“Don’t fix it if it ain’t broken”. “It’s going fine, we don’t need to change”. “don’t rock the boat”
When was the last time you heard one of these sayings in the workplace?
They often said for the right reasons because work is going well, clients are happy, and the revenue stream is steady.
However, particularly in our business we must always be aware of both the need to innovate what you do and to innovate how you do it.
You will see a couple of articles on this site that talk about innovation. These address the need to constantly evolve your product and how you solve client issues. This article is more about how as people we need to change, to evolve how we work.
Look back over the past 5 years at how quickly technology is changing how we communicate, travel, shop etc. Think about the next 5 years and the change will become exponential. As a business we must be ready for that change.
At my agency I have several strategic plans called FF20, FF21, FF22. These stand for Fit For 2020…. They address different challenges around the five facets of our business (People, Prospects, Product, Process and Performance).
The area I want to cover here is people.
When you have a successful business like ours that has long term clients, on annual scopes you have a lot of stability which is great for financial planning and resourcing but not always great for staying business fit.
Stability is great, but it can create a comfort zone, where you know your what you do so well and are so polished at doing it you cannot approach a challenging in any other way than the way you always have. This is called ‘Functional Fixedness’ or having a fixed mindset. To be the best at what you do, you need an open mindset. You must welcome and embrace change.
For some people change is tough, it can hurt as it can be scary being taken out of one’s comfort zone to experience new things.
As American Physician said, “people don’t dislike change, they dislike being changed”.
I am fortunately that I find change dynamic and exciting.
Part of my role as MD is to be a change agent, a catalyst for change. It is not change for the same of it but change that ensures we are fit for the future challenges that our industry and our clients will bring.
For people to embrace change you first need them to realise the need for change. We must break the cycle! This must be handled carefully and in context to the specific situation.
If urgent change is needed to survive an imminent situation or event, the realisation must be created very quickly and very firmly. This is likely to be the case in high risk environments where the risk of not changing can literally be life threatening. Fortunately, this is not the case in most creative agencies!
In our industry the need is more one of evolution not revolution. Although the need is not as urgent from a time point of view and not life threatening, it is important that people understand the need to evolve how we work. The balance is breaking the fixed mindset in a positive, forward looking way.
When people have a fixed mindset, it is most often because they are very well versed at what they do. They have a high level of craft and have practiced their craft for a long time. In changing their mindset, the craft must not be lost, it must be enhanced and broadened. They must be made to see that their craft is highly valued but that it needs to be redirected to reflect the changing business. We must recalibrate their mindset to an open one.
In a business, the other challenge related to both change around innovation and change around people is to maintain the current performance (one of my 5 facets) whilst driving change. We must continue our BAU work to deliver for clients, to deliver revenue and profit whilst driving innovation through the agency and taking people on a journey to become fit for the coming challenges.
by Richard Wright
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