I'm Stuart Stewart Easton I'm the CEO
one of the founders at transparent
choice and
um we tend to run a couple of webinars
each month one of them is sort of a demo
of our software the project
prioritization software and the other
one we do something around uh thought
around leadership around strategy around
business issues and today I'm delighted
that we that we have Lisa with us Lisa
wheatcroft
um not only does she have a splendid
accent uh from uh you know as
Northerners have to stick together less
um so not not only does he have a
brilliant accent from from the north of
England if the Americans won't get the
reference I apologize
um but she also has loads of experience
as a business leader an executive in in
the airline industry infrastructure that
kind of area and and most of that career
was spent managing big transformation
and change programs so for example
um you know she was able to increase you
know engagement uh and and reduce costs
by 90 million pounds through one uh
organizational uh transformation program
and Lisa and I were talking I guess
about two months ago Lisa about this
yeah
and you know we're having a really good
uh really good matter about
um uh about you know what does it take
to land good transformation because the
stuff that we do the project
prioritization is a key enabler of
business transformation you know that's
it's how you figure out what to actually
do in order to transform but it's not
the whole story right it's it's one of
those necessary but not sufficient
conditions for achieving business
transformation and so what we thought
we'd do today is explore a little bit
what good transformation looks like and
maybe even have a few horror stories on
the way
um and and hopefully you've got some of
your own horror stories that you can
tell uh as we go through
um again if you have been to our
webinars before then you know the
routine we will be probably peppering
you with pop quizzes and all sorts of
fun things and I yes I do expect you to
jump on the keyboard and respond not
just sit there in receive mode
um when you do that it's so much more
fun for us
um and hopefully it's more fun for you
and it means that we can kind of respond
to what you're saying and sort of tailor
some of the content to the things that
are interesting you so please do jump
onto the chat
um if you haven't already introduce
yourself tell us where you're from uh
but with that I'm going to hand it over
to Lisa
um to to start the ball rolling and it's
going to be kind of a mixture of a few
slides bit of conversation all that kind
of good stuff so if you have questions
for Lisa comments observations you agree
or you disagree something resonates
drop it in the chat let us know
brilliant Lisa over to you thanks Stuart
and for the kind introduction and I'll
try to tone down my very normal accent
for those who may not understand it
we should be getting into sort of some
Yorkshire dialect later that will really
confuse people
I've got some sides but obviously if you
want to ask questions as we go along
then please do because it's just a real
framework to open the conversation but
what we wanted to talk to you about
today as Stuart said was really what
what is business transformation what
makes it successful what are some of the
pitfalls of business transformation and
give you some hints and tips really so
that you can start to think about how
you can embed a change in an
organization or a large conservation
successfully
so it's a real iterative process and
those of you who've LED or been through
transformation Cycles will understand
that it can often feel like you need a
road map to navigate through to the
other side
fantastic so first question
um but actually Lisa just could you show
your screen again because I think
something's thing is stalled online
so a question for everyone just drop
into the chat whether you
are interested in you know change and
transformation because you're leading
that transformation as the sponsoring
exec or are you maybe at the the sort of
program or the pmo level being tasked
with implementing it just just give us a
feel for what level you're at and what
you're what you're interested in there
um so so Sandy I'm going to ask you to
kick off and get everybody going going I
know I know you'll you'll join in
um and uh just let us know where you are
in there thank you Sandy that's great so
everyone join in and uh just give us a
heads up where you are in the in the in
the process
brilliant on you go Lisa sorry no great
so I mean look for all of us I think you
understand that change is never easy so
business transformation can feel
challenging whether you're needing it or
whether you're the recipient of of
change and I'm sure we've all been
through you know
change being being deployed to us and
also moments of leading it depending on
what type of role you're in and I
remember very early in my career an HR
Director saying to me if you get change
and transformation 80 right then you're
world class so I always try to stick to
that and I've always stayed in my mind
throughout my career but as we know it
can go wrong and it does go wrong often
and the impact of things going wrong in
a transformation project can be loss of
Market position loss of stakeholder
credibility you can lose key team
members and lose engagement and
motivation of the team and it can really
impact the leaders in the business as
well and create a disengagement with
with their people so it's really
important to have a robust plan and
obviously we'll talk about the planning
process as we go through but having a
robust plan and being clear on the
transformation to make sure it is a
success
brilliant so while you move to the next
slide just really quickly the feedback
from people feels like a a slightly more
pmo implementation level audience with a
with some Consulting and some leadership
uh transformational leadership in here
great
so yeah it's really interesting if
you've got any views or want to
challenge that it'll be great to hear
hear what you've got to say
um look there are many and you'll all
know actually in these roles there are
many different models that you can use
for business transformation and I
typically tend to try to use an academic
model when I'm doing something just to
make sure that there's a framework and
John Cotter is somebody who I'll read a
read a lot of and utilize but what I try
to do is keep a real
grief and succinct Change Model that I
will stick to every time to make sure
that really I'm getting the most out of
the change in transformation projects
and I can plan and organize the the
transformation around that
and normally I'll make sure that they
you know I really stuck to these four
key elements and the first one is Vision
then engagement optimization and
embedding and the vision really is about
creating that real pace for Change and
making sure that the vision is really
clear to those who are leading the
change but also to those who are
recipients of the change now that can be
anything from creating a sort of north
star and a good feeling of of what it
will look and feel like in the
organization after the transformation
has been deployed but also being really
clear on what the business is trying to
achieve and what the impact is of not
changing and often we forget that in any
change in transformation process and
being clear on what needs to change but
also what must change and what the
impact is of not changing is critically
