Showing posts with label technology. Show all posts
Showing posts with label technology. Show all posts

12 December 2012

How organisations can manage change in their staff’s subconscious


Most of my 20 year marketing career has involved managing change. In fact, I would go as far as to say that understanding change has been more important to my career than learning marketing theory.

Change means new processes, new metrics, different organisation structures, ground breaking technology, outsourcing part of the value chain and focusing on different customers or customer needs. Ultimately, change means we need people in our organisations to do different tasks (or tasks differently) because we are being forced to or because it will lead to greater success.


Every major marketing initiative from my first ecommerce website, through implement an automated dialler, several CRM solutions, social media and analytics right up until the IPad applications that I have launched have relied more on managing change than marketing. And not just technology based marketing projects, rebranding, putting customer insight at the heart of planning, establishing lead generation campaigns, all require major change management.

Of course customer insight is part of these developments DNA, but the initiatives success is comes from managing the change effectively. 

So we educate, explain, make time for stakeholders to question, we are open to shape the change by those most impacted. We produce robust documentation, governance and risk management. All of these ingredients are baked into most organisations change or project management processes.

Yet what nearly all firms ignore is that our behaviours are driven by our values and capabilities, and they live in our subconscious. Organisations rationalise change, just as they do redundancy. They say ‘it’s not you being made redundant, it’s your role.’ Which of course rationally is true, so why does it feel like bereavement to the majority of people affected. Because our subconscious has developed values and capabilities that have always worked for us and no matter how much we try to rationalise at a conscious level, our subconscious holds these values to be true.

So how do organisations manage change at the level of their staff’s subconscious?

Firstly they must recognise that continuous change is the reality of their business.

Secondly, they must ensure that change management is monitored among their leadership as a core skill on which promotion is predicated on demonstrating it.

Finally, and most importantly, they stop looking at branding, staff engagement, culture and their stated values as nice to haves, but essential to the firm's survival. They stop talking about these pillars of successful change management as fluffy, but hard edged measures that will ensure the sustainability of the business models to deliver shareholder value.

Change comes everyday, anyone that says otherwise is a kidding themselves. Any business that doesn’t embrace it is on borrowed time.

27 July 2012

Amazing tech usage data from the UK's Ofcom that will affect how we consume the Olympics #2012

Countdown to London 2012

According to Ofcom research published this week, the UK's communications industry regulator, it is anticipated that at least 38 million adults in the UK will tune into the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games on TV.

One quarter of working people plan to follow the Games while at work, with 25% planning to watch or listen to the Games during office hours.

More than half (53%) of adults agree technology makes accessing coverage easier, with around one fifth (19%)  likely to follow developments on many different devices.

Social networking sites will also be used by some viewers to keep tabs on results and medal tables, with over one quarter (26%) of respondents claiming that social networking sites will make following the Games easier.

Beyond the Games

Text-based communications are surpassing traditional phone calls or meeting face to face as the most frequent ways of keeping in touch for UK adults.

The average UK consumer now sends 50 texts per week - which has more than doubled in four years - with over 150 billion text messages sent in 2011. Almost another ninety minutes per week is spent accessing social networking sites and e-mail, or using a mobile to access the internet, while for the first time ever fewer phone calls are being made on both fixed and mobile phones.

Teenagers and young adults are leading these changes, increasingly socialising with friends and family online and through text messages despite saying they prefer to talk face to face.

96% of 16-24s are using some form of text based application on a daily basis to communicate with friends and family; with 90% using texts and nearly three quarters (73%) using social networking sites.

Talking on the phone is less popular among this younger age group, with 67% making mobile phone calls on a daily basis, and only 63% talking face to face.

Traditional forms of communications are declining in popularity, with the overall time spent on the phone falling by 5% in 2011. This reflects a 10% fall in the volume of calls from landlines, and for the first time ever, a fall in the volume of mobile calls (by just over 1%) in 2011.

The change in communication habits reflect the rapid increase in ownership of internet-connected devices, such as tablets and smartphones - making access to web-based communications easier.

UK households now own on average three different types of internet-enabled device - such as a laptop, smartphone or internet-enabled games console - with 15% owning six or more devices.

The full Communications Market Report website including breakdowns by medium and UK region.