Ensuring Successful, Sustainable Change

Most business improvement efforts (efforts that are introduced to change performance) are declared failures and abandoned before they are even given a chance to succeed.

In fact, 75% of all change initiatives fail - due to lack of sustainability. The changes just don't "stick."

Why?

Are we overestimating people's ability to learn to do things differently (learn new habits), and underestimating their resistance to change (unlearn old habits)?

The tough part isn't introducing change - it's making change sustainable - making business improvement last.

Here' are steps to ensure that change initiatives will stick:

1. Create a sense of urgency.
2. Build a strong guiding change initiative team.
3. Develop a clear vision for what you want the outcome to be.
4. Ask the tough questions.
5. Work the plan.
6. Build in short-term wins.
7. Embed change initiatives into your organization's culture.
8. Repeat as necessary.

BOTTOMLINE: To enure that the results of any business improvemente change initiatives last, re-read these 8 steps often during the change process and measure your performance against them.