#course readings

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The course reading from Sylvia Novac on ‘Family Violence & Homelessness” undermine the main issue of youth runaways, which is also reflected in one of my other blog posts with the “Characteristics of Street Youth’s Families 2003” chart. This reading investigated the effects of abusive childhood experiences for adult homelessness. Although it ties it to adults, I think this is still relevant because they had to experience this negative and abusive period of their life as a youth. The studies within this journal concluded that increased neglect and physical abuse from a parent during the child’s lifetime drastically increases the possibilities of homelessness later on in the victim’s life. When street involved and youth experiencing homelessness studies are conducted, a striking similarity of family disruption and childhood abuse factors have been found. When downtown Vancouver underwent studies of youth experiencing homelessness in 2002, many youths that were interviewed told the researchers their chaotic and conflict-orientated experiences at home. In addition they admitted to constantly ‘couch-surfing’ (which is in fact another type of homelessness) and having a lack of connection with adults offering support (Novac, 2007).

To counteract this, one of the other course readings included information about the Children’s Aid Society of Toronto (CAST). Their main objective is to protect children under the age of 16 within communities and they operate under the Ontario’s Child and Family Services Act. This is the largest board-operating child welfare organization in North America, and have served families and youth for over 100 years. Their legal jurisdiction and responsibility is to prevent harm from children that are at risk of neglect and or abuse at home. A form of action includes the removal of children from the abusive environment and to provide foster or substitute care. Either voluntary agreement from the parent begins this process, or if the organization sees an immediate threat to the children, they are placed in CAST’s care by apprehension by the Family Division of Provincial Court (Fitzpatrick et al, 2009).

I think organizations like this are great for the community and for the children, because the actions of aid actually prevent youth homelessness and offer adequate care for the time being.

  (Course Reading References)

Novac, S. (2007). Family Violence and Homelessness: Connections & Dynamics. Retrieved from http://www.urbancentre.utoronto.ca/pdfs/researchbulletins/CUCSRB40_Novac_FVHCD.pdf

Submitted by Cristiano Amoruso 

People are not machines. For how self-evident this statement may be, I have been mesmerized by the number of times I have witnessed, first hand or just as a spectator, corporate change situations in which this simple tenet was spectacularly violated, unsurprisingly obtaining less than spectacular results.

A specific instance left a specific mark on me.

  In 2005 I had just joined the then Prudential Plc Investment management arm, M&G, which had two main divisions: M&G International and M&G UK. In a company supposed to do the same things – i.e. manage money – there could not be more disparate cultures and backgrounds. In the UK division there were 99% of English Mother tongue speakers in UK, 0% in the International division. The UK division worked in a big, corporate office while European divisions worked in team of four-six in smaller offices around Europe. The two divisions had worked phenomenally well as long as they had not gotten into each other’s way. M&G International in particularly was seen as the hip part of the company. It had grown at the fastest pace in the entire corporate history. All was set to go perfectly and in harmony within each department until, on a early morning of May 2006, we all received a memo from the CEO of M&G International.   

  The relaxed buzz of a mid-week breakfast was broken by this email subject: ‘M&G International and UK to Merge’. Wow. Although I was not going to be directly impacted by the change, I had to re-read the email a few times to really understand what was going on and overcome the surprise. I could not imagine how people directly impacted could have felt. Some of those had been at the company for decades and their best farewell was a fairly cold, detailed email with changes of structure effective as of that morning, including various ‘decision to pursue other opportunities’.

  I was really by struck how swiftly and surgically this surprise strike had been carried out and obviously planned. What however did also seem clear is that the plan would have found a few bumps along the way. None of the people who carry executive tasks like head of Marketing, Operations etc had been briefed in advance. Neither had been the many employees that have the company hum along every day. It was those people who were the most anxious about the announced merger and would have to buy in the merger to have it become effective. How could they do so if their job and years of precious experience had become just a plan detail?

  As implementation started to take shape, the following months became a frenzy of corporate political activity in which some people tried to make themselves precious by showing they were indespensbale solving fake problems they had created. Others tried to fill the incognitos about their future by winning the respect of (read lobbying) change agents. Only problem: there were no change Champions. On the basis of belief that people can automatically do well what they have been instructed to do, the integration was looked after by a ‘Change Team’ – a group of mid-low level employees that had shared desks and coffee points with those who they had to say to: ‘your job doesn’t exist anymore’.

  Who was the winner in all of this? Nobody. The imposition of a top down change had not been preceded by buy in, reassurance and creation of urgency. As at today, I struggle to remember why that merger happened…and with what results? Almost half of the international team left in the three following years and The CEO who was once seen as a friend spearheading the growth of M&G International had now become a classic CEO, distant and only nominally accessible.

Submitted by Brieuc Corlay

  One of main takeaways from the Organizational Change course was the necessity to create a sense of urgency to initiate the change movement. Executives, managers will tend to create some sense of opposition to the status quo in order to rally their troops. We have discussed different methods to reach this goal. A preferred one in the corporate world seems to be the email/memo to the employees depicting how difficult the situation is, Nokia being one of the most recent and publicized example.

  Sometimes urgency is not created by any leader or is not even forecasted or planned. In the Harvard Business Review’s article “Leadership in a permanent crisis”, authors compare a heart attack with an unanticipated crisis which leads to change (in diet, in life on the long run and so on). I was inspired to use this idea to examine recent global events, how they create urgency and what lessons may be learned.

