Winning
hearts and minds in the 21st century
Leaders must consider new ways to change the
attitudes and behavior of employees.
The psychological contract that
traditionally bound employees to their employers has been fraying. Many of
today’s workers, having experienced the pain of the economic downturn and
large-scale layoffs, no longer feel as much loyalty and commitment to their
organizations as they did even a decade ago. Job hopping has been described as
the “new normal,” and millennials are expected to hold 15 to 20 positions over
the course of their working lives.1
Meanwhile, middle management—the executives who
traditionally act as a conduit for communication from the top to the bottom of
companies—has been hollowed out. So perhaps it’s no surprise that in the face
of these two trends, leaders struggle to get their employees to embrace big
change programs. Rather than adapt to the demands of an organizational
transformation, employees are more likely to resist passively, undermining the
effort and spreading that contagion throughout the organization. Or they might
simply decide that such a transformation isn’t worth the risk and look for
their next opportunity elsewhere.
To counter these problems, it’s more important than ever
for companies in transition to invest time and effort in changing the mind-sets
and behavior of the workforce. Almost 15 years ago, we introduced the idea that
four key actions could work together to support such initiatives: fostering
understanding and conviction, reinforcing change through formal mechanisms,
developing talent and skills, and modeling the new roles. New research has
since reinforced the significance of these four priorities.
The challenge for executives now is that they must learn
to apply the model in new and imaginative ways that would not have been
possible when we first published our research, at a time when the world was a
very different place (exhibit). Back in 2003, the iPhone had yet to be
released. There was no such thing as Facebook, much less Chatter, Twitter, or
Yammer. The more fortunate millennials were off at college and still dreaming
of the success they would eventually have from launching start-ups like Box or
Instagram. Uber was just a German word. We rented movies at Blockbuster, drove around
in Hummers, and read Newsweek—all of which have since folded.
Exhibit
Two key features of the modern workplace are
particularly important in the context of change. One is the increasingly
advanced technological and digital landscape, including mobile connectivity and
social media, that has opened up exciting new possibilities for influence. The
second is the new generation of millennial employees. On the surface, at least,
they seem to have different needs and respond to change in ways that set them apart
from their more tenured coworkers—though we’d echo our colleagues’ view that
their attitudes, in some ways, reflect those of the workforce as a whole. In
the face of these interrelated opportunities and challenges, here are some
ideas on how to win hearts and minds in the modern era.
New tools for influence
Digital advances can turbocharge efforts to foster
understanding and conviction, thereby helping employees to feel more involved
in change efforts and better able to play a role in shaping them. Consider, for
example, how modern digital communications make it easy to personalize messages,
tailoring them to the needs of individuals and delivering them directly to
frontline employees. We take such personalized communications for granted, but
they are significant in the context of major change efforts: they help to
prevent a break in the cascade when a message trickles down from the CEO
through middle management. For example, a global pharmaceutical company engaged
in a major change program used its internal social-media platform in exactly
this way, sharing different messages with different groups of users and
ensuring that communications stayed relevant.
Technology also can help identify obstacles to change,
such as overconfidence in your abilities or knowledge. Consider the popular
FitBit and other activity trackers: these small devices provide an accurate
(and sometimes surprising) picture of individual activity, expose the truth,
and hold users accountable for their performance. Rapid-fire online-polling
tools make it relatively straightforward to take an organization’s pulse,
identifying differences in outlook and understanding between top management and
the rank and file. Research based on McKinsey’s Organizational Health Index
suggests that management frequently overestimates the impact of its messages on
employees .
More positively, leaders can use technology tools to
celebrate skill building. For example, digital tools give organizations a
creative way to show how increased effort (such as the adoption of new software
or attendance at a training program) can improve performance. By profiling
success stories on company Intranet pages and displaying training certificates
and “badges” on Chatter and Yammer, organizations can instill a sense of
control and competence that stimulates the improvement efforts of both
individuals and teams.
Social platforms are more than just tools for
communication and for building skills and a sense of community. They provide a
sophisticated analysis that reinforces role modeling and builds up a momentum
of influence. Over the past couple of years, we’ve seen a growing number of
companies use social-networking analyses and similar techniques to help
identify hidden influencers: people whose attitudes may command respect among
their colleagues and whose role might be critical for the success of a change
program. Having identified a few dozen influencers across regions, functions,
and roles in this way, a large manufacturer we know enlisted the support of
these employees to help communicate the changes it wanted to make, role-model
the desired mind-sets and behavior, and fight skepticism.2
New employees, new
challenges
Indeed, the power of the group may be the most potent
influence of all. Today’s increasingly connected digital world provides more
opportunities than ever to share information about how others think and behave.
Millennials typically take their cue from positive reviews on Instagram,
SnapChat, or Yelp or from “Twitterati” with many followers. It’s no surprise
that users of social media can “buy followers,” thereby boosting the popularity
of a person or brand when it starts trending. Millennial workers, sometimes
described as “hyperconnected globally,” may be especially open to persuasion
through the collective voice and expect real-time communication from everyone,
not just top management.
The potential of technology to inspire action is good
for would-be change agents, because today’s employees are increasingly
skeptical. A generic change story won’t cut it now, if it ever did. To change
hearts and minds, a story must be personally meaningful to the listener or
reader. That’s particularly true for today’s younger employees. Recent
interviews with hundreds of high-potential millennials, for example, revealed
how, in many cases, their decisions to stay with or leave a company depended
upon their ability to find meaning and purpose within it.
Technology’s new transparency, though, can be a
double-edged sword. In today’s world, sites like Glassdoor take the mystery out
of salaries and increased job mobility. That makes it easier than ever for
employees to judge when they are unhappy with the direction of a company or
decide that they are not getting an equitable deal. Remember, some
twentysomethings recall how their own parents were mistreated in previous bouts
of cost cutting, and many jaded older employees remain in the workforce.
Organizations hoping to win over such employees need to do what’s necessary to
neutralize compensation as a source of anxiety and focus instead on what really
matters. For some workers, extra flexibility and telework may be more alluring
than a bigger paycheck. Leaders directing significant change efforts should
look at all the formal reinforcing mechanisms at their disposal.
Finally, don’t overlook skill building as a means of
fostering commitment in the younger generation; millennials, after all, appear
to be particularly hungry for opportunities to develop. The previously mentioned
McKinsey research on this generation found many who were eager for advancement
opportunities and receptive to various learning programs—from entrepreneurial
challenges to more traditional rotational programs. In the past few years,
organizations have started to tap into this mind-set, and some are exploring
discounted education as an employee benefit. Starbucks’s college achievement
plan, for example, now pays tuition fees for part- and full-time workers taking
Arizona State University’s courses. Other organizations, such as Anthem and
Fiat Chrysler Automobiles, have since launched similar programs.
Millennials may seem challenging. Yet their search—for
diverse role models, meaning beyond a paycheck, equitable treatment in an
increasingly transparent and transient world, and leading-edge skill
building—is one that many employees, regardless of age, industry, or nationality,
are undertaking today. Leaders who understand both the changing workforce and
leading-edge digital tools and have a well-tuned grasp of the building blocks
of organizational change should be well positioned to break through the noise
and inspire these employees.
About the author(s)
Tessa
Basford is
a consultant in McKinsey’s Washington, DC, office; Bill Schaninger is
a director in the Philadelphia office.Article Actions
http://www.mckinsey.com/business-functions/organization/our-insights/winning-hearts-and-minds-in-the-21st-century?cid=other-eml-alt-mkq-mck-oth-1604
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