Check your weather station data. Change Saturation: What to Do When You’ve Got Too Many Changes Going on at One Time. For the best experience on our site, be sure to turn on Javascript in your browser. These include disengagement, apathy and indifference; burnout and fatigue; anxiety and stress; confusion; and cynicism and scepticism. What actions are you going to take as a result of reading this article? All Rights Reserved. Structure the performance contracts of executive team members to reward benefit realization and sustainment of each change initiative in the portfolio, rather than rewarding the initiation of changes. Project Symptoms In times of change saturation, projects performance can suffer the following symptoms: lack of resource; poor or failed delivery of results; delays and schedule implications; missed deadlines; or insufficient buy in and support from senior leaders. The way you initiate, lead, and implement change will directly impact whether your employees experience change fatigue. Instructions on how to find this data and how to change your station can be found here. These symptoms are costly and long lasting; directly effecting operational quality and creating a poor working environment. Six Actions to Reduce Change Fatigue. Once you select the change portfolio scope, consideration is given to the key factors of influence and resources. Receive the latest news and updates through our email newsletter. At the project level in a change saturated environment, change projects do not realise benefits, there is a lack of resources to devote to each project, clear and decisive sponsorship is lacking, changes are not sustained and projects fail to gain the required momentum because priorities are ignored and resources are scarce. An appropriate change management strategy is essential to minimising the disruptive influences of change on an organisation. On the surface it may seem that as much change is unavoidable so too is change saturation and as such it, and its consequences, must be endured. Role model the A,B,C’s of sponsorship yourself and expect your direct reports to do the same: Define the finish line for each initiative based on when the desired benefits will be achieved and sustained, not based on the project implementation date. The threshold for change saturation is highly variable and will differ amongst individuals, groups and projects within an organisation. Scenario 1: Low Change Portfolio Resources – Across all levels of influence (low, moderate or high), the optimal path is ‘Visualize’, Scenario 2: Low Change Portfolio Influence - Across all levels of resources (low, moderate or high), the optimal path is ‘Visualize’, Scenario 3: With moderate or high resources aligned with moderate or high influence, the optimal path is ‘Manage’, Scenario 4: With high resources and high influence, the optimal path is ‘Optimize’. Each level will have an impact on the organisational level. How do you survive as a change practitioner when it feels like no more change can be absorbed and change projects are running up against each other. Assessing the Change Climate, The way you initiate, lead, and implement change will directly impact whether your employees experience change fatigue. These factors combine to create an organisation saturation … Seventy-eight percent of the participants in the 2015 study reported that their organizations are near, at, or past the point of change saturation, up from 77% in 2013, 73% in 2011, 66% in 2009 and 59% in 2007. “Employees will just have to learn to cope with the increasing amount of change” is a response I’ve often received when questioning a senior leader about change saturation. This means that about two-thirds of its capacity is held in reserve. Change fatigue is one of the most commonly recognised symptoms of change saturation and arises when an organisation's capacity for change is outstripped by the disruptions caused by the cumulative change. These criteria can then be weighted to ensure mandatory/regulatory projects will be automatically included, while projects with questionable business value can be eliminated. Start by considering how much you can influence the outcome of the change portfolio. The capacity for change has a lot to do with the volume of successful change an organization has gone through, but what is really the capacity that an organization has? Change Portfolio Management is a structured approach and set of tools for managing the cumulative and collective impact of a ‘portfolio’ of change. Prosci’s research clearly shows that active and visible executive sponsorship is the most important contributor to the success of change initiatives. In fact, once a strategy is designed, you are only 15% of the way there! That is why you must create a realistic “Implementation Plan” and not just an “Installation Plan” for all your projects. The number of changes is certainly a factor in the development of change fatigue but it isn’t the whole story. The inevitably of change is being driven by technological advancements; as well as the need for competitive agility.