important to help people understand the
reasons for Change and kind of move
forward from the status quo
so so Lisa I mean on that right so that
the and I'm keeping half an eye on the
on the comments so I'm going to try and
weave some of that in right so so Gregor
was asking uh really wanting to
understand what is the challenge in
transformation right so so you're
starting to map out kind of what the key
components are but what's the real
challenge what what is what is it that
can that can go wrong you know
what does it look like when it goes
wrong what does that feel like what are
the consequences of that you know so
what is is The Challenge from the point
of view of gosh if we get it wrong and
then and then maybe you could talk a
little bit about the difference between
um
transformation and change management
because change Management's one of those
phrases that people get a little bit you
know there are at least two different
methods two different definitions of
change management it's not useful
um so so maybe you could talk about that
a little bit as well before we dive too
much into how
yeah I think there's a few questions in
there isn't it but I think that the
things that I've seen go wrong are
typically where the people element isn't
considered properly and and will segue
into the engagement page but
um it's where people aren't considered
and the change or transformation are
deployed as a task rather than a program
of work so
um so that is that is critical and the
other part is the planning which you
know it's really important to have a
really robust plan where you're very
clear on what the priorities are who is
who is doing what who's delivering what
outcome and when but most importantly
how you're delivering that and that
links back to the people element so
um you know obviously through the the
transparent Choice framework there's a
number of ways of really kind of delving
into that priority and planning element
but it's um it's something that I see
often organizations forget about and
they'll often dive straight into the end
State and trying to deliver the end
State whether that be a reorganization
or a culture change without really
giving critical or to the the work
streams the the prioritization the
phasing of different work pieces and
also how people will be engaged in that
process so what do you think's behind
that Lisa because Ashok actually just
throughout another question it was very
similar to where my mind was going our
show which is that you know sometimes uh
people don't engage in that process they
don't uh or or they
um or they
actively undermine that process
so why because that that really seems
like
you're you're almost baking in
deliberately baking and failure so why
do you think there is that
it's interesting isn't it do you mean
the people piece or the planning on both
uh both actually yeah I I was I was more
thinking about the planning but but both
because it's you know it's it's kind of
at this stage anyone leading a change
program should know that you have to
take the people with you right there's
no excuse for not knowing that right at
this point in time so so so kind of both
it is an interesting question from my
experience typically when a business
decides to change there's already been a
number of discussions or a period of
time where that's been debated and you
know chewed around by an executive team
so by the time it comes to the change
needs to be delivered there isn't as
much time so it's often it often becomes
a reactive extra piece of work on top of
business as usual rather than a planned
considered and strategic change program
or you know
transformation and so I think that that
that's typically what I've seen it just
becomes that reality and reactive piece
and I was talking to a large
construction business last week and and
they said to me oh we haven't got time
to deploy the change and I I kind of
thought but what are you doing you know
what is so important that a business
critical piece of work can't be
delivered effectively and it was almost
um again reactive after it it's already
started and certainly we were asked to
go in and do some Consulting but it was
two days before the change was going to
be announced so that organization
despite being a very well-led large
construction business you know UK wide
they operated almost too late in the
process to have any sort of real plan or
take their people with them so it's it's
interesting from a planning perspective
and I think often organizations unless
it's really built into their culture
about how important people are can
underestimate what that actually means
in reality taking people on the journey
isn't just about communicating with
people and telling them what's going to
happen and when it's about getting them
really involved in that process and I
see many many businesses forget about
that and
try and deliver the task without slowing
down to plan prioritize and engage
really right so so part of it is that
people are trying to
um you know swap the engines on the
jumbo Jetta
so that's that that usually doesn't work
too well
um so so another thing that sometimes
comes into this is
um and actually I had a conversation
yesterday with a one I'm not going to
give you the name but it's a name you
everyone on the cold will recognize a
Global Engineering Company and you know
they were they were trying to they're
looking at this sort of five to ten year
vision of where they need to be and you
know their particular challenge was that
the owners in the different business
units
were kind of resisting any kind of
change because actually they were
performing very well right but so those
guys were making the bonus every every
quarter
but the guys who were thinking five ten
years in the future who are going to
make sure that you're still making your
bonus then
um you know that kind of seen as noise
and and you know who these guys in the
cloud you know they don't they don't
have the feet on the ground all this
kind of good stuff so so sometimes it's
just about not having a
not having a common vision of what the
change is for and why yeah right
um and not having incentives aligned
yeah absolutely and I and I think it and
not really considering the the impact of
not changing because if you look at the
way the world has changed we talked
about it last week Stuart with AI and
different technology you know those
organizations who were strategic and
thought ahead about that weren't
massively impacted in the pandemic they
were able to optimize that that
opportunity
um but many where they were stuck and
were operating in the status quo I saw
lots of organizations that that failed
that I was I was in one at the time
where they just weren't able to innovate
or take themselves forward or do
anything different so they they
ultimately had a you know had a very
difficult time during the pandemic
um so yeah I think I think you're right
it's about that vision and strategy and
if that isn't in place for a business
then it almost becomes a done two rather
than a kind of forward-thinking piece of
work to transform an organization
and if there's not a burning platform
like you said you know sometimes massive
underperformance or a massive cost
challenge can create a burning platform
for change but if the businesses kind of
operating at a consistent level that you
can often feel quite uncomfortable sort
of for people to move forward and drive
transformation