  I am going to start with the tsunami in Japan. It is worth noticing that the tsunami killed thousands of people but did not generate any urgency. On the other hand, the Fukushima plant generated a large international reaction though “only” twenty people died there. First lesson: urgency is not necessarily rational or, at least, rationally scalable. In less than a month, there have been many reactions regarding the nuclear sector: some projects have been frozen, the WSJ reports that EDF, the company operating the most nuclear reactors, has changed is risk assessment to include two simultaneous disasters instead of one and so on. How much of the reaction is based on facts, how much is based on public pressure, it is hard to say. However, we have our second lesson: change can happen fast when the right urgency trigger is pulled.

  Let us move to the political unrest in Africa and Middle-East. Many countries have experienced the ‘Arab Spring’ but few of them have an exit plan. Oman experienced some unrest in February. Sultan Qaboos offered a minimum wage policy and the creation of public jobs. The protest dimmed rapidly. On the other hand, many countries are still facing post-crisis dilemma: Egypt sees the growing pressure of Salafis, Bahrain is torn between the Sunni and Shiite influences and Tunisia is still trying to build a democracy. Third lesson: urgency can be used as an ignition for change but the underlying problem still has to be addressed. Oman did it, or seems to have done so, because the Sultan understood the problem behind the protest. It is not easy to identify the true problem when urgency is “created” and planned, let alone when the crisis leading to change was unforeseen.

  Last, let us examine the financial crisis in 2008. Private banks have been bailed out with taxpayers money; Did this unpredicted urgency change anything in Wall Street? As far as I know, not really. 2010 bonuses are back at their pre-crisis level, banks continue trading and selling products only Ph.D. in Mathematics can understand. Yes, regulators have designed stress-test for the banks and both Europe and the US have passed laws that increase transparency. Nonetheless, it is a miss: the opportunity to change the system in a better way was not seized. Nobody had the audacity to ask the right questions and demand the answers. Lesson: urgency can induce the change but, to be sustained, the change needs leaders with courage.

Submitted by Miles Puttergill

Nestle CEO, Peter Brabeck, believes that successful change is often  made in small steps, rather than  in gigantic leaps.

A 30-year veteran of the company, he argues that radical change is necessary in times of crisis or when faced with a dramatically shifting environment and that such change is accepted by the organization in those circumstances. However, in normal times, when companies are performing well, radical shifts cause more harm in disruption, fear and management distraction than they deliver in ultimate value.

Much of the impetus for dramatic change comes from the short-termism of financial markets and management or technology fads. Managing to these whims is not a recipe for delivering sustainable value. Long-term strategies, which create significant value but require patience, are not appreciated and decisions are taken which could put the health of the enterprise at risk.

In contrast, long-standing management is constantly improving Nestle in an evolutionary way, so violent shifts in direction are not necessary. A major benefit of this consistency and evolutionary approach to change is greater confidence from suppliers, employees and customers. Nestle management defends a number of ‘untouchable’ aspects of the company against any change; for example, the central place of people, products and brands in company thinking.

Centrally-led change is particularly difficult in a company like Nestle, which has a strong tradition of decentralized decision-making and trying to get close to customers. Big centre-led programs often fail to appreciate the specificities of businesses on the ground and cause resentment by forcing conformity and reducing autonomy.

To avoid the risk of complacency in an organization which is changing only slowly, Brabeck recommends creating and broadly communicating a clear vision for the future and selecting a senior management team that is aligned with that vision. He seeks to ignite a more aggressive, courageous, self-motivated mindset in staff across the company. He claims that this will to win and desire to challenge yourself and others is critical to driving improvement. This culture is embedded in several of the people development systems at Nestle, including monitoring of high-performing junior staff and promotion based on evidence of the ability to take risks.

Stanley Fourteau

Topic: “The Hard Side of Management”

  Although many focus mainly on the soft side of change management, the hard factors are more critical in forcing change within an organization.  Hard factors have three characteristics:

1)    Companies are able to measure them in direct or indirect ways

2)    Companies can easily advocate their significance

3)    Companies can implement these hard factors quickly

  There are four main hard factors that will enforce change within an organization.

            The first key factor is Duration.  In order to ensure that the change initiative is running its course, change projects need to be reviewed consistently, and are suggested to be reviewed at least bi weekly.   Scheduling milestones and completing a review enables executives to identify areas of improvement and be constantly thinking about the transformation project.  It also enables executives to track the progress of the organizational change.

            The second key factor is performance Integrity.  Although senior executives want to make sure that the best workers are not distracted from their day-to-day job functions, they need to be aware that the best workers will increase the probability of a successful change project.  Therefore, businesses need to free up the time of the best workers while not disabling their day-to-day activities.  Also, these change programs need to be well managed and need to define well the role, tasks and commitments of each member of the project in order to align the responsibilities of the staff with the transformation project in place.

            The third key factor is Commitment. In order for an organizational change project to be successful, the project needs to have the support of the most influential executives in the organization.  In doing so, these thought leaders have to communicate many times to the company their support of the change being put in place.  By communicating their support, the influential figures of the firm demonstrate the importance of this change to the employees of the organization.  This will help enforce the change more quickly.  Moreover, change projects also need to identify the level of enthusiasm of those that must deal with the new changes being implemented.   Tracking this enthusiasm enables the change agents to identify the commitment of the staff. 

            The last key factor is Effort.  Organizations need to calculate the amount of extra work each employee will have to do to ensure the success of the transformation effort.  Also, the extra work should not be assigned during periods of intense workloads.  It is said that the maximum amount of extra work demanded (for the transformation project) should not exceed 10% of the person’s day-to-day responsibilities.