The soft-skills needed for change-leadership are vital to move your organization forward. Learn a step-by-step process for getting buy-in for your next initiative.

1. by Paul Casey

2. "Change can be likened to a
planned journey into uncharted
waters in a leaky boat
with a mutinous crew."
Michael Fullan

3. Discuss: Summarize your
personal experience with deep
change in an organization.

4. Discuss: What are the consequences
if your organization doesn’t change?
"If we don't change the way we're going, we're likely
to end up where we are headed." –Chinese Proverb

5. You Can Be a CHANGE AGENT
“Change is the law of life.
And those who look only to
the past or the present are
certain to miss the future.”
– John F. Kennedy

6. You Can Be a CHANGE AGENT
In most situations, change is
inevitable; so we can either
watch it occur, resist it, or
help guide and direct it—
you cannot avoid it.

7. 5 Traits Leaders Must Possess
To Be Successful Leading Change
1. Moral Purpose
2. Understanding change
3. Relationship-building
4. Knowledge creation and sharing
5. Coherence
(Leading in a Culture of
Change, Michael Fullan)

8. Essential Elements of Change
—and the Consequences of
Lacking Just One
Discuss: In the last change effort
you were a part of, use this chart to
evaluate what was present and
what was absent.

9. You Can Be a CHANGE AGENT
"The single factor common to
successful change is that
relationships improve.
If relationships improve,
(organizations)… get better.
If relationships remain the same
or get worse, ground is lost."
–Michael Fullan, The Change Leader

10. Soft-Skill Change Strategies
“(Followers)… are more likely to
accept change programs if the
(Leader)… is perceived as actively
supportive of the (Follower’s)…
role in implementing the change."
Robert Howsam
1.

11. Soft-Skill Change Strategies
2. “guiding coalition”

12. Soft-Skill Change Strategies
"(Leaders)… who would effect
change had to be familiar with and
able to manipulate the power
structure within the community."
Ralph Kimbrough
3.

13. Soft-Skill Change Strategies
Turn those committed
to change into
organizational leaders.
4.

14. Soft-Skill Change Strategies
Who Moved
My Cheese?
5.

15. You Can Be a CHANGE AGENT
"Well over half of all change efforts
fail at the first, most crucial step:
gaining widespread cooperation.
People won't move out of their
comfort zones to make the
necessary changes unless there
is a sense of urgency."
–John Kotter, What Leaders Really Do

16. You Can Be a CHANGE AGENT
“To master change, your
paradigm must switch
from what you will lose to
what you will gain.”

17. You Can Be a CHANGE AGENT
Exercise: Draw a picture of where
you are now and where you want
your organization to be (in the
area you know must change)
in one year from now.

18. You Can Be a CHANGE AGENT
“People are like tea bags.
You don’t know what they
are inside until you put
them in hot water.”
–Ray Armstrong

19. You Can Be a CHANGE AGENT
“Leaders look at similarities;
followers look at differences.”
–John Maxwell

20. You Can Be a CHANGE AGENT
“Innovations…
were successfully
institutionalized when
they…were able to be
undertaken gradually.”
–Ronald Lippitt

21. Soft-Skill Change Strategies
"(Leaders)… must set an
atmosphere… that is conducive
to change and must provide
(the team)… with a range of
substantive supports.
–James McLeskey/Nancy Waldron
5.

22. Soft-Skill Change Strategies
Discuss: When do people
actually make a change?
5.

23. You Can Be a CHANGE AGENT
“Planned
Abandonment”

24. Soft-Skill Change Strategies
“Nothing hurts when you
are winning.” –John Maxwell
6.
Discuss: What gets rewarded these
days in your organization, and why?
Any of those tied to a culture-change
attempt by leadership?

25. Soft-Skill Change Strategies
"Nothing will ever be attempted if
all possible objections must first
be overcome." – Samuel Johnson
7.
“At the gates of excellence stand 2
fearsome sentries: risk and learning.
The keys to entrance are faith and
courage.” – Robert Quinn

26. You Can Be a CHANGE AGENT
“Resistance to change is
natural; change is needed for
survival.”
Discuss: Why don’t people
want to change?
–John Gardner

27. 1. Leaders and other participants feel
that the project is their own—not one
devised by outsiders.
Resistance Will Be Less If:
(by Goodwin Watson)
2. The innovation clearly has wholehearted
support from the top leaders.
3. The participants see the change as
reducing rather than increasing their
present burdens.

28. 4. The project accords with values
already acknowledged by participants.
Resistance Will Be Less If:
(by Goodwin Watson)
5. The program offers the kind of new
experience which interests participants.
6. Participants feel their autonomy and
security is not threatened.

29. 4. The project accords with values
already acknowledged by participants.
Resistance Will Be Less If:
(by Goodwin Watson)
5. The program offers the kind of new
experience which interests participants.
6. Participants feel their autonomy and
security is not threatened.

30. Resistance Will Be Less If:
(by Goodwin Watson)
7. Participants have joined in diagnostic
efforts leading them to agree on what the
basic problem is and to feel its importance.
8. The project is adopted by consensual
group decision.
9. Proponents are able to empathize
with opponents; to recognize valid
objections; and to take steps to
relieve unnecessary fears.

31. Resistance Will Be Less If:
(by Goodwin Watson)
10. It is recognized that innovations are
likely to be misunderstood and
misinterpreted, and if provision is made for
feedback of perceptions of the project and
for further clarification of need.
11. Participants experience acceptance,
support, trust, and confidence in their
relations with one another.

32. Resistance Will Be Less If:
(by Goodwin Watson)
12. The project is kept open to revision
and reconsideration if experience indicates
that changes will be desirable.

33. “Design and institute a system which
will provide feedback on the extent to
which the proposed change is
accomplishing its objectives, and
diagnose those aspects of the program
or its implementation which need
improvement.”
8.
– Richard Gorton

34. Soft-Skill Change Strategies
Three motivators that don’t work:
Tell ‘em, Bribe ‘em, Force ‘em.
The only one that really works
is integration.
9.
Leaders take responsibility for the
storyline at their company.

35. You Can Be a CHANGE AGENT