Q 373. Explain the components of the Change Effectiveness Equation (QxA = E). How can a project leader quantify these components to maximize the effectiveness?

 

 

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Most companies fail in implementing a solution or a project not because solution was bad, but they did not engage stakeholders in the change. Hence for a change to be effective, change management becomes critical for successful adoption of the solution.  One of the tools used by GE widely to successfully implement project was CAP-Change Acceleration Program

Change Acceleration Program talks about the equation which is important to understand how change will be effective.

 

Q x A = E

Q       = Qualitative/Technical Solution

A       = Acceptance/Engagement

E       = Effectiveness

 

For any solution to be successful and adopted, acceptance from stakeholders is important.  Engaging them in the project journey is important will make better adoption of the project/solution.

 

Few key reasons for failures of major change efforts: -    

1. Decision-driven and behavior-dependent change.
2. Failure to mobilize and engage pivotal groups.
3. Over reliance on structure and systems to change behavior.
4. Inability and unwillingness of Leaders to change. Criteria for performance not clear.
5. Lack of a winning strategy.
6. Failure to make a compelling and urgent case for change.
7. Not willing to confront how they and their roles must change.

 

Having the right strategy is only one of these factors; others relate to poor implementation and execution.

 

Change Acceleration Process Model

 

 

 

Leading Change:

Having a champion who sponsors the change.

 

Creating A Shared Need:

The reason to change, reason to drive project or solution should be communicated well within the organization and should be pursued through data, assessment, demand from business and not anecdotal. The need for change should be acknowledged so that resistance is reduced.

 

Shaping A Vision:

The desired outcome of change should be clear to everyone and adopted widely.

 

Mobilizing Commitment:

There is a strong commitment from key stakeholders, understanding their role and ensuring they are invested in the change, make it work.  Forums in the organization to ensure management are updated periodically to get their support on time.

 

Making Change Last:

Change is not about implementing a project/solution or a change but ensuring enough controls and owners who will own it and enable adoption of change.

 

Monitoring Progress:

Tracking the progress to ensure the changes and expected benefits are getting delivered.  Setting KPIs/KRAs and other indicators to ensure accountability

 

Changing Systems and Structures: 

With change getting implemented and to ensure they are long lasting and permanent, existing practices, system and structures should change.  Modifying and updating the management practices which complement and reinforce change to executed.

 

Commonly used CAP tools to help create a shared need and drive change are:

• Stakeholder Analysis
• ARMI Model

Stakeholder Analysis

Stakeholder Analysis is an important change management tool.  It helps analyze various stakeholders getting impacted with the change and their role.  It helps in planning to onboard stakeholders who may not be pro change.

Below are the steps that done to map the stakeholders and plan actions to ensure they are onboarded

·       Plot where you think individuals currently are with regard to desired change (ü = current).

·       Plot where you think individuals need to be (X = desired) in order to successfully accomplish desired change – identify gaps between current and desired.

·       Plan action steps for closing gaps to move from current to desired.

 

 

 

 

ARMI (Approver, Resource, Member, Interested Party) Model
ARMI model is another CAP tool used to assess each person’s role in the project during different phases of the project. ARMI is an acronym which stands for:

A - Approval of team decisions

R - Resource in the team whose expertise will be required

M - Member of team, with the authorities to execute steps as per charter

I - Interested Party, someone in business who needs to be informed on direction and findings

ARMI helps in defining the role of everyone in the project team. It helps in clearly defining the roles and responsibilities of each individual to avoid any ambiguity. Below is an example of ARMI:

 

 

 

In 1989-90, Jack Welch, the CEO of GE realised that thet were entering an era of constant change, and adaption to change was critical to survival

 

So, he formed a team of consultants to study the best practices in change management and form a methodology for GE.  Thus they formed the Change Acceleration Process, referred to within GE simply as “CAP" which drives change in GE. 

 

For this, the team studied many projects and business initiatives., and gathered that in most cases Projects fail due to attention to cultural factors, and not technical strategy.  