so so you you use the word change I
think two or three times in that little
section there so um so let's let's just
address that the question that who asked
it uh that Henry asked about the
difference between between business
transformation and change is there a
difference or is it the same thing
change management yeah yeah I mean lots
of people would argue it's the same
thing and lots of people would argue
with it's very different how I would
tend to see it is change change can be
quite minor so it might be a change to a
process or
um a change to a way of working but
business transformation is typically
where it's a culture change or a you
know a huge kind of piece of strategic
thinking that's going to take the
business in a different direction or you
know open a large element of the
organization so
um I see it's been two different things
but based on scale and that would be my
you know my view of the world it's not
necessarily an academically with it but
but
um certainly you know change management
is typically when it's iterative and
um
less less broad I suppose in my in my
experience but you know there are lots
of people who would argue that it's more
of the same thing because ultimately
you're transforming and changing an
organization
brilliant so so so
um so so it's it's kind of a Continuum
at one end you've got sort of more
tactical projects you know upgrading a
CRM system or something like that at the
other end you've got something that's
actually fundamentally changing so this
is changing bits of the business this is
changing the business right is sort of
the way I would think about it and
there's no clear line that says one is
you know it's like it's like it's like
when you go from you know on on those
wonderful color wheels that you see when
you're picking the color and PowerPoint
you know and you you know there's no
point where it goes from being blue to
purple right you know that over here
it's blue and over there it's purple
right and somewhere in the middle you
could call it from the one but it
doesn't really matter right it's the
same same sort of idea yeah absolutely
absolutely and when I think about change
management from my perspective it's been
in the people scenarios it's often about
changing the structure of the
organization or changing a way of
working or implementing a process but as
you say changing the business if you
think of the one that pops my mind at
the moment is Twitter where the you know
Elon Musk has gone in and absolutely
changed the way of operating that is
changing the business not just a small
change in an organization so yeah for me
at the same
um
you know you've articulated that well
but it's it's around scale and less
iterative and more transformational and
and and Ashoka I hear your comment right
I I take that but if you look at that
right if you're in the call center
and they change the CRM tool that's a
transformation yeah but if you're in the
c-suite and someone in the call centers
change the trans the CRM tool that's
just a little change projects yeah yeah
right so so some of this is about
perspective as well
um so you know to the people in the call
center changing CRM tool is a
foundational change to how they work
right so it's it's one of those terms
it's a little bit elastic generally I
agree with what you said but but whether
something is transformational on this
you know inside the box or outside the
box depends a little bit on where you
are in the organization and what your
perspective is yeah and I would agree
and obviously you know advising from a
kind of business on the business
perspective rather than in but I take
that point which is why it's really
important for the next piece which I've
talked about on the that kind of four
stage processes around that engagement
so
for that reason that you just described
to it it's really important to engage
people in any business change whether
that be small iterative
um you know system Improvement or it's a
large-scale business transformation
because ultimately getting people
involved in that change will will make
sure that they understand what's
happening they're brought into what's
happening and they can in the end become
ambassadors or accelerators for a change
and the call center is a you know is a
great example because if you when you
when you know as a business if you
decide to change some way of working in
the poll Center by getting the teams
involved before the change has been
fully planned to understand what works
for them what doesn't what leads to
change how they see improvements being
made then that will ultimately mean that
they don't feel like it's too
transformational it's a it's a
collective and collaborative process but
it'll also help make sure that it's done
in the right way because I often find
that the people who were in the call
center on the ground in the business are
those people that know more about what
needs to happen and sometimes the
leaders do because they have the you
know the experience of what's actually
going on so that engagement piece is is
massively important for me whether that
be in a sort of in the business change
or a large-scale business transformation
piece
so so that's a really interesting one so
so again the the
um
sort of melding these two issues
together right the those change versus
transformation and then and then
engagement of people down in ground
level so I we did one of these webinars
or two or three years ago and I'm trying
to remember the name of the guy and it's
escaping me right now but anyway he was
telling me about a program he ran or an
initiative they ran at a utility U.S
utility a big utility
and
um and basically what they did was they
they just went to the organization
and said tell us all the dumb things we
do and give tell us what we should do to
stop it
and through that they achieved if I
remember the numbers correctly 300
million in capital uh expenditure
reduction in 200 million in cap in um
operating
um expense reduction
now
even for a utility company that is
transformational that amount of change
is transformational
but it was great that particular one was
Grassroots lead right so the vision was
let's stop doing the stupid stuff right
it was that simple that was the vision
and then they they put in place a whole
bunch of
um uh yeah and so they empowered all
kinds of people just to fix stuff right
and they empowered the organization to
identify where the area what areas of
problem were and what's really
interesting in this debate is Right each
one of those little projects was a
little change project
but the result was a transformation in
the business right and uh so so it's
really interesting it sort of combined
that little story combines all of those
things that you were talking about you
know a really simple Vision they engage
the people they executed well which I
suspect you'll talk about in a minute
but they executed well and and in a way
they kind of bit into lots of little
pieces that they could do that they knew
they could deliver and the result was it
you know a very significant
transformation and in their case that
you know U.S utilities are not known for
stock appreciation but over the next two
or three years their stock grew by 50
right that never happens to utilities
right
and so that clearly was a major
transformation for that that business
yeah absolutely it's reminded me um
again and it's it's one of the horror
stories we all have on the stories
