The First 90 Days (21 page)
Authors: Michael Watkins
Tags: #Success in business, #Business & Economics, #Decision-Making & Problem Solving, #Management, #Leadership, #Executive ability, #Structural Adjustment, #Strategic planning
Transforming Organizational Psychology
People’s attitudes and emotions vary in predictable ways depending on which of the STARS situations they are experiencing. Participants in a start-up are likely to be more excited and hopeful than members of a troubled group facing failure. But at the same time, employees of a start-up are typically much less focused on key issues than those in a turnaround, simply because the vision, strategy, structures, and systems that channel organizational energy are not yet in place. Participants in a turnaround often know what the problems are, but not what to do about them.
Success at transitioning therefore depends, in part, on your ability to transform the prevailing organizational psychology in predictable ways. In start-ups, the prevailing mood is often one of excited confusion, and your job is to channel that energy into productive directions, in part by deciding what not to do. In turnarounds, you may be dealing with a group of people who are close to despair; it is your job to provide a light at the end of the tunnel. In realignments, you will likely have to pierce through the veil of denial that is preventing people from confronting the need to reinvent the business. Finally, in sustainingsuccess situations, you have to “invent the challenge” by finding ways to keep people motivated, to combat complacency, and to find new direction for growth—both organizational and personal.
Leading with the Right Skills
The management skills necessary for success vary among the four STARS situations. Start-ups and turnarounds call for “hunters,” people who can move fast and take chances. In turnarounds, for example, the premium is on rapid diagnosis of the business situation (markets, technologies, products, strategies) and then aggressive moves to cut back the organization to a defendable core. You will need to act quickly and decisively, often on the basis of incomplete information.
The skills that contribute to success in realignment and sustaining-success situations, by contrast, are more akin to farming than hunting. More subtle influence skills come into play: Skilled farmers focus on understanding the culture and politics of the organization. They also painstakingly cultivate awareness of the need for change, by promoting shared diagnosis, influencing opinion leaders, and encouraging benchmarking.
To put it another way, in turnarounds the problems teach the people about the need for major changes. In realignments, by contrast,
you
must teach people about the problems. Turnarounds are also ready-fire-aim situations: You make the tough calls with less than full knowledge and then adjust as you learn more. Realignments (and sustaining-success assignments) are ready-aim-fire situations. Time urgency is less extreme, but it is more important to understand the organization, get the strategy right and build support for it, and make some good early calls.
Because of their differing imperatives, it is easy for hunters to stumble in realignment and sustaining-success situations and for farmers to stumble in start-ups and turnarounds. The experienced turnaround person facing a realignment is at risk of arriving with “the answer” and moving too fast, needlessly causing resistance. The experienced realignment person in a turnaround situation is at risk of moving too slowly, expending energy on cultivating consensus when it is unnecessary to do so, thus squandering precious time.
This is not to say that people who are good at hunting cannot farm or vice versa. Good managers can succeed in all four of the STARS situations, though no one is equally good at all of them. But it is essential to think hardheadedly about which of your skills and inclinations will serve you well in your particular situation and which are likely to get you into trouble. Don’t arrive with your spear if you need to be plowing.