 

Thus, the team created the Change Effectiveness Equation, QxA=E. This means that Effectiveness (E) of any initiative = Quality (Q) of the technical strategy * Acceptance (A) of that strategy.  Therefore, the people aspects are equally important to change management as technical aspects

 

 

How can a Project Manager develop this process and use this equation :

 

• Leading Change : Drive a committed and authentic leadership throughout the duration of the initiative
• Creating A Shared Need : Develop a compellinneed which breaks the inertia in all stakeholders
• Shaping a Vision : Articulate a clear vision of the To-be state which is widely understood.  He must descrie the end state in measurable terms 
• Mobilizing Commitment : Execute an influence strategy to build momentum.  Leverage "early adopters,” to wear down resistance
• Making change last : Leverage early wins, transfer learning’s and replicate
• Monitoring process : Track progress of change initiativeand celebrate wins
• Changing Systems and Structures : Identify how existing business systems (the way work gets done in the organization) influences the behavior you are trying to change, and modify them appropriately.  

Change Effectiveness Equation (E = Q*A) tells about the Effectiveness of the change in an organization and 2 critical components for a change to be successful are :
1.    Quality of Technical Design (Technical Aspects)
2.    Acceptance of Strategy (People Aspect)
If any of these elements is missing (Zero) then the overall change deployment success goes for toss and Effectiveness of Change mathematically becomes Zero.

 

Mind Map of the Equation : (Visual Presentation) - If we see the mindmap below, Effectiveness of change is dependent on 2 critical components (A and Q) and have tried to project some of the subcomponents of each. So say if a company plans to launch a new software or product, these aspects shall also be covered in their overall strategy.

 

 A project leader can quantify the benefits of the same using lot of techniques like :

 

• Pugh Matrix
• AHP (Analytical Hierarchy Process) and Analysis
• Cost Benefit Analysis
• QFD
• Decisional Balance Sheet

Origin of Concept : This concept Originated from GE (General Electric). In 1989-90, under the direction of Jack Welch, GE launched “Work-Out” progranmme – a team based problem-solving and employee empowerment program introduced after Japanese quality circles model that was in a hit at the time.  Work-Out was a huge hit and Mr. Welch was really concerned by the rate of adoption through the business.  He realized that GE was entering an era of constant change, and that those who adapted to change the fastest would be the survivors in long run.  He commissioned a team of consultants (including Steve Kerr, who was to become GE’s first Chief Learning Officer) to mould industry and academics to study the best practices in change management and come back to GE with a tool kit that they could easily implement.  The result was the Change Acceleration Process, commonly referred to within GE simply as “CAP.” (Shown Below)

 

 

 
This team studied hundreds of projects and one of the finding was that a high-quality technical strategy solution is insufficient to guarantee success.  Surprisingly, a high percentage of failed projects had excellent technical plans.  (Examples below)
The team found that it is lack of attention to the cultural factors that normally derails such projects when there is a failure – not the technical strategy.  Failure, means as failing to achieve the anticipated benefits of the project (i.e., the benefits that justified the project in the first place).

 

Many of the technical design those have failed had the problems with either of these parts (Either Acceptance or Quality of Technical Design).

Example : Google Wear Glass

 

Product Description : It was a wearable, voice-controlled Android device as a pair of eyeglasses and displayed information directly in the user's field of vision.

 

 Why this product failed ?
i)    Consumers were not able to comprehend the benefits as what this wearable computer will solve and why they need to spend extra money on that. (Acceptance of Change missing)
ii)    Design was not aesthetically appealing. Looked like a dork. (Technical part was missing)
iii)    Privacy related concerns . Recording of videos using cameras. ((Acceptance of Change missing)
iv)    Safety Concerns. Exposure of eyes or face to Radio Frequency Radiations all the times. (Acceptance of Change missing)

Example 2 : 3 D Television

A television that conveyed 3D depth perception to the viewer for special 3D-formatted programming.

 

 
Why this product failed ?
i)    Awkward User Experience as not possible to wear 3 D Glass all time (Acceptance of Change missing)
ii)    Eye Dizziness – Safety (Acceptance of Change missing)

 

Examples of Good Technical Designs with great People Acceptance :

1.    Google Chrome : Excellent technical design and features, compatible with google products and free to use and hence excellent reach to customers.

 

 

2.    Microsoft Windows – Easy to use than MS DOS with good navigation of the features. Available to large audience (With Pirated versions).