throughout our career it wasn't
necessarily a horror story but we had um
in an aviation business I worked in they
there was really bad relationship with
the people and the teams and the trade
unions so the business was
underperforming everyone was disengaged
it was like a monotonous job for people
and as a leadership team we went and
tried to improve engagement and improve
what people felt about the business and
felt about work and we as a leadership
team got together planned out looked at
the pulse survey looked at all of these
things that people have told us and
created a strategy went out and
delivered it and the next year the
engagement scores went down and that was
because we hadn't done what you've just
said there what we didn't engage
properly with people we didn't go back
and say let's have a look and try and
unpeak some of what people are telling
us and really get them involved with
suggestions and solutions we just looked
at the problems
but we then didn't say well how do we
fix them for you so it was a you know as
one of the kind of critical learning
points in my career certainly about
engagement and involvement of people
because we it took us probably a year
extra to have that business
transformation piece in in the in the
space we wanted to because we hadn't
engaged with people and um you know
really got under the Crux of what some
of the issues were
yeah that and that sounds kind of Fairly
fairly typical and one of the things
that we
uh so one of the things that we see a
lot is being very specific about
engagement because because this is sort
of this isn't sequential it's kind of
happening all the time right so one of
the things that we see around engagement
in the prioritization process for
example is that you know very often
um organizations assume that the
executives just magically know
what things are the most impactful and
sometimes it's the executives who think
that right and and I hate to burst the
bubble you're wrong
um the so so you know the the just
within that you know just in that first
early stage of going from what's the
vision to what we're actually going to
do this this prioritization piece
um you need to be having a structured
engagement between the executive team
who own the goals
and the subject matter experts within
the business who understand the way the
business really works to help identify
opportunities for change to help
um uh score them identify risks all
these kind of things up front and if you
if you do that then you can you know
then you're gonna get much more
uh much more a engagement buy into the
execution but you're also going to find
identify the landmines before you before
you step on them and you can you're
going to not do bits do stuff that you
don't need to do and all those things if
you structure that properly which is
kind of what we do day in and day out
um just to address your your point there
about this company having a lot of
wasted
yeah sure they had a lot of ways but I
guarantee you know throw go get the Wall
Street Journal put it up on your on your
wall right they probably don't do still
don't don't do that anymore but they
used to have nice cages full of ticker
symbols and prices and things right
throw a dart at it and whatever company
you hit I guarantee they have similar
levels of waste and stupidity right all
organizations do
uh the PMI just as one example PMI did
some research that with the economist
intelligence unit looking at just
project portfolios and in a typical
project portfolio nothing special about
these portfolios this is probably your
portfolio in a typical portfolio 20 of
the projects in that portfolio are so
badly aligned with the strategy of the
organization that they should be stopped
so so
don't don't fall into the Trap the oh
that's them we're not like that chances
are you're exactly like not you
personally but your organization is
exactly like that right and so so this
you know the stuff that that's uh uh
Lisa would be talking about if she could
get a word to that word in edgeways
um yeah this this stuff really
can help for organizations large and
small I'm not helping you get through
you slice Lisa but I know I know we've
got a few people I know we've got a few
people here who are from from much
smaller companies you know not not the
not the Heathrow Airport yeah I know you
worked at Hitler for a while for example
worked with them you know so not at the
scale of Heathrow Airport much much
smaller scale
business
is that the same is it different
yeah I mean I it's for me it's the same
and as a consultant and I'm sure you
hear some of the things from from your
client stewards it's um everyone says
our business is different my business is
different our industry's different our
people are different but as a person
who's worked with people for you know 20
years actually you get into an
organization and the problems are very
much the same it's just scale again so
you know I like your analogy of sort of
the data at the organization because it
is true you I see the similar and same
problems in every business I go into
just in different sort of levels of
maturity or scale
um so no it's even more important
actually when you look at a smaller
organization to engage with people and
make sure there isn't that wastage and
that there is a real clear plan and
deliverables because you haven't got the
the kind of fattened ability to Pivot as
well as you might do in a sort of larger
organization because any one mistake is
is a big mistake and anyone win is a big
win so it's um it's actually even more
critical for my personal in an
organization that is smaller but doesn't
have the scale of a an airport
and and in my experience in smaller
organizations especially if you still
have kind of the founder involved it can
be it can actually be a lot harder to
manage transformation because because
the emotions are higher right yeah it's
so personal in that it's it's not about
corporate and how many people do I have
and oh God these corporate issues it's
stuff I've spent the last 10 years
building
this and you're going to tear it down
really yeah right
[Music]
yeah I've worse than a founder-led
organization and again I've spoke to a
lot of people who work in founder-led
businesses and it's typically the same
same issues you've just described plus
the fact that you know they've been
successful they've built a successful
business so why do they need to change
and typically in these founder
organizations that haven't got
necessarily the years of experience of
working with other organizations because
they've been focused on building their
business so it's that kind of inward
view versus the kind of strategic
outward View and it is harder to
influence and um you know really build
and make a change there
yeah yeah absolutely absolutely
um fantastic let's move on I'm going to
shut up for a minute let you carry that
way so
it's okay I mean we've covered some of
this so it's really quite interesting
but the engagement piece of me is that
is the most important and then how are
you optimize doing a um a change program
and transformation and we talked about
there about execution so really for me
it's it's using the the transformation
and change program to look at all of
these systems look up ways of working
processes silos different different
things that slow down and really do
impact an organization and use it using
it as a burning platform to really
