting ThoughtWhich institutions will

succeed?

The capacity of an academic institution to change is becoming a strategic value and organizational asset; this capacity will confer advantages on those that learn how to do it, and commensurate disadvantages on those that persist in operating in 20th Century modes. (Barbara Holland 2012)