 

 

3.    RPA Softwares (UiPath, Automation Anywhere etc.) - User Friendly with elimination of Mundane tasks and increasing user productivity, quality of work with easy to use features and lot of training materials availabe on Sites. Free Trial Period as well.

 

4.    HP Printers: Good Technical Design. Excellent After Sales Services. Easy Parts Availability. Training Manual / Product Manuals. Compact Designs. Aesthetic.

 
5.    Maruti Suzuki Ertiga: Good Design, Good Mileage, Excellent after Sales Service, Low Price, standard features, Value for money with huge dealer network (reach) of Maruti.

 

 
Examples of Some of the Products in Use which may become Obsolete tomorrow due to missing on these aspects:

 

Old Statistical Softwares like Minitab, SAS etc. may go off trend (High Licensing Cost, Low reach to users, not an open source, no amendments / libraries addition possible) due to advent of new free statistical Softwares / tools available like R, Python (Lot of additional techniques for analysis, compatible with upcoming industry trends like Machine Learning, Artificial Intelligence etc.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Change Effectiveness Equation (Q x A = E), where Q stands for Quality of the Product/tool/solution Developed by the Organization/Department and A stands for Acceptance of the Tool/solution by the End Users.  Typically, the Success of Any Tool/Product/solution is depending not only on Quality of the Tool or how good it is, it also depends on the Acceptance by its Customers or people who uses the Tool. 

 

Quality typically focus on Technical side of the Tool its Design & Features; Acceptance focus on End user point of view, WIIFM (What’s In It For Me).

 

Below given is the Equation for Change Effectiveness:

 

 

For 100% effectiveness of any given solution 20% weightage goes to Quality of the Solution and remaining and major portion of 80% weightage goes to Acceptance of the solution. It would be very interesting to note that we are doing the product (x) of the Quality and Effectiveness.  Any of these is not good or Zero than the Change effectiveness score will become Zero/reduced drastically.

 

It is important to note that just finding a solution is not enough, but the identified solution should be understood and implemented. It is very important to create the “Shared Need” as early as possible in the project life cycle and continue building the momentum for the Change.

 

It is very important for the Project Leader to Quantify these components and increase the Effectiveness Score. It can be done in following ways:

 

·       Identify key selling points of the Solution and create the awareness with end users the key benefits of using the solution (WIIFM)

 

·       Summarize and share the key Features of the Product, give more specification about Product Quality

 

·       Perform Stakeholder analysis and involve Leadership team to encourage team to use the solution

 

I have seen many instances where poor Effectiveness score due to resistance to change initially when the new solution is launched.  By leveraging some of the solutions mentioned above will improve the Change Effectiveness Score.

The Change effectiveness equation signifies that the Effectiveness(E) of any Change initiative, is the product of the quality of technical strategy(Q) & Acceptance of this Strategy(A). This means that to bring an effective Change Management implementation a project leader should have the best quality of strategy which helps drive the top down approach (eg: Hoshin Kanri - catch-ball process) to establish the link of strategy at all level to the organisation vision and mission and that is easy to monitor(eg: Using X Matrix, kpi’s and targets) and the Acceptance(A) of this Strategy which can be done only if we involve all to participate in fixing the goals and targets(i.e Hoshin Kanri method), this brings the buy in of every employee and transparency at all levels and easier for being accepted.

What is Change Acceleration Process (CAP)?

A change management framework with a set of tools to assess the political/strategic/cultural environment in an organisation and plan for action which can eventually decide how much success a change initiative can bring in within the existing operating boundaries.

 

Backdrop (CAP Origin):

Jack Welch understood the fact that his company GE was entering an era of constant change and realized the fact that those who adapt to the changes only will be able to survive. Therefore he wanted his team to acquire best practices on change management and come back with a tool kit that can be easy to implement in the organisation. The end result of the exercise was Change Acceleration Process (CAP)

 

Change Effectiveness Equation

Jack's team had studied innumerable projects and business initiatives and got quite a handful findings. One such finding was that having a high-quality technical strategy alone is not suffice for getting success. Lack of attention to things like cultural factors can deeply affect a project outcome. The team found this in a hard way. Many a project faced this.