manage and improve some of those things
that might get in the way as well so
really optimizing that and then looking
at execution is absolutely critical why
whilst I you know do agree it's it's
important to have that plan it's
important to make sure that the plan is
or you know stuck to from you know got
some project managers on the call but
the plan is structured as closely as
possible because I've again I've seen
lots of organizations large and small
kind of lose sight have a strategy have
a plan and then don't execute it and and
only sort of deliver part of that
transformation and change program
because they already focus on a certain
part of it so the execution is
absolutely critical and as I say many
many businesses forget about that
um as he's embedding because often we
can think we've ticked off we've done
the change the project team have stepped
down we're finished it's all over and
then everybody behaviorally reverts back
to what was happening before and the
business lose sights at the new site
loses site to be of the end State and
actually goes off course and goes in a
totally different direction and needs to
waste time again going back and really
kind of going through some of the
transformation and change process again
to make sure that those systems and
changes are embedded so all of that is
really critical and it does need to link
together with a you know a really robust
plan that you know has a simple change
in mind
and and so that that I mean I've got so
many questions I'm making those to try
and remember them all but um so so
who
I was going to say whose fault is that
that's the wrong question who is
accountable for embedding it
yeah I mean the executive leaders are
the leaders you know it depends how big
the changes and the the kind of
transformation but the ioc as a
leadership responsibility to to embed
that because and often I'm sure some
people in the project will you'll get
stood up onto a project as I do as a
consultant you stood up
deliver this and then you move on to
something else but it's really important
that whoever's leading a change does
oversee that from start to finish but
also afterwards and make sure you know
and again I think a prime example is an
organizational change with with people
in a you know a reorganization or a
Target operating model and often I see
leaders kind of throw the boxes go
through the process get people in the
Box get a different name in a different
box and then
just turn them back and get on the
business as usual and what happens is
the the rules and the new framework and
new organization doesn't get delivered
because people just revert back to what
they were doing before so it is it's
really about that that leadership that's
really critical and it's a a critical
part of any changes to have strong
leadership
and and and I suspect there's something
in there about culture of the because
because a transformation program can
almost build up its own culture yeah
yeah so there's something in there about
the culture of that program I would
imagine yeah no I think it's it's a good
point and I remember reading a quote
years ago about it's basically very
famous I just can't call after my head
about culture being what happens when
you turn away when you're not watching
um and actually I think it is a good
point it is it is a you know the culture
of the business before the culture of
the business during you need to kind of
really start thinking from the start in
the vision area about what you want the
culture to be at the end because the
only way you'll achieve that is to make
sure it's embedded throughout and you
don't turn you back and it reverts back
to what it was before or a kind of newly
created culture that's been formed as
part of a business change so so I'm
gonna I'm going to chime in in the in
the um in the teaser for this we talked
about 79 70 to 90 of transformation
programs fail now actually we cheated a
little bit and now whoops
um that statistic was specifically about
digital transformation right so digital
transformation I think is is a very yeah
an even more interesting case than
General business transformation because
often what I see there is
um the it organization
will change the software they'll change
the infrastructure
and and then the job then
then they think the job is done right
the job's not done is it
no no
[Music]
I agree and again I've seen I mean I was
with a large large organization probably
it was a very
large Global cleaning and infrastructure
Facilities Management business 50 000
people across the globe and they'd this
was when I was kind of HR advisor level
so I didn't take as much notice of the
reasons but it stuck in my brain but
they tried to implement sap across the
globe and um it was the same thing you
know actually they spent four million
pounds and what I remember remember the
person standing up on the stage they
spent four million pounds buying
embedded sap and then because the
behaviors
of the people in the organization and
the culture of the organization didn't
adopt that they had to pull it and it
was just a waste of four million pounds
and I I only remember because the person
had to get up on the stage and tell
everybody that despite spending four
million pounds they decided to not
progress with the sap system and and
that was all down to culture and
behaviors and not embedding and um just
exactly what you talked about what you
know it's probably 15 years ago so
probably even greater impact because
technology wasn't as advanced and um
adaptable as it is now
yeah yeah and it's it can be a real it
can be a real uh be real challenge um so
our shark's thrown out a comment a
comment a shock's on fire today thank
you Ashok uh where he's saying um would
Place some gates and checkpoints to
ensure new methods are followed be an
idea
um and and he's had some success with
that what are your thoughts on that
yeah I know I do agree I think that my
expertise isn't in terms of project
management but where I've seen really
successful business transformation it's
where there's some governance around
things and I personally think it's
really important as part of that
planning process to have those sign-offs
gateways and and somebody who's
responsible for making sure that things
are delivered so yeah I do you know I do
agree
um and it's and again it's something
that's often forgotten about doing a
change management and transformation
piece
yeah and and now again I want to just
throw up that there are at least two
ways that people use change management
and Lisa just used it in a different way
to the way we were using it earlier so
earlier we were talking about change
right
I think what you were when you use
change management there it's a very
specific process of stakeholder
engagement to ensure adoption of your
deliverables right yes
um and and Gregor you'd said you'd put
something I just found people put a
couple of things into the Q a area so
Gregor you'd said something uh similar
to that a little while ago
um so so change management in that sense
I think Gregor was asking should that be
part of you know a pillar of
you know delivery and and I'm assuming
from my perspective the answer is
absolutely you know if you're doing
smaller projects every project manager
should be trained in change management
if you've got a bigger organization you
might actually have a change management
team to support the project managers in
change management and if you're running
