How We Deal with Change (and Stress)

We are all dealing with a lot of stress as we roll out our implementation at MSC. I was reminded of some conversations I had with folks about what it would be like for us in the winter. Last summer, things were really starting to heat up, and we were racing through our 2014 Year of Deployment. People were asking when it would quiet down. I answered that we hadn’t yet seen the worst of it. People looked at me like really? Are you kidding? I had predicted then that January 2015 would be our hardest time and should mark a high point (or low point depending on your reference) in our evolution. Consider the fundamentals of how change is processed by humans. Significant change takes about 24 months to really become a new reality. The worst part of that is the first 9-12 months. Here are a couple of graphs to illustrate: [click to enlarge] Both of these graphs show how humans adapt to change over time. I was making the point that we would have four Releases all somewhere in the Valley of Despair, in January. The length of time that a person or organization spends in the Valley ranges from four to nine months depending on how well the change was led and managed. There is typically a honeymoon period of 2-3 months after a change and then reality sets in and we humans usually spend about six months moving through the transition and climbing out. This is particularly relevant in a transformation program like ours and even more relevant when you consider that we had three major releases in just five short months. If you do the math, it meant that January and February of 2015 was the confluence of Release 4 coming out of the Valley, Release 4b just starting the climb, Release 5 smack at the bottom, and Release 6 on the slide into the Valley. Finally, add the timing of all of this, and that just happens to coincide with the end of a calendar year where a whole bunch of stuff that occurs just once a year (such as Open Enrollment, closing the statutory tax books, etc.) hits at the same time as all of our newest Clients moving through the Valley. So we have three Releases hard in the Valley and a whole lot of folks in small Valley as they go through new processes for their first calendar year end. WOW. All of this is intended to help everyone understand why it feels like absolute chaos and craziness right now. But, starting in February and on into March, we will round the curve. We will have more Clients climbing out of the Valley, and by the May-June timeframe most of our Clients should be out of the Valley or nearly out. We are making the turn and I feel pretty darn good about how we are doing. We have had a few Service areas move through a crisis period: Leave, Payroll, Contact Center, and to some extent AP. This is normal as well. The fact that we scaled up so quickly illustrated where we had some weaknesses in our service processes and brought into sharp contrast some things we needed to fix quickly. We have responded well, and are making solid progress on all of our Get Well Plans. There is more change coming, particularly with One Ascension, but we will get a chance to breathe and stabilize. Top leadership at Ascension are uniformly supporting the importance of stabilization, even if that means we have to push the new couple of Releases a bit. We have a solid year to focus on our execution and, working with our partners on the Symphony team, make some much-needed improvements to the systems we rely on to deliver our Services. Where we find ourselves is where I predicted we would be. Not by hunch, but by study and science. In the same way, we will move into a groove of greater stability. [inlinead] [Note: if you liked this article, please use the buttons on the left side of the screen to share it across your LinkedIn groups – and contribute to this discussion by posting your thoughts in the comment section, below. Thank you for being part of SSON's community - Barbara Hodge] About Lee Coulter: Lee Coulter has had an impressive career, and is broadly considered one of the leading Shared Services practitioners in North America today. Now in his 8th industry, Lee was previously Senior Vice President of Global Shared Services at Kraft Foods and a leader of Kraft’s corporate wide "Organize for Growth" transformation initiative. In this role he implemented shared services in nine global functions, delivering support across more than 70 countries and completing major outsourcing transformation "mega-deals" in IT, HR, and facilities management. He created and led the Shared Services Center of Excellence and the Outsourcing Center of Excellence at Kraft. While there, he also received Chairman Roger Deromedi¹s CEO Award for his efforts. Prior to joining Kraft, Lee served as Vice President of Infrastructure Services at AON Corporation, where he implemented ITIL and shared services, reduced costs by more than 35%, and integrated legacy infrastructure from a long acquisition strategy, finally outsourcing IT to CSC. Lee spent 15 years with GE in a multitude of roles culminating in VP of GE’s outsourcing business. He also spearheaded the Company’s global Y2K initiative and served as a technical and operating executive in its Healthcare Services business, including as an expatriate in China. He received the President¹s Award from GE CEO Jeff Immelt. Lee holds a BS in Electronics Engineering from DeVry University and has completed all course work for a BS in Electrical Engineering and a Masters Degree in Biomedical Engineering at California State University at Long Beach. When not leading MSC, Lee can be found in his workshop, making sculptures out of wood and stone. He will be writing a weekly column for SSON's website in which he will share (nearly) everything that comes across his desk these days. More from Lee next week...

How We Deal with Change (and Stress)

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