Debunking myths of organizational change

Debunking the myths
of organizational
change management

2Copyright © 2015 Accenture All rights reserved.
Moving beyond myths
Accenture Change Tracking
• 15+ years of research
• 250 change initiatives
• 150 organizations
• 50 industries
• 25 countries
• 850,000+ employees
The largest base of empirical change research
data ever developed dispels conventional myths
about organizational change
Copyright © 2015 Accenture All rights reserved. 2

Myth: Change is a straightforward process that
moves from A to B to C―from the beginning of an
initiative to its end
Our research: Change is a non-linear
process with no beginning and no end
Many change programs take circuitous routes, sometimes
backtracking and often become stuck. Change programs do follow
predictable pathways however, whether through actions that lead
to failure or towards success. Our multi-dimensional change map
and navigation tools capture this predictability.

Myth: Too much change, too fast, is destructive
Our research: The highest-performing
groups have more change taking place
at a very fast pace
The highest-performing organizations thrive on change. They
have more change taking place – 30 to 50 percent initially –
and at a faster pace than lower-performing counterparts. They
have a strong capability to drive ongoing change and achieve
greater benefits.

Myth: Change causes organizations to go off track
Our research: Change does not
cause organizational dysfunction,
it merely exposes it
85 percent of groups with change programs that had gone off
track had major underlying issues before implementing their
initiative. People blame change initiatives for their problems, but a
dysfunctional culture and behaviors are typically ingrained in the
organization prior to the implementation of change.

Myth: Change solutions can be boiled down
to a handful of simple rules
Our research: Successful change
requires a complex, coordinated strategy
of actions sustained across time
Change is among the most complex organizational processes.
Leaders should accept this complexity as an integral part of their
change initiatives, and plan coordinated actions sustained across
periods to ensure success.

Myth: Change is driven from the top down
and is resisted by middle management
Our research: Change leadership radiates
out from the center, starting with leaders and
teams who want to change and eventually
reaching every corner of the organization
The role of the business unit leader―sitting between corporate
and team leadership―plays the most significant role in
implementing change, delivering business benefits and ensuring
ongoing business performance remains high.

Myth: Business performance will dip during
the early stages of change
Our research: Business performance generally
increases throughout a change program
For high-performing groups, business performance—cost
management, customer service levels, and effectiveness—rises
continuously from the start of a change initiative to its end.

Myth: People must suffer through the ‘valley
of despair’ as a normal part of change
Our research: People do not have
to experience negative feelings as part
of the change process
In high-performing groups, positive feelings and emotions
such as passion and drive remain high through all stages of
a change program.

Myth: People need to understand changes before
committing to them
Our research: While this progression
is true for the lowest-performing groups,
it is reversed for high performers
In high-performing groups, trust in leadership is so high that
people are willing to get on the bus even before they know where
it’s headed. They first commit emotionally and are happy to find
out where they are going, as they move along.

Myth: All change can be managed effectively
by applying universal best practices
Our research: A one-size-fits-all approach
to change will generally fail
Organizations often manage change by focusing on a few factors
that have produced results in the past. But there is no such thing
as a single list of actions or interventions, a single sequence of
events or a single method that will apply in all situations, or at
different stages of the same initiative.

Myth: Organizations achieve the best results
by focusing on communication, training, team
leadership, and accountability
Our research: Other factors that are hidden
and difficult to define have a greater impact
on the outcome of a change initiative
Vision and direction – building understanding and gaining
agreement – is by far the most important factor in realizing
benefits from a change program, 3 to 4 times as important as any
other intervention. To drive improvements in business
performance, the most important factors are business leadership,
systems and processes and passion and drive.

Myth: Charismatic and empathetic leaders build
trust through the quality of their one-to-one
relationships
Our research: One-to-one trusted relationships
are necessary but not sufficient. A system of
trust is needed at multiple levels of leadership.
High-performing groups build a ‘trust grid’ where each level of
leadership is dependent on other levels and the trust holds
together in an interrelated series of actions. The synergistic effect
of collective leadership goes well beyond what is possible from a
single level of leadership acting in isolation or in one-to-one
relationships.

Myth: Focusing on emotions does not lead to
business outcomes. Ignore them and get on with
the tasks at hand
Our research: Both positive and negative
emotions have a huge impact on the benefits
realized from a change program
High levels of fear and frustration can result in a decline in
benefits realized by more than 20 percent, while a high level of
passion and drive can lead to an increase of 50 percent. These
differences can translate to millions of dollars to the bottom line.

15
Find out more:
Read ‘Turning change upside down’ at:
www.accenture.com/MythsofChange
Read about ‘Big Change, Best Path’ at:
www.accenture.com/BigChangeBestPath
For more information contact:
changetracking@accenture.com

16
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About Accenture Strategy
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function strategy to help our clients envision
and execute industry-specific strategies
that support enterprise-wide transformation.
Our focus on issues related to digital
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both efficiencies and growth. For more
information, follow @AccentureStrat or
visit www.accenture.com/strategy.

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