an I.T Department of any size you need
someone on that team who is a real
change management expert because and I'm
not picking on it guys but I T so we see
this a lot with you know it's kind of
cio's organization with engineering
organizations generally engineers and it
guys work really well with other
engineers and it guys
but they don't always communicate
and and interact quite as effectively
with the business and so that change
piece can often get missed in the
technical details of here's the
deliverable
and
um you know what we've trained you to
you to press the buttons that's not the
same as actually understanding why and
how and what do I need to do differently
and what's in it for me and all that all
that good stuff so absolutely
um uh I think 100 Gregor that that needs
to be part of your plan having a change
management in that sense embedded in
anything that you do and I don't think
that's unique to business transformation
I think that that that applies to any
kind of project delivery organization
should should be thinking that way your
job's not done until the business value
is realized and the business value will
not be realized if people don't adopt
the change
yeah I I totally agree I think the next
slide which which kind of segment segues
me on is that
the business transformation and what I
typically found in my experience is that
people who've got the ability to
lead something and and set a vision and
the strategy but also have some sort of
skill to to project management it's all
vice versa are those who were successful
now clearly you're not going to need it
and project manage it but having that
skill set or awareness of all of that
together makes
um you know makes a successful
transformation leader really because if
you if you only focus on the people or
you're only focused on the strategy or
you're already focused on the process
then it's clearly not going to work so
having that more strategic oversight and
skill set and also having these kind of
um behaviors and Leadership skills are
really important which kind of fits into
some of the things we've already talked
about
leading a change in a transformation is
requires a different skill set from
day-to-day business as usual
um and I always compare it I led a large
retail organization and it I was you
know measured every day on how much
money we made the day before so the
leadership skills I needed around pace
and drive and delivery and numbers and
finances and sales they were kind of
very you know hard behavioral skills but
actually when you're leading change you
need the opposite of that and you need
some Visionary thinking you need some
communication you need to collaborate
you need to motivate people and Empower
people through that
um sort of change management process
that we've just described so that people
can operate within that framework and
that the leaders that I've seen you know
do this best to those who do create a
vision do communicate and collaborate
work with the project managers work with
the IT team work with other people in
the organization and really create that
cross business piece of work to to
transform you know the outcomes
so it's a really interesting kind of
debate about behaviors and skill sets
needed in a change in transformation
program
and and you know two or three weeks ago
we did we did one of these webinars
actually it'll be almost a month ago now
we did one of these webinars uh around
governance project portfolio and and um
program governance and a lot of the
things that were coming up there a lot
of the topics that were coming up that
were exactly the same topics and there's
quite a lot of overlap here between sort
of leading transformation and more
General project governance and portfolio
governance
um in that it's about you know it's
about having Clear Vision at the
portfolio level what we should be doing
at the program level what the business
results are at the project level what
the outputs are that we need to deliver
right and and having cleared clear swim
lanes for decision making right so so I
mean your point about the skill set
being different is cool but the the
decision-making Authority and structures
are completely different as well right
yeah absolutely and it's interesting I'm
sort of listen to what you're what
you're saying and the things we're
debating and ultimately it's all changes
and it's just scale of change and it's
all a project it's just a scale of a
project and it all needs governance it's
just scale of governance so that's how I
see it and I think what you know often
actually more often than not there is
limited governance around a transmission
project and there's more governance if
you look at sort of an I.T change and
but I've got a close friend who works in
I.T governance and she very black and
white about what is yes and no
um and I think that that is an important
part of a change program but it's having
that kind of broader
Vision communication collaboration with
that governance in the in the program
really that's a really interesting
observation Todd I'm going to ask you to
step in if if you're if you're paying
attention yeah I understand if you're
not by the way but because I know you I
know you're very busy but sitting in
your chair would you agree with that do
you think that's a fair point that you
know sometimes the business
transformation has less governance than
the more formal work a day you know it
projects and things like that
um you probably have a foot in both
those camps uh I'm not sure if he's in a
position to be able to type but uh we'll
throw that one out there and see see if
he uh see if he lands
um
yeah so but but the the the so the key
thing here is that you've got all of
these skills and then there's there's a
little bit of sort of structure
underneath that to support those skills
and help people bring it together right
that that which is what a lot of that
governance does yeah absolutely and you
know personally I would like to see more
governance that'd be interesting to see
um what's on says but see more
governance around transformation and I
think you know when we look at software
you know software like transparent
choice or other software that I've come
across very recently it does give you
the opportunity to create that
governance in a slightly softer way in a
more collaborative way than it would
necessarily in a you know a kind of
typical project
framework
um so I think we will see more of that
happen and it'll become more of a kind
of again a skill set and change leaders
will need that ability to to to have
governance and make sure that things are
on track
brilliant brilliant
um right sorry I'm just catching up on
uh oh good Todd disagrees good uh so
some of this larger transformation
projects have more governance
um uh but they also have things that fly
under the radar too which is that's a
really that actually that's a super
Point Todd thank you because underneath
all of this of course is that change and
transformation
if you don't have that good that solid
leadership and agreement around it
then people will find ways to do stuff
and you get a shadow portfolio and
Shadow transformation and things
happening that you don't even know is
happening yeah all of those and the
danger there is that that you know all
of those things that aren't necessarily
sanctioned
um
are
pulling resources
bullying people's ability people you
know we're all on you know we're only
