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Common theme, shared vision

The change message rollst be well and widely understood. Initially, this is a matter of articulating it well and broadcasting it to many audiences. It can be crafted by a small group, but it becomes truly shared-internalized as it is used by large numbers of people.

Symbols and Signals

People are always reading the organizational tealeaves, looking für signs of whether the change is serious and how it will feel. Small symbols can have big consequences. The fight early signals can show people what the change will mean für them. (Eliminating reserved parking is how some companies signal a reduction of hierarchy.)

Guidance Structure and process

Change needs someone at the controls, even if ultimately everyone has to get involved in change. And there need to be a process für steering it in the right direction. This involves the nuts and bolts of project management, on a large scale. Assigning accountability für the big picture - the overview of all the elements of change - is an important step.

Education, Training, action tools

How do people know what to do to make the change operational, to make it real in their activities? The same words can be understood differently by each part of the organization, interpreted from their own perspectives. Therefore education is necessary to communicate the why and what of change. Training is necessary for people to become adept at the new behavior implied by the change. And action tools help people relate the change to their own day-to-day work.

Champions and sponsors

Changes need people who become passionate about seeing that they take place. Champions are the activists and cheerleaders für change, often carrying out mini change projects themselves. Sponsors make sure that the change has the backing of those with the power to fight for it.

Quick wins and local innovations

Early successes show that change is possible and indicate what the change means in practice. It is important to get the grass roots involved in shaping the change by picking projects that particular units can tackle. This is improvisational theater at its best - a clear overall direction, but details created as units take hold of the change and make it their own. That's why shared vision is directly opposite this element on the Change Wheel; pilot projects, demonstrations, and local modifications make the vision concrete and ensure its acceptance.

Communication, best practice exchange

Change requires even more communication than routine activities. Top leaders need to know what's happening in the field so they can make adjustments to support it or steer it in a different direction. Local units need role models to learn from the experience of their peers, to see what's possible, and to be spurred on to new heights. Change can be chaotic without a way to communicate what's happening everywhere.

Policy, procedures, system alignment

Every organizational rule, routine, requirement, or procedure can either reinforce or undermine the desired change: human resource systems (hiring criteria, promotion criteria, compensation policy), information systems (what data are shared, with whom, when), policies about who gets to talk to customers or to the press. Rules and processes need to be reassessed and adjusted to support the new direction.

Measures, milestones and feedback

It is important to know whether the change is on track. Establishing measures of progress is important, especially for softer changes (such as a shift of culture) or ones that will not show up in conventional financial results. Dividing big changes into small increments with clear milestones is helpful für measurement and morale; each milestone succesfully passed is a cause for celebration, or each one missed a cause for reajustment. There needs to be a feedback loop based on agreed-upon measures of progress.

Rewards and recognition

Who gets rewarded and for what reasons is an essential component of change. The organization's carrots and sticks combine with its publicity engine to create heroes of the revolution or enemies of the change.