Change

Merging cultures in the public sector

Challenge

A UK Government department had expanded rapidly and more than doubled as a result of a merger, bringing in staff from outside civil service.

The HR model was being redefined along the lines of Dave Ulrich’s model, with a move to HR business partners and shared services on a regional basis and specialist services, e.g. disciplinary and grievance, learning and development.

The need was both to help HR staff from the newly-merged organisation to adjust to their roles in the new structure, e.g. business partner, and to understand how the new roles fitted together to provide one HR across a diverse department. Coping with the change of culture to a civil service approach was also an issue for HR people who were mapped into roles in the new organisation.

Solution

After analysing the development needs of the 80 HR staff involved at regional and area business partner levels, and in other specialist roles, an HR development programme was created. A development programme of two modules was designed to help people assess their new role and understand the interfaces between HR. One important area was the need to focus on change and transition. An early process of mapping oneself on the transition curve and mapping managers helped to bring out issues around the changes, as well as the role of HR in tackling them. Working in small transformational coaching groups, people focused on their current challenges, how to build key relationships, how to establish their role in their clients’ eyes, how to let go of old parts of their role, or handle the difficulties of getting others to take on their old roles, including managers! Another major theme was influencing and increasing one’s personal impact with an opportunity to review one’s personal style and how to improve this.

Outcomes

Creating a network across the new department was seen to be a great benefit derived from the programme. The initiative showed that it was far more effective to bring people together in a learning environment to understand the change and their new role than to leave people to muddle through. It enabled them to start to work across the boundaries which the role created in each region, and to avoid misunderstanding and barriers or blame that can easily arise in times of stress. Change is a constant in any area of work, especially central government and more changes are on the way but it will potentially be easier for the HR function to cope with as a result of this development approach.
 

A leading development charity

Challenge

The first pressing challenge was for the organisation was to increase its performanceand delivery as the group had missed its volunteering targets for some years. They also wanted to build on the success of the fundraising department who had met their target for the previous year.

There was also the issue of the culture of the organisation. Due to performance and delivery as well as leadership changes some of the staff felt that this was an organisation in decline.

The third key challenge was that of the structure of the charity. There had been an organisation redesign three years previously but this resulted in lots of tiers of management that created a complex structure and hierarchies. However, as the organisation had been through constant and considerable change, any further change needed to be handled sensitively and followed through, as there was considerable ‘change scepticism’.

The company director met a trustee from her previous employment: “When I spoke to her about my needs, she mentioned Bath Consultancy Group who had provided pro bono work when she was CEO of Crisis. My ears pricked up as they sounded exactly like the type of organisation that could help.”

The company director approached Bath Consultancy Group outlining her needs and requirements and the organisation was taken on as a pro bono client.

Solution

The three challenges that were outlined are interlinked and could not be dealt with separately. To tackle the structure issue and make the desired difference to performance and delivery, the culture of the organisation needed to be moved. Bath Consultancy Group also advocated working closely with the UK Senior Management Team to help deliver the change.

The project was led by Jane Speller and involved Nick Smith alongside other Bath Consultancy Group consultants.

“I immediately took to the approach that Bath proposed.” said the company director. “I knew that I needed to change the structure of the organisation, but Bath brought home that any change had to be holistic and you needed to engage on different dimensions to deliver the change.”

Bath Consultancy Group designed a three-stage process to be delivered over a 6-month timeframe.

Stage 1: Kick-start the change by involving everyone. Get understanding and buy-in, surface data about why things are as they are and how things will need to change.

Stage 2: Work with the UK Management Team to help deliver the change by ‘behaving’ the change they wanted to see. Instigate the formal consultation process regarding the new structure, redundancies plus the creation of new job descriptions. Slot employees into new jobs and structures.

Stage 3: Getting going as the ‘new’ organisation. The Stage 1 events focused on achieving buy-in to the desired organisational changes, to share responsibility for change widely by creating a shared vision about what
is possible, and to consider desired behavioural changes at the individual, team and organisational levels. The events were designed to ask lots of questions and collect data about what is happening in the organisation, why change is difficult where things seem stuck, and where change is most likely to be welcomed. The aim was to get everyone involved and heard in a way that was clear and yet not over-consultative.