human at least for now right everyone is
human
um so we're only human and you know
humans have only got a certain capacity
and every person's different but a
certain capacity to absorb change and
process it and take it on board and so
all those Shadow projects are are
um consuming people's ability to to
absorb change as well which reduces the
impact of any change with proper
transformation so you know again this
sort of brings us back to this idea of
you know Vision leadership
um prioritization and alignment of what
you're doing with what you what your
goals are and you know working on that
process getting a really good process at
that end of it because those those
Shadow projects don't come out of it you
know they don't they don't just
magically appear on their own someone
someone green likes them someone says
yeah go do that right it so that's
that's an engagement problem at the
senior level in the organization when
things like that uh happen so there we
go thank you for that thank you for that
Todd uh our challenge to convince people
that want to stay outside of structural
process
um yeah and and
um that's a very good it's a very good
point and at the end of the day I think
there's
it's that that can particularly be a
challenge in organizations that are
growing
quickly
where you know maybe they've they've had
more flexibility in the past just
because things were going so well and
everybody's going so fast that you know
we don't have time to have process and
all the rest of it and people kind of
got used to that and I think that's the
the cultural thing you you mentioned
earlier on at least where there's
transformation is not just about
software systems infrastructure process
it's about people as well and and
helping them understand why what's in it
for them
which it depends on what company you're
in but you know it could be something as
simple as well actually you'll get your
projects done quicker right it might be
as simple as that
um or it might be as simple as taking
them aside and saying you know last year
you were really complaining about how
that guy got all the resources well if
you were part of this process you would
be part of figuring out you know and not
allowing that to happen right so there's
also some positive carrots and little
devious things you can do to get people
engaged in that conversation
um and it and you know it's it's not
that doesn't mean it's easy but it's
certainly
doable
um and and it usually comes down to
what's in it for me yeah absolutely it's
an interesting point again about the
kind of um under the radar change
because you do see that happen often
don't you you know there's there's a
north northern star and the business is
moving towards that and people use it's
an opportunity to kind of create change
themselves and then that creates fatigue
in the business and there's too much
happening
um again I don't want to keep going back
to Heathrow but what I saw there was
them changing the really transforming
the business from what was like really
underperforming organization it didn't
seem it because it's all glossy on the
outside but they um operationally didn't
perform particularly well massively
um fat in terms of cost they the
engagement was really low and
it was just you know a big strategic
kind of new about expansion and trying
to move the business forward but one of
the CEOs came in and he's still there
now but he's he he really transformed
the thinking of the business by putting
a very simple framework in four key
pillars and it was I I can visually
remember was about we need to win
expansion we need to cut our costs we
need to become the best airport in the
world we need to get our mojo back and I
can visibly see that now and he was very
clear that if if it doesn't lead back to
one of those things you don't do it and
like clearly it took a long time and
some of that to happen in all of these
little cross projects came out but I
remember
um seeing the kind of governance around
what people did completely shift just by
that real strong leadership about this
is a direction of the business so quite
interesting and obviously that filters
all the way down to that project
management and kind of planning piece
but that was transform transformative in
in a you know a really large
organization
and that which is great and and then
there are other techniques I'm not sure
I'm necessarily recommending this one
but in this particular case it was very
effective and it was a global bank and
um you know there were there were Shadow
projects there were different divisions
and groups that were going off and doing
their own thing and that you know they
were basically going in and saying look
you know we've got a half billion dollar
budget just give me 100 million of it
right and I'll go do my stuff right and
and so things which is it was and people
were so used to that that the idea of
central planning was was terrifying and
so they in in that case the CIO
basically turned around and said okay
here's how it's going to be
if you don't go through this process you
will not get any engineers
that's the end of it right so if you
want them you go through this process
and of course as once people got into
the process then they're kind of going
oh actually this is quite cool right
this is helping me this isn't getting in
the way it's helping me and
um and yeah so sometimes that's the
right answer there's no there's no one
answer it's very culture dependent and
dependent on the style of leadership
that's that's in your environment I
think
um absolutely
brilliant excellent all right I'm going
to shut up again I've done it again I'm
not telling you no it's fine we've
covered a lot of um a lot of what we've
talked about but I think when we started
talking about business change and
transformation we talked about what
happens in times of uncertainty and
often you know like this times you know
an economic kind of Challenge and time
in the UK and across the globe you know
businesses can often double down and try
and save money and really kind of
protect what they already have just
waiting for things to go back to normal
but I started thinking about you know
what what do organizations need in these
times when it is uncertain and um we
don't we can't you know kind of predict
what's going on because there's been so
much turbulence and there's I looked at
a few different McKinsey pieces of work
and this stood out for me about when
times get tough and tough get innovate
and create past to Future growth so
again you use the pandemic scenario and
that real growth in Tech because of what
what what happened but this really
stands out for me about how
organizations can get through change get
sorry get through uncertain Times by
starting to create a you know
transformation process
um and again I've seen lots of
businesses do this really well where
they've looked at things like
repurposing people in their organization
and looking at where typical functions
don't no longer add value and where they
might be repurposed or retrained to to
start child value or even you know
removing Departments of just seeing
something on um I think it's one of the
banks in the UK are going to remove
something like 50 000 people and replace
it with AI now that'll clearly take them
a long time and it'll be a massive
transformation program but that's where
you know you do see people starting to
look to the Future and grow and innovate
but where where it can help in smaller
