A Leader’s Guide to Thriving in the Change Continuum

How would you describe change? It’s the journey from a clear starting point to a desired endpoint, right? For businesses, that journey is typically delivered in a structured way as a project or programme; it’s planned, executed and completed in distinct, manageable phases, and then leaders can move on to the next initiative.

But in recent years, we’ve observed that change itself is changing. Change projects are no longer about simply moving from A to B. Instead, there is so much change happening simultaneously across different functions, and at such a rapid pace, that organisations are essentially in an iterative, never-ending state of evolution – a change continuum.

This means that to remain competitive in the marketplace, organisations have to not just execute change well, but build the capability to change continuously.

The question is no longer ‘how do we get from A to B?’, but ‘how do we equip ourselves and empower our people to keep evolving from A to B to C to D and beyond?’

In this Insight, I’ll share the answers.

I mentioned this has been a shift we’ve seen happening for some time now. And, as with almost every facet of business, it’s been massively accelerated by AI. Technology is  advancing more quickly than organisations can adapt, yet they must keep pace to remain relevant, and this is inspiring a wave of new change initiatives. 

In the highly regulated, safety-driven industries in which we operate,  sometimes regulation can be perceived as in conflict with technological innovation – rightly, we have to be sure the innovations we embrace are right for our patients, customers and people. Because the application of AI continues to rise so rapidly, the relationship between regulatory control and seemingly limitless industry opportunity must be very smartly and proactively managed.

In addition, customer expectations have only continued to grow, geopolitical and macroeconomic influences are creating uncertainty and instability, and organisations are under pressure to embrace ESG-based operations. All of this necessitates change and transformation, adding fuel to the fire of the change continuum we’re now seeing.

What does all of this actually mean for business leaders and their workforce, suppliers and customers?

Well, the one thing all of those groups have in common is they’re human, and the biggest challenge with continuous change is that humans like predictability. We are intuitively wired to feel comfortable with the familiar, which is why any change can feel disruptive. So, if change is seen as an endless cycle of disruption, it will be resisted, ignored and ultimately not adopted.

But as ever, change starts from the top – that’s why leadership is the highest weighted of the 6 levers of successful change. Firstly, leaders have to accept that transformation is no longer just an occasional necessity; it’s now the defining characteristic of modern business.

Of course, this is only half the battle. Where leaders see AI as representing growth opportunity, competitive edge, greater business resilience, and enhanced customer or patient benefit, the people within their organisations might feel uncertainty or fear, especially when it comes to AI.

Therefore, in the change continuum, it is pivotal for leaders to create a workforce that embraces disruption, innovation and evolution. In short, leaders need to build a change-ready culture.

What are the key traits, behaviours and attitudes of a change-ready culture?

Leaders must nurture a sense of psychological safety across their workforce. To do this, they have to be honest, acknowledging that in such a rapidly changing environment, they don’t have all the answers, but that they are navigating this in partnership with their people. At the same time, employees have to feel able and be encouraged to ask questions, express their concerns and share their ideas.

The days of the strongest leaders being those who control every detail are long gone. In the change continuum, the best leaders are those who embrace adaptability, agility and curiosity, empowering their people to experiment, iterate and, dare I say it, fail (fast).

This is the only way to eliminate a fear-based attitude to change. If someone’s worried that AI will replace their job, they’ll naturally disengage from it. Instead of allowing that fear to take hold, leaders must reframe change as an opportunity for growth; for that individual’s skills and development, for the business itself, and most importantly for the customers or patients that the business serves.

Culture – another of the 6 Levers of successful change – becomes even more important in the change continuum. If leaders fail to build the right culture, change will always feel uncomfortable. Layer of change on top of layer of change will mount up to an exhaustive change load that is neither psychologically nor practically managed. Because of this, a change-ready culture will never organically just happen; it has to be deliberately built and reinforced.

As mentioned, the major cultural shift required is to embrace experimentation. Leaders should create a space where people feel safe to test ideas and are assured that failure is an opportunity to learn. A fail fast approach – welcoming mistakes, pivoting quickly and avoiding analysis paralysis – nurtures an agile, adaptable workforce.

I also touched on the importance for leaders to be transparent about their own lack of definitive answers, but this transparency must also be applied to the overall business direction. Leaders will have a vision for what they want their change to achieve and how this connects to the business strategy. This link must be made explicit for employees so they understand the ‘so what?’, the ‘why?’ and the ‘what’s in it for me?’.

To put this into the context of a commonly used change framework, ADKAR, until people are fully Aware of the opportunities your change unlocks, they will never Desire it. From there comes Knowledge, Ability and Reinforcement, and a true change-ready culture will also embed continuous learning and improvement into the way it operates to progress through these ADKAR phases.

In addition, building the foundations of your change journey on a common guiding North Star vision helps to connect initiatives that might have seemed siloed or disparate, which in turn reduces change fatigue when you’re several months or years down the line.

Perhaps the new normal of business is that there is no new normal, only continuous evolution. There are no signs of this change continuum slowing down – quite the opposite. Global business is already in an exponential state of advancement. Therefore, the organisations that remain competitive and that survive will be those that underpin their business with the mindset and the capability to embrace this reality, rather than ignore it and hope it goes away.

While no two change initiatives are the same, our pioneering SIMPLE^TM framework does provide you with a structured set of critical steps to operationalise your change strategy. Find out more about it here, and if you need support with any aspect of your change programmes, from leader mindsets to creating change-ready cultures, get in touch with our expert team.