Jane Speller comments: “At the first whole organisation event, we noticed that people were very quick to fill flip charts with words and drawings. They were very open about expressing how it was to work in the organisation. But when asked to come forward to start projects or focus on specific areas of enquiry, people held back. They obviously work very hard but we needed them to concentrate on working smarter to achieve the organisation’s goals.”

During this stage four enquiry groups were formed that addressed:

• Customer care
• Internal communications
• Leadership and management
• Links and interdependencies

These enquiries became central to the change process. They were consulted and referred back to at every stage. “People needed to see that we weren’t just talking about things but that change was happening and their ideas were included.” comments the company director. “We were able to carry these themes through and that helped tackle the cynicism.”
During the second stage, Bath Consultancy Group focussed their attention on the UK Senior Management Team. The intention here was to help members of the team realise that they needed to behave differently - in line with the changes they were advocating - to create the kind of transformational shift they were seeking. The company director says: “This was crucial and one of the most significant aspects. Initially the team consisted of five others and myself. It was a team that had not been used to working as one, so had to undertake quite a significant mindshift to start thinking strategically and coherently about the organisation as a whole rather than just running individual functions. What Jane and Nick did was help the team see how the organisation needed to change.”

Another whole organisation day was planned this time led by the Senior Management Team with Jane Speller in support. It provided an opportunity to inform the organisation of the changes and to reinforce what was required at an individual, team and leadership level. Another important element was to collect reflections on the process and consider how to continue to work together in the future.

Bath Consultancy Group also helped the senior team look at the clarity of communication around the strategy; structure to deliver it; whether individuals and teams were clear about their roles; tackling poor performance; strengthening customer service and working more efficiently across the organisation.

“Redundancies were part of the structure change and we also helped other people move on.” reflects the company director. “It’s never comfortable or satisfying but at times, for the good of the organisation, you have to make this significant shift. We handled this as sensitively and carefully as possible, significantly supported by the organisations new HR & OD Director.”

During this period, 16 posts were made redundant and seven new posts were created. “Creating a new structure and changing a culture is a difficult process. The Senior Management Team did some very good work and although when people were helped to move on it was bruising, the team could hold their heads high about doing a difficult job well.” says Jane Speller.

The third stage was about getting going as the new organisation. To support this final stage, Bath Consultancy Group worked with the company director and her new senior team to think about ways of consolidating the new middle manager group.

A day was designed and run to help the group of 30 managers work together more closely and to realise their important role in continuing the changes.

Outcomes

The organisation has undertaken a major restructuring and change process in only a few months. Bath Consultancy Group helped to work through every stage of this process with the organisation.

The company director says: “We’ve got the feeling of a fresh start for the organisation, and much of this is due to the work of Bath Consultancy Group. We’ve got a newly formed UK management team and I feel very confident about taking the  change forward. They have provided us with a sense of continuing change and helped us build a platform going forward.”
 

Government department responsible for welfare and employment issues

Challenge

We worked alongside the internal Organisational Change Centre of Excellence as partners on their change journey.

The first phase of the departmental Capability Reviews led to a programme of transformational change at the organisation with the goals of improving customer experience, improving value for money for tax payers and improving staff engagement.

Solution

A team of consultants from Bath Consultancy Group (BCG) worked in the Department from March 07 – April 08. There were three aspects to the work (as summarised below) but these initiatives were integrated so that insights from each part of the programme served to inform work and learning in other areas.

BCG provided “Team Coaching” to the Executive Team and Board, adding value in four spaces - working together; working apart; managing the current business; and leading transformational change. We also linked the effectiveness of
the Executive Team with the Change Agenda.

BCG worked in partnership with the internal team in Organisation and People Development (OPD) to enhance their capability to provide first class OD consultancy to the Department.

