HR transformation journey. First things first: Engage your team

Engagement As a leader of HR Transformation at any level – be it global, regional, country or site, one of the first steps for success is to inform and truly engage your own HR team.

Sounds obvious doesn’t it? But you would be surprised how often HR leaders focus more on HR process mapping and system and portal technology in creating a vision and business case for transformational change – and skim over the people aspects of change which impact their own team.

Sometimes this “light approach” to people is because they are uncomfortable and not sure who in the HR team will be with them on the journey, or indeed who will become a future state participant and player in the target operating model (TOM).

Sometimes they are hesitant to reveal all about future state headcount and synergy targets in a context where sensitivity is required, and consultation processes need to be honoured in order to fully answer the big questions: What’s in it for me? What happens to my role?

My advice based on hands-on experience of seven transformation projects over the past 20 years is to be as open and transparent as you can, as early as you can, in order to retain and build trust and involvement in your HR team.

As a leader your primary goal is to achieve the business objectives by enlisting those who can help to make this happen and have a willingness to do so. And for HR Transformation that starts with HR.

When HR is on-board with the change, HR becomes an ambassador of the change with managers and employee clients. On the other hand, a disengaged, uninformed and disempowered HR team will certainly slow down if not dilute, block and derail your transformation program.

The Change Engagement Scorecard below enables you, as the leader (and coach + enabler), first to assess the change readiness level of each team member (on a score of 1 to 6 – follow the arrow up from the foot to the top of the page) and then , in true Situational Leadership* style, choose the appropriate leadership action to coach and grow your team through the change curve.

By following this approach you can progress and develop individuals and the team to a point where, at minimum, they reach level 4 and become actively involved in creating and implementing the change.

Taking time to assess change readiness is worth it. Blockers and resisters have nowhere to hide, and if we are honest, most of the team actually do want to come to work to do a good job. They can play an intelligent change agent role only if they become fully aware of and equipped for the reasons for change, and are engaged by you, the coach and leader, at both an emotional and intellectual level.