The great facilitator

The facilitation of change is not the responsibility of any single individual, but is guided and directed by leadership on many different levels. Because change is dynamic, leadership must be equally so to keep pace with the opportunities and challenges.

A “management mentality” in the face of change produces a specific outcome, which is essentially to ask, “The organization is changing--now what?”

Leaders on the other hand become the real and active facilitators of change. They understand the forces behind it and use its dynamics as a means to effectively and repeatedly transform their organization. Rather than fear the concept of change, leaders welcome the opportunities it provides.

There are several proven leadership techniques owners and managers can employ to successfully facilitate change.

Promote your vision daily
The importance of the leader’s personal vision is a guiding and fundamental leadership principle. It is not sufficient for leaders to simply state their vision; they must continually remind employees of their direction as they guide them step-by-step through the processes, transitions, problems and successes en route to attaining their vision.

As changes occur, leaders must showcase individual and group initiatives demonstrating progress toward the defined vision.

Lead by personal example
One of the most valuable resources available to a leader is time. Time is at a premium, and leaders must schedule carefully to achieve what is important to them. When employees see that their leaders are organized around the strategic priorities established to facilitate change, it communicates that they are earnest about it.

As a general practice, leaders need to adjust their calendars to reflect the strategic priorities of facilitating change. This communicates that the leader is leading with action to back up their words, as they are focusing their time specifically upon the point of change.

Be a visible leader
Leaders cannot lead from behind a desk or office door. They must be at the point of change to train, coach, cajole and comfort.

Leaders can only observe and learn when they are in the midst of their employees during the implementation of change. This is why the efficient scheduling of time is critical if leaders want to be actively involved in the direct facilitation of change transformations.

Be a compulsive listener
Leaders have one primary responsibility: go out and listen to their employees. It should not be done in a passive style of listening. Actively engage your employees, learn from their frustrations, take action to clean up a particular stressful or unproductive situation, and enthusiastically encourage each one of them. Facilitating change requires leaders to actively listen and make changes based upon what they learn and observe.

Honor your frontline staff
Leaders understand that the point of change happens in the front lines. This is where its real impact is felt–and where leaders must directly focus their time, efforts and attention.

In this regard, leaders should honor their frontline employees. Accomplish this by celebrating all major and minor successes and learning from failures as they test new ideas and concepts.

Delegate
When leaders delegate they are not only freeing up valuable time, they are empowering and training others to perform key tasks. Proper delegation allows leaders to be more responsive to the needs of their organization because they can get out from under tasks demanding their time and hindering their ability to lead. The key to successful delegation is the maintenance of high standards for those the leader designates to perform the delegated work.

Manage horizontally
When leaders manage horizontally, they are opening up communications and responsiveness at the front lines of their organization, and across multiple functions. This minimizes the delays of bureaucratic up and down communications and replaces it with faster frontline communications across functional boundaries. This allows leaders to test, try, modify, and act on ideas quickly, and facilitates change more rapidly.

Question daily progress
It is easy for leaders to mask a number of functions, items and agendas under the label of change. An effective leader constantly questions his or her progress on a daily basis and asks, “What exactly have I changed?”

Rather than measuring progress over time, leaders understand that facilitating change involves countless decisions and minor changes that produce modifications, alterations or elimination of unproductive practices across many planes. They are more pragmatic about looking at specific daily changes to ensure that transformations are taking place throughout their organization.

Create a sense of urgency
While the nature of change brings about its own sense of pressure, leaders must continually reinforce their personal sense of urgency to overcome all of the potentially paralyzing fears employees may experience due to change. Every action a leader undertakes must also be viewed as a call for urgency in the pursuit of constant testing and improvement in subsequent change transformations throughout the organization.

Timothy Bednarz is author of Facilitating Change: Pinpoint Leadership Skill Development Training Series (Majorium Business Press); timothy.bednarz@majorium.com.