Corporate Cultures – Overcoming Cultural Resistance to Change

The firm hand of culture drives what, how, and why work gets done. Consequently, attempts to change established policies, processes, or practices will meet with a degree of cultural resistance. Therefore, the challenge for leaders becomes how to effectively implement needed change in spite of this resistance; especially if the foundational tenants of the organization’s culture must be preserved.[wcm_restrict plans=”60654, 25542, 25653″]

Overcoming Cultural Resistance to Non-Culture Related Change

Effectively overcoming cultural resistance to change requires proactive predictive and mitigating actions to:

1. Understand the organization’s work performance culture
2. Identify cultural traits to be impacted by the change
3. Develop and implement actions to mitigate the cultural impact

Understand the Organization’s Work Performance Culture

Predicting the cultural resistance to be encountered requires leaders to first understand their organization’s culture as it relates to how work is done. (See StrategyDriven Corporate Cultures article, Culture’s Impact on How Work Gets Done and StrategyDriven’s Cultural Analytics) Such analyses reveal the triggers (leaders, supervisors, individual contributors) and controls (procedures, standards and expectations, knowledge and skills) governing the organization’s work performance.

Identify Cultural Traits to be Impacted by the Change

Armed with this knowledge, leaders then identify the specific cultural traits and/or characteristics that will likely present a roadblock to their desired change. Cultural traits focus on work triggers and controls while characteristics reflect the values and beliefs evolving form each unique trigger-control combination. (See StrategyDriven Corporate Cultures article, Culture-based Work Performance Model) Those potentially presenting challenge are the traits and characteristics the change does not reinforce (neutral change) or contradicts (negative change). Traits and characteristics reinforced by the change (positive change) are unlikely to experience cultural resistance.

Develop and Implement Actions to Mitigate the Cultural Impact

Each work performance culture possesses specific strengths and vulnerabilities resulting from its unique trigger-control combination. Knowing these and the traits/characteristics impacted enables leaders to develop change mitigators that leverage their organization’s cultural strengths. Such mitigators reinforce leadership’s respect for the organization’s culture and signal that while the change will fundamentally altering how work is done, the organization’s values will be protected.

Effective Organizational Change Management and Initiative Selection

Effectively overcoming cultural resistance to change begins long before the change initiatives starts. Strategic initiative development and selection processes should consider cultural impacts and include the resources necessary to implement cultural mitigators. Furthermore, initiative implementation plans should incorporate the identification and implementation of cultural mitigators as a part of their overall change management activities.

Final Thought…

Because knowledge of the work performance culture is fundamental to the successful implementation of strategic initiatives and major changes, it can be concluded that the organization’s culture should be periodically assessed. Assessment periodicity should be governed by factors influencing the culture’s rate of change, such as workforce turnover, organization growth, mergers and acquisitions, changes in product and service lines, relocations, etcetera.[/wcm_restrict][wcm_nonmember plans=”60654, 25542, 25653″]

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About the Author

Nathan Ives is a StrategyDriven Principal and Host of the StrategyDriven Podcast. For over twenty years, he has served as trusted advisor to executives and managers at dozens of Fortune 500 and smaller companies in the areas of management effectiveness, organizational development, and process improvement. To read Nathan’s complete biography, click here.