This included working alongside them consulting on:

• The structural review and re-organisation of Organisational Capability Centre of Expertise
• Arrangements for reducing headcount
• Advice on succession planning, transition support, talent management and role assessments
• Coaching leaders to manage change in their teams
• Assisting with transition support to the new Director of OPD
• Delivering three Organisation Systems workshops to the Change Team (using the Barry Oshry Systems approach) and providing supporting methodology

BCG provided OD coaching and consultancy to the Change Directorate, particularly to those involved in the Culture Change workstream, working in partnership with internal OD consultants to change the culture and improve the customer experience and also worked with key leaders in the Change Directorate to help them recognise that how they personally led change would also model the new culture for the organisation. This included design and facilitation of key workshops, and Senior Civil Service (SCS) conferences.

Skills transfer was a key element here. BCG worked with the internal change team through an explicit ‘outside-inside’ partnering on all pieces of work. At times, they were front of stage working directly with leaders (e.g. designing and delivering a high impact and engaging Senior Civil Service conference) and in other circumstances, were coaching, co-ordinating and advising internal consultants to lead. This built the internal capacity to address change and identify cultural patterns blocking change. Feedback from the internal consultants about what they valued about the work included:

• Seeing the whole system in all aspects of work, even in one to one transition coaching
• Diversity in the consultants, real people with different strengths and weaknesses, not clones
• Willingness to think together
• Strong relationships with the consulting team - of trust, respect and understanding - and commitment to see things through, however difficult they became

Outcomes

Challenges and lessons learnt include the importance of working across the team boundary to improve the relationship between the Executive Team and its key stakeholders, in particular the Change team. The benefits of integrating different elements of the Bath Consultancy Group work and the wider programme were also clear. Finally, in order to work effectively with top management BCG needed to field highly credible consultants with technical, intellectual and inter-personal skills of the highest order, who had access to the top quality intellectual property of Bath Consultancy Group.

The benefits realised from the assignment were tangible and appreciated by the organisation. At the annual and two-year Capability Review it was noted by the reviewers that the effectiveness of the Executive team had improved significantly. Internal consultants became more capable and productive as a result, and were more effective as consultants to the Change Director of the multi-million pound Change Programme.

Voluntary Service Overseas (VSO)

Challenge

Judith Brodie joined as Director in January 2006 to drive VSO UK forward and immediately identified some initial challenges that had to be tackled.

The first pressing challenge was for VSO UK to increase its performance and delivery as the group had missed its volunteering targets for some years. Judith also wanted to build on the success of the fundraising department who had met their target for the previous year.

There was also the issue of the culture of the organisation. Due to performance and delivery as well as leadership changes some of the staff felt that VSO UK was an organisation in decline. "The 125 strong UK operation is full of bright and dedicated individuals who clearly want to make a difference but I really felt that there was a lack of expressed ambition and aspiration," says Judith. "This wasn't just personally, it was also corporately - there was no corporate growth ambition. When you have an enormous need worldwide, and we can give great value through our highly skilled volunteers, why would you not want to do more of it?"

The third key challenge was that of the structure of VSO UK. There had been an organisation redesign three years previously but this resulted in lots of tiers of management that created a complex structure and hierarchies. However, as VSO UK had been through constant and considerable change, any further change needed to be handled sensitively and followed through, as there was considerable 'change scepticism'.

Judith Brodie met Shaks Gosh who had been a trustee at Impetus where Judith had previously worked. "When I spoke to her about my needs, she mentioned Bath Consultancy Group who had provided pro bono work when she was CEO of Crisis. My ears pricked up as they sounded exactly like the type of organisation that could help." Judith approach Bath Consultancy Group outlining her needs and requirements and VSO UK was taken on as a pro bono client.

Approach

The three challenges that Judith outlined are interlinked and could not be dealt with separately. To tackle the structure issue and make the desired difference to performance and delivery, the culture of the organisation needed to be moved. Bath Consultancy Group also advocated working closely with the UK Senior Management Team to help deliver the change.
The project was led by Jane Speller and involved Nick Smith alongside other Bath Consultancy Group consultants.

