Given
that it’s meant to be as good as a rest, change does
seem like awfully hard work. According to the Chartered Institute
of Personal Development (CIPD) organisations across all sectors
undergo a major change at least once every three years, but
frequent practice doesn’t seem to help that much; over
40 per cent of reorganisations fail to meet their stated objectives.
Not surprisingly, then, managing change regularly crops up
as a key concern for those in charge, and when the NCVO looked
at the worries facing the sector’s chief executives
a few summers ago, it was right at the top, cited by every
single respondent.
Many of the problems encountered tend to focus around staff.
Employees are not, in fact, always adverse to change. Looking
to CIPD data, again, suggests that many changes are welcomed,
with employees saying that on the whole they make their work
better. On the other hand, certain changes – most obviously
redundancy programmes, but also restructuring and cultural
change programmes – tend to damage employee relations
and hit retention rates, and even benign changes can snatch
defeat from the jaws of victory if handled badly.
In this respect, the charity sector is particularly vulnerable.
Partly this is down to its record on human resources generally.
It continues, after all, to attract a disproportionate number
of employment tribunal cases. Although it’s possible
to overstate this, Peter Grant, senior fellow in the faculty
of management at Cass Business School, says charities do struggle.
“It may be unfair, but it’s probably still true
that major changes cause particular problems for charities,”
he says.
This is hardly unforgivable, though, especially since many
can blame a lack of resources. John Burnell, head of consultancy
Personnel Solutions and author of Managing People in Charities,
says that the sector’s record on handling staff during
periods of change is “patchy” but tends to be
fairly good among those that have dedicated HR departments.
However, there aren’t that many of those, and in the
remainder personnel issues are sidelined in preference to
looking at financial streams, property and IT infrastructure.
“The staff only get discussed in terms of who’s
going to fit in where and, if you’re lucky, what type
of retraining they need,” he says. “But the truth
is, when you have a big change it’s vital to get your
staff onside.”
Doing so should not be impossible – nor necessarily
expensive. Some of the issues are purely practical. For example,
the uncertainty change brings can be minimised. When lone
parent charities One Parent Families and Gingerbread merged
earlier this year, the charities pushed the legal merger through
within two months of the decision to go ahead.
“We really wanted to make sure this wasn’t hanging
over people for longer than necessary,” explains Chris
Pond, chief executive of the new organisation. Similarly,
NSPCC’s take over of Childline kept the due diligence
period down for the sake of the staff. In November 2005 the
two charities were still in talks; by 1 February the next
year, the merger was complete.
This won’t always be possible. As Grant points out,
most organisations start out with the intention to push through
changes before other issues creep in. Nevertheless, he says,
the most successful changes do tend to be those that are completed
fairly quickly.
It is also worth making sure all your procedures are in place
for where things don’t go smoothly. As Burnell points
out, complaints procedures and redundancy policies are more
likely to be called on in such times, so making sure they
are in place and are clear will help. “Because if you
try to make those up on the hoof, you’re only going
to make things worse,” he warns.
Mostly, however, successful change management comes down to
simply keeping staff informed. If employees know what is happening
and why, they are more likely to welcome the change. “It
is pretty difficult to over-communicate with people during
these periods,” says Grant.
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The tricky bit
Exactly what to tell them and when is another question,
though, and even with the best laid plans it can be difficult
to get right.
When Childline’s staff came over to the NSPCC, for
instance, the latter’s HR director Liz Booth found
they knew far less about the move than she expected. Many,
for instance, had no understanding of how the TUPE regulations
would work and, despite an active policy on NSPCC’s
part to interpret the regulations as widely as possible
in the new employees’ favour, there was a fair amount
of suspicion among the workers it took on. This took time
to overcome.
“We should have been far more involved in what was
communicated to our prospective employees,” says Booth
now. “That did come back to bite us.”
On the other hand, it is possible to communicate too early.
One Parent Families and Gingerbread, for instance, first
considered a merger two years ago, but decided then that
it wasn’t the right time. Only when the charities’
boards had agreed to go ahead did Pond consult with the
staff. “To float the idea of a merger without it happening
was just going to cause anxiety that may have been totally
unfounded,” he explains.