organizations is to start to think about
you know creating leadership capability
so that leaders can operate during
volatility it can be getting people
involved and give a good example earlier
around you know what do we need to do to
kind of improve things around here and
just giving them some freedom to cope
with suggestions and innovate themselves
they can be new partnership arrangement
it can be using new technology and
different different kind of things to be
able to kind of create efficiencies so
there's definitely a kind of repurposing
and a refocus in uncertain times when
you're looking at business
transformation or any any type of change
and that's certainly where my my
thinking's got to and watching what's
happening in the market it's definitely
a period of of growth I think
right um so on that actually so there's
some interesting
um thoughts on how to do uh you know so
because everybody's under pressure to
reduce cost and to do more with less
right and so a really useful powerful
way of thinking about that is something
called the efficient Frontier and this
is one of the things that you get in in
our software but I'll give you the idea
so the idea is if you look at the things
you're interested in so it might be
projects or it might be the services
that you offer right now so if you're
the CIO again I'm picking on cios I
don't mean to but if you're the CIO
right there are all kinds of services
that you provide to the organization and
and all kinds of software and tools and
applications you've got out there and
this yeah and if you come up with as you
said that those sort of pillars for what
the organization needs and then score
those projects against those pillars you
can create accumulative scores if you if
you start with you know the ones with
the biggest impact here and ones with
the least impact over here
and then you can look at how much it's
going to cost you to deliver these
different levels of service and what you
see is that you get this flattening off
curve basically what that's telling you
is that if you spend a million dollars
here it's going to have a really big
impact if you spend a million dollars
extra here
right it's gonna have a very small
impact right and so what you can do and
what you actually what you actually
found is a um uh there's a a researcher
into this kind of stuff called lotion uh
and he's looked at this so this is all
about the Pareto analysis right you've
all heard the 80 20 rule right so this
is another name for the efficient
Frontier is the Pareto curve and so
lotion's done some
um research that shows in many cases the
curve doesn't look like this the curve
looks like
this right goes up
and then it goes down so actually these
projects are destroying value
so if you can understand this and start
to quantify or these these initiatives
whatever the services are destroying
value if you can if you can look at this
and quantify this then very often you
can find areas to cut costs
right in as part of your transformation
program and improve value at the same
time and that's all you remember the guy
I was talking about at the utility right
that's all they did was they looked at
all the things they were doing that that
were destroying value and they stopped
doing them
you know it's it's stupidly simple
stupidly simple in principle hard to do
in practice but it's stupidly simple in
principle
sorry Lisa no no again I think it's
interesting and like you know I like
that uh you know what you do and how
much return does it give you because I
think again that's something that's
skipped in many transformation programs
a real the review which is you know so
it's really interesting and there's a
really like simple quote isn't there
about what's going to be I think there's
an Olympian I listened to once and he
talked about what's going to make the
boat go faster you know so if it doesn't
make the boat go faster you don't do it
and it's actually a really simple kind
of analogy to apply to business which
you're reminded of will be of when you
do the you know the graph on the screen
yeah well so um we're almost out of time
I'm not going to open up the questions
because hopefully you've all been asking
the questions as we went through and
really appreciate you
um doing that folks because it as I said
it makes it more interesting for us and
hopefully it means we're adding uh we're
able to address your questions and
comments as we go
um so Gregor has one uh question which
actually leads perfectly into
[Music]
um uh our discussion in The Green Room
about
um Lisa can you share links or case
studies or best practices on
transformation so you've got some
thoughts that you want to share and
we're going to circulate that in the
email right yeah so we will pull
together
a sort of ebook or something that we'll
we'll share afterwards with some
different models in as I said I I often
like Cotter as a quite a modern thinker
in terms of
um transformation and change and there's
a book called accelerate e XLR8 and
that's all about you know Employee
Engagement and getting ambassadors
involved in the change to accelerate
change so that that's definitely you
know a bit of best practice that I've
that's stuck in my mind and yeah
certainly we'll give some other examples
of things that you can you can use as an
outcome of the of the session
brilliant excellent thank you very much
um and and thank you everybody for for
uh joining and staying with us through
the through the session I hope that was
useful
um if it if it yeah as I mentioned
earlier we will be sending out an email
in the next couple of business days uh
where we'll just tidy up the video and
collect Lisa's input and circulate that
to everybody Lisa would it be okay to
circulate the slides as well is that
yeah absolutely yeah okay perfect so
we'll share the slides as well and um
and anybody who would like to engage
Lisa how should they engage in a
conversation how should they do that
Lisa yeah I mean reach out on email I'll
I'll send my details I'd love to speak
to anybody even if it's just a debate
about what we've talked about it would
be great to um to hear from people so
um we'll include my email then in in the
in the um the documentation afterwards
perfect perfect and then you know most
of you at least I hope mostly at this
point know where I am and how to reach
me but I'm Stuart Easton on LinkedIn or
just jump onto our web page and hit the
contact button or loads of other buttons
on our webpage that will get you to to
one of the team and and that will
eventually get to me
um so feel free to reach out connect I
would love to connect with with everyone
and if you want to learn more about the
prioritization side of this which is
really where we spend most of our time
do reach out on the website there's
loads of materials we will be doing uh
in a couple of weeks time I think Lenora
I don't know if you can confirm this but
I think in a couple of weeks time we
have another demo webinar scheduled and
in about a month we'll be doing another
one of these
um another thought leadership kind of
business C more businessy webinar so do
look for those uh in your inbox
whitelist our emails
um so that they make it through spam and
we will see you all next time Lisa thank
you very much for sharing your
experience and enthusiasm thanks thank
you and thanks for the questions it was
interesting yeah that was great thank
you everybody for for joining in
fantastic