"I immediately took to the approach that Bath proposed," said Judith. "I knew that I needed to change the structure of the organisation, but Bath brought home that any change had to be holistic and you needed to engage on different dimensions to deliver the change."

Bath Consultancy Group designed a three-stage process to be delivered over a 6-month timeframe.

Stage 1: Kick-start the change by involving everyone. Get understanding and buy-in, surface data about why things are as they are and how things will need to change.

Stage 2: Work with the UK Management Team to help deliver the change by ‘behaving' the change they wanted to see. Instigate the formal consultation process regarding the new structure, redundancies plus the creation of new job descriptions.  Slot employees into new jobs and structures.

Stage 3: Getting going as the ‘new' organisation.

The Stage 1 events focused on achieving buy-in to the desired organisational changes, to share responsibility for change widely by creating a shared vision about what is possible, and to consider desired behavioural changes at the individual, team and organisational levels. The events were designed to ask lots of questions and collect data about what is happening in the organisation, why change is difficult where things seem stuck, and where change is most likely to be welcomed. The aim was to get everyone involved and heard in a way that was clear and yet not over-consultative.

Jane Speller comments: "At the first whole organisation event, we noticed that people were very quick to fill flip charts with words and drawings. They were very open about expressing how it was to work in the organisation. But when asked to come forward to start projects or focus on specific areas of enquiry, people held back. They obviously work very hard but we needed them to concentrate on working smarter to achieve the organisation's goals."

During this stage four enquiry groups were formed that addressed:

• Customer Care
• Internal Communications
• Leadership and Management
• Links and Interdependencies

These enquiries became central to the change process. They were consulted and referred back to at every stage. "People needed to see that we weren't just talking about things but that change was happening and their ideas were included." comments Judith. "We were able to carry these themes through and that helped tackle the cynicism."

During the second stage, Bath Consultancy Group focussed their attention on the UK Senior Management Team. The intention here was to help members of the team realise that they needed to behave differently - in line with the changes they were advocating - to create the kind of transformational shift they were seeking. As Judith Brodie says: "This was crucial and one of the most significant aspects. Initially the team consisted of five others and myself. It was a team that had not been used to working as one, so had to undertake quite a significant mindshift to start thinking strategically and coherently about VSO UK as a whole rather than just running individual functions. What Jane and Nick did was help the team see how VSO UK needed to change."

Another whole organisation day was planned this time led by the Senior Management Team with Jane Speller in support.  It provided an opportunity to inform the organisation of the changes and to reinforce what was required at an individual, team and leadership level. Another important element was to collect reflections on the process and consider how to continue to work together in the future.

Bath Consultancy Group also helped the senior team look at the clarity of communication around the strategy; structure to deliver it; whether individuals and teams were clear about their roles; tackling poor performance; strengthening customer service and working more efficiently across the organisation.

"Redundancies were part of the structure change and we also helped other people move on," reflects Judith. "It's never comfortable or satisfying but at times, for the good of the organisation, you have to make this significant shift. We handled this as sensitively and carefully as possible, significantly supported by VSO's new HR & OD Director."

During this period, 16 posts were made redundant and seven new posts were created. "Creating a new structure and changing a culture is a difficult process.  The Senior Management Team did some very good work and although when people were helped to move on it was bruising, the team could hold their heads high about doing a difficult job well," says Jane Speller.

The third stage was about getting going as the new organisation. To support this final stage, Bath Consultancy Group worked with Judith and her new senior team to think about ways of consolidating the new middle manager group. A day was designed and run to help the group of 30 managers work together more closely and to realise their important role in continuing the changes.

Achievements

VSO UK has undertaken a major restructuring and change process in only a few months.  Bath Consultancy Group helped to work through every stage of this process with VSO UK.

Judith Brodie says: "We've got the feeling of a fresh start for VSO UK, and much of this is due to the work of Bath Consultancy Group. We've got a newly formed UK management team and I feel very confident about taking the change forward. They have provided us with a sense of continuing change and helped us build a platform going forward."

