In order to facilitate ITSM into your IT Department, you need to build a culture for making the necessary changes to your processes, that cultural change may prove more difficult than any other part of ITSM. Ralph Laurie helps us understand the steps to implementing change in our environments.

The Change Pyramid

In order for us to understand further why we have trouble incorporating change into our lives, we must look at the five stages of change. Many times we think that change means doing what we're doing now but a little better. If you need to change, what you're doing now is usually not adequate to properly reach the new objective.

Stage One - Environment

The stages of change explain why we have a tendency to stick where we are. The first stage of change involves changing your existing environment from what you're doing now to that which will help facilitate your outcome. For example, if a person wants to lose twenty pounds, it's necessary to change their existing environment by taking all the sweets out of the pantry and then replacing them with fruit in the refrigerator. When the dieter needs a snack, they eat a piece of fruit instead of a candy bar. This environmental change was necessary to keep the dieter from repeating a bad habit.

Stage Two - Behavior

Our behavior changes as our environment is modified. In our example, the dieter can no longer eat sweets because they've been removed. Therefore, the dieter's behavior is altered by eating fruit. Changing the environment and altering behavior are the most difficult stages through which to go. Changing one's environment and behavior is chaotic because even under the best conditions, you are forced to change the current status quo. It involves throwing away what you're doing now and dragging you out of your comfort zone to replace it with something entirely new. In most cases, when you step out of your comfort zone, it's difficult to envision what the new environmental change will bring. Because the fear of loss is far more traumatic than gain, we have a natural tendency to resist and go back to the old way. If you think you're changing something in your business and you're not in chaos, you are probably not changing anything. If you are in chaos, you should be celebrating, giving each other high-fives, and feel good about knowing you're actually on the right track. It's imperative for the leader to continually remind the people going through change that a bit of chaos means we're on a successful track.

Stage Three - Capabilities

During stage three, we begin to increase our capabilities. Once the dieter throws away the chocolate and puts fruit in the refrigerator, then substitutes the old behavior by eating the fruit instead of the sweets, he begins to lose weight. It's at this point where the dieter begins to see progress. Now that they've lost a bit of weight, they can wear a smaller size, feel more energetic, and want to begin to exercise. Once the people begin experiencing the benefits of change, increase their capabilities and see progress, they move directly to stage four, beliefs.

Stage Four - Beliefs

Despite how you felt before, once you've seen the progress associated with the change, your belief system changes. Once you believe you can do it, your sub-conscious helps you get there. Once you begin to believe in the change, I strongly suggest that you put your mind in its proper perspective. Think of the outcome you are trying to achieve, not the process through which you must travel. Visualize how you will feel after you've achieved your objective. Then write out the outcome as if it's already completed. If you want to run the Boston Marathon, write something like, "It was a long run, but, I made it and I feel great" or "26 miles, was not as difficult as I thought it would be." What you gain by putting the outcome in writing is commitment from your inner self. Even though you may not realize it, the subconscious mind will work on a problem until it achieves the desired result. Have you ever tried to remember someone's name and it just slips your mind? You said, "I know it, I just can't think of it. I know it'll come to me." Your sub-conscious mind picks up the problem and while you may have consciously moved on, your inner mind has not. Then two days later, the name pops into your head and no matter what you're doing or to whom you are talking, you yell it out. Your subconscious did the work in the background and when it resolved the issue, it turned it back to your conscious mind. You may have heard the expression, "what you think, you become." When you consistently visualize the outcome, you change your sub-conscious mind. It will move you toward the outcome, if you consciously want it.

Stage Five - New Identity

The last stage of change is your new identity. You've have now produced the desired result and you have a successful outcome. In the first years of business at CAESY (Clinically Advanced Education Systems), we only had inside sales reps whose primary function was to sell to doctors over the phone and at tradeshows. They would receive phone calls from all over the country and didn't really have any defined area of the country for which they were directly responsible. This business model worked well for us until we introduced the new CAESY Enterprise product. Because this product had more capabilities from our original DVD version is was necessary to start an outside sales force to perform in-office demonstrations. When I announced that we would be putting on an outside force to help sell the Enterprise product, the inside reps immediately became threatened. They felt that it would be just a matter of time before they were going to be replaced by the outside sales reps. I understood their concerns so I structured the sales process in a team configuration. This meant several things to the inside reps. First it would be necessary for each rep to have a defined territory and each would work with a minimum of two outside sales reps. They'd have to change their environment from answering any of the incoming calls to answering calls only in their assigned territory.

I had several collective and one-on-one sessions with the inside reps explaining how important they were to the success of this new plan. I spent days explaining where we wanted to go with this new way of selling. I needed their buy-in to ensure that they would work hard to make this happen. I never got their total commitment. But they agreed to try. To help alleviate their collective fears, I structured the sales function in such a way that no matter who made the sale, both the inside and outside reps would be compensated. This was very positive because the inside and outside rep actually had a better opportunity to make more money.

Despite the positive aspects of this change, the inside reps were very recalcitrant to the situation. They had to change their environment and their behavior to accommodate the outside sales reps and they didn't want to move away from their comfort zone. Nevertheless, I forced them to realign and focus in their dedicated territories. Everyday, I met with them to encourage their efforts. Each day they were pushing back saying it wasn't working. At the end of month one, they were so discouraged because they'd lost money due to less commissions as a result of lower overall sales. We decided to make them whole by compensating them with their normal pay to help them through this chaotic time.

During the second month, they were slowly making progress. They started scheduling more demonstrations and sales began to spike upward. Suddenly, the inside reps were calling the outside reps asking them how they were doing and if they needed any help. The staff was beginning to work together and their capabilities began to change. At the end of month two, we'd made our goal. The inside reps began to envision their future and their belief systems changed. By the end of month three, we were on a collective roll. One by one the reps came into my office and said that this was the best thing that we could have done. It took three months and all five levels of change to incorporate, but it was successful.

There is another side to reaching your outcome successfully. It's temporary, because in order to continue to be the best for you and your clients, you will have to continue to change. The cycle starts over. It's called the Reassessment/Change Cycle. However, if you all work together and you communicate with the staff regularly, they begin to understand that in order to win requires a little chaos before a lot of success.

Get Your Copy of Ralph's Book - The Magic of Business Charisma

Copyright© 2005- The Laurie Group

Send Feedback to: spotlight@itsmpa.org

ITSM Professional (ITSMP) ™ and ITSM Certified Professional (ITSMCP) ™ are Registered Trademarkes (2008)