It can also lead to misapprehensions. “There has to
be a fundamental boundary between governance and management,”
says Burnell. If you consult before a decision is made,
it can lead staff to think they have a right to determine
the policy rather than its implementation. “Once a
decision is made, though, there’s no point hiding
it,” he adds.
You also have to be prepared to hear back from the staff,
however. Sue Green at change management consultancy BASIS
says there should be genuine consultation wherever possible.
“When change is done to people, rather than with them,
that’s where there are normally issues,” she
argues. “Consulting them gives people a sense of control.
“In fact, I would say it’s dangerous to go into
a change without having a really good consultation and communication
plan in place,” she adds.
One large charity, for instance, had over a year’s
work preparing to restructure and relocate wasted after
failing to convince its staff about the move. Despite running
workshops and informal consultations, staff didn’t
feel their worries were heard.
“There were lots of opportunities to comment, but
the concerns were simply ignored,” says the head of
the staff council during the change. The result was that
when the council held a staff survey late in the process,
these worries “exploded” and the results convinced
trustees to abandon the proposals. “There was a huge
amount of disillusionment and discouragement,” says
the council head.
Interestingly, though, it was not their own job security
or conditions that most occupied staff, he says: rather
it was a failure to explain how the changes would further
the mission of the organisation. What was needed, was what
Mike Hudson in his book Managing without Profits terms a
“motivating vision” to convince staff of the
benefit of the changes. This is demonstrated by the fact
that a similar set of proposals is now largely being welcomed.
“I wouldn’t say staff have been more involved
in the process this time, but there is this motivating vision;
last time there wasn’t,” says the staff representative.
“They can see how the changes will build on the organisation’s
values.”
Of course, it’s not always easy to supply this, but
if staff can see the destination, they’re more likely
to set out on the journey. As Pond puts it: “You have
to make sure that people can see the sunlit headlands while
they’re tramping through the foothills. Because change
is always unsettling, but change that doesn’t seem
to have any purpose is worse.”
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The case for change: East Suffolk Mind
When Jo Searle took over as chief executive of East Suffolk
Mind in July last year, it was obvious there would have
to be changes. The organisation was facing severe financial
problems and had a top-heavy management structure, with
over 30 managers for an organisation of 120 people and a
turnover of £3 million.
The first few months were taken to get an understanding
of the organisation. Staff were told little until the proposals
were finalised, although some questions arose when Searle
put a freeze on recruitment in order to hold vacancies for
the forthcoming redeployment.
To deal with these, a memo was sent to inform staff formally
about the freeze and tell them that the charity was looking
at its structure. They were also told details of the proposals
would be available in the New Year. “If you can’t
answer someone’s question, you can at least tell them
when you can answer it,” says Searle.
She also decided to hold off from presenting the proposals
until after Christmas.
In January, an event was held at a local hotel to present
the proposals to all staff. This saw Searle explain the
form the restructure would take, the rationale behind it
and the process by which it would be put in place. Staff
also received a pack with the presentation and further details.
This was then put out to consultation.
Over the next month Searle and the HR manager attended team
meetings at every project so that all staff had an opportunity
to question them. They were also invited to make direct
contact. At the end of the consultation period, another
full staff event was held where the structure – with
revisions arising out of the consultation – was presented.
“It was really important that people saw we would
make changes in response to what they were saying,”
remarks Searle. At this meeting the process for dealing
with the 34 managers whose positions were at risk was also
presented.
Again, Searle took a central role. She and the HR manager
met with each individual to discuss their options and their
preferences. Each one also undertook an extensive scoring
exercise, including evaluation by themselves, their line
manager and Searle and the HR manager. The resulting aggregate
score along with the employee’s preferences were used
to fit staff into the new roles. There was then another
meeting with each member affected to discuss the results.
“It was a lot of work, but it was important everybody
got the same treatment and knew that their voice was heard
by those making the decisions,” explains Searle.
According to John Burnell, the exercise was one of the best
handled reorganisations he has ever seen. In total nine
managers left the organisation, including two compulsory
redundancies, but otherwise retention rates are high and
staff satisfaction with the changes runs at about 95 per
cent.
Despite this, concerns raised by three employees led to
the charity hiring Burnell to conduct a formal investigation.
The only conclusion he can draw is that you can’t
please all the people all the time.
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