Change only with cultural development
A new "Changeability" study by the consulting firm ComTeam shows that employees consider their companies to be less competent when it comes to change. 462 specialists and managers in German-speaking countries took part in the "Changeability" survey.
Change and how to deal with it are part of everyday life in most organizations today. Globalization, demographics, digitalization and cost pressure are the drivers of constantly new change processes. The board and management alone believe that the culture in your company strengthens change more than it inhibits it.
On a scale of zero to ten, the value of the bosses is 6.4, the average of all is 4.6. "Often there is too little awareness of culture" sums up Lorenz Forchhammer, study leader and senior partner at ComTeam. "Grown cultures are more sand than oil in the gears of organizations under changing environmental conditions. They hinder change rather than giving it wings," says Forchhammer.
In particular, the handling of conflicts, resources and time as well as power and hierarchy, respectively recognition and criticism as central cultural elements are in need of improvement according to the respondents. Here it is important to develop a culture in which new things can gain a foothold: "New agile methods enable progress that makes both the culture and the organization fit for the future. They don't just bring about cosmetic adaptation, but profound change," explains Forchhammer on possible solutions.
Change needs patience above all
When it comes to change, respondents give their companies little credit for competence. On a scale of 1 to 5, the value is exactly 3, which does not speak for special skills. When asked about the greatest learning area in connection with change, the term "patience" emerged by far the most frequently, without specifications. Forchhammer adds to this result: "Everywhere there is a lack of management, methodology and time. Everything has to happen quickly, the necessary resources are not activated. The social complexity of change projects is still blatantly underestimated."
Less competence than will to change
Slightly better values than for change competence are achieved by organizations in terms of the will to change that is attributed to them. Here the average value is 3.26 (scale 1 to 5). The will to change is obviously stronger, but the ability to do so is rather weak. In both questions, top management assesses its company much more positively than the entire workforce does. ComTeam has already identified such different views of management and employees several times in studies on the topic of leadership, corporate culture and change.
The "Changeability" study also looks at the question of who initiates change in a company, the effort that companies put into change processes, the issues that are important in the process, and the associations that employees and managers have with change.
The report on the results of the survey is available for download under this Link