Mark Goldring, VSO's international CEO, said that organisational success would be achieved if every leader would: "be ambitious, be accountable and be flexible." VSO UK is now in a position to achieve this on an organisational, department, team and individual level.

Building transformational change capacity post capability review

In the Department for Work and Pensions, we worked alongside the internal Organisational Change Centre of Excellence as partners on their change journey.

The first phase of the departmental Capability Reviews led to a programme of transformational change at DWP with the goals of improving customer experience, improving value for money for tax payers and improving staff engagement.

A team of consultants from Bath Consultancy Group (BCG) worked in the Department from March 07 – April 08. There were three aspects to the work (as summarised below) but these initiatives were integrated so that insights from each part of the programme served to inform work and learning in other areas.

• BCG provided "Team Coaching" to the DWP Executive Team and Board, adding value in four spaces - working together; working apart; managing the current business; and leading transformational change. We also linked the effectiveness of the Executive Team with the Change Agenda'?
   
• BCG worked in partnership with the internal DWP team in Organisation and People Development (OPD) to enhance their capability to provide first class OD consultancy to the Department. This included working alongside them consulting on:
  • The structural review and re-organisation of Organisational Capability Centre of Expertise
  • Arrangements for reducing headcount
  • Advice on succession planning, transition support, talent management, and role assessments
  • Coaching leaders to manage change in their teams
  • Assisting with transition support to the new Director of OPD
  • Delivering three Organisation Systems workshops to the Change Team (using the Barry Oshry Systems approach) and providing supporting methodology
     
• BCG provided OD coaching and consultancy to the DWP Change Directorate, particularly to those involved in the Culture Change workstream, working in partnership with internal OD consultants to change the culture and improve the customer experience and also worked with key leaders in the Change Directorate to help them recognise that how they personally led change would also model the new culture for the organisation. This included design and facilitation of key workshops, and Senior Civil Service (SCS) conferences

Skills transfer was a key element here. BCG worked with the internal change team through an explicit ‘outside-inside' partnering on all pieces of work. At times, they were front of stage working directly with DWP leaders (e.g. designing and delivering a high impact and engaging Senior Civil Service conference) and in other circumstances, were coaching, co-ordinating and advising internal consultants to lead. This built the internal capacity to address change and identify cultural patterns blocking change. Feedback from the internal consultants about what they valued about the work included:

• "Seeing the whole system in all aspects of work, even in one to one transition coaching."
• "Diversity in the consultants, real people with different strengths and weaknesses, not clones."
• "Willingness to think together."
• "Strong relationships with the consulting team - of trust, respect and understanding - and commitment to see things through, however difficult they became."

Challenges and lessons learnt include the importance of working across the team boundary to improve the relationship between the Executive Team and its key stakeholders, in particular the Change team. The benefits of integrating different elements of the Bath Consultancy Group work and the wider programme were also clear. Finally, in order to work effectively with DWP top management BCG needed to field highly credible consultants with technical, intellectual and inter-personal skills of the highest order, who had access to the top quality intellectual property of Bath Consultancy Group. 

The benefits realised from the assignment were tangible and appreciated by DWP. At the annual and two-year Capability Review it was noted by the reviewers that the effectiveness of the Executive team had improved significantly. Internal consultants became more capable and productive as a result, and were more effective as consultants to the Change Director of the multi-million pound Change Programme.
 
"I was extremely impressed with the way in which Bath Consultancy Group consultants were able to slide alongside our senior leaders and create real positive impact so quickly. Their approach is testament to their expertise i.e. a fine balance of theoretical knowledge of organisational development and change coupled with quality skills in consulting and coaching. They helped lay the foundation for our ongoing transformation across DWP and, within my own functional area, ‘Organisation and People Development', provided a real benchmark of excellence in developing and embedding internal OD and Change consulting skills. Their pedigree is strong, as a group of practitioners who bring enormous experience from across numerous sectors, both in corporate and consulting roles."

Jerry Arnott, Director, Organisation and People Development, DWP