 

This was the time, when the team decided to bring in a formula(read equation) deemed as Change Effectiveness Equation.

 

The equation is determined as follows

Quality of the technical strategy * Acceptance of that strategy = Effectiveness of an initiative  i.e.

Q * A = E, where 'Q' represents Quality, 'A' represents Acceptance and 'E' represents Effectiveness

 

This tells the fact that however superior be the quality of a technical strategy (solution), still it has to be accepted by the people who use or work on it. Else it(strategy/solution) is deemed as a failure which means that the benefit planned for that initiative through that technical strategy cannot be achieved.

 

Let us now see how we can make the mindset change to ensure the 'Acceptance' factor (in the above equation) is obtained, with the help of the CAP model

 

The CAP model

This is a 7-step process

 

1. Leading Change
2. Creating a Shared Need
3. Shaping a vision
4. Mobilizing Commitment
5. Making change last
6. Monitoring process
7. Changing Systems and Structures

 

Let us deeply dwelve on these steps involved in this model.

 

1. Leading Change - As the name says the leadership team in an organisation should be committed to any initiative being taken. Only with the explicit support and commitment from the leadership team(or management team if you want to call as per your organisation culture :-)) then an initiative can move flow through the hierarchy in the organisation. Otherwise it would be a failure

 

2. Creating a Shared Need
People whom we (as a leader of the initiative) want them to be involved as part of the initiative and whom we think would be using the initiative should be agreeing to the need for this initiative. There has to be a justification as why we are going for a change. The reason for change has to be propagated across these stakeholders at a convenient pace.

 

3. Shaping a Vision
There has to be a clear-cut agenda (vision) and that needs to be shared across and be properly understood by everyone.The resultant state should be observable and measurable in terms of individual behaviour.

 

4. Mobilizing Commitment
After doing the aforementioned steps which includes the commitment from leadership team, your reason for putting this initiative with a proper vision, we try to leverage with an influential strategy to build momentum by roping in with some supporters(those who want to adopt our initiatives/thoughts) to pilot our initiative and then learn from the lessons that the pilot implementation teaches.

 

Because we are dealing the initiatives with the 'supporters' or early adopters, the shortcomings from that pilot work is noted down with a tinge of acceptance (which can be later useful for improving the initiative or the implementation of that-wherever it is failing)

 

5. Making change last
While steps 2,3 and 4 are for making us to adopt to new changes and accelerate towards that, starting from this step till the end step , its all about making the change persistent. Here we tend to take advantage of the gains that we got from our piloted implementations and take the learning and best practices into our wider rollout of our initiative. We get to know what is helping and impeding the initiative and how that can be overcome and also look out for how to integrate our initiative with other existing ones, wherever required    

 

6. Monitoring Process

How do we know the initiative that is being brought in newly is working or effective ?  Well, there has to be a measurable mechanism for that. Set it up (Own it). Measure and celebrate when it becomes a success. In case it is not measuring upto the expectations, then we need to have the accountability for the lack of progress.

 

7.Changing Systems and Structures
An initiative will make some kind of impact in a business process. When there is a change being made in the business because of this initiative it impacts also the supporting systems and structures, in which the business operates. Therefore, in order to make the initiative a successful one, we need to understand how the systems and the structures get influenced by the initiative. Otherwise, our initiative can become a failure.

 

Let us see some examples of how implementing initiatives through CAP model resulted in unprecedented success

 

1. Streamlining of 'Continuous Integration' process in Software Development

In one of the projects that i was aware of, there was a constant challenge. The developers were not regularly updating the changes that they made on the local workstation(machine).

 

As a result of that, the developed codes grew in size and whenever the developers tried to push their code into the Source Code (version control system for maintaining the various versions of the developed code), there were so many code conflicts and this created software build failures.Moreover, the Continuous integration Server used on the project, Jenkins, provided several reports and it threw lot of coding standards errors Primarily and few critical performance(Memory) errors and all the errors varying from 'low' to 'high' category.

 

The leadership team of the project was worried pretty much and did not have too much control on how to arrest this deteriorating situation at the earliest. Every day the issue was galloping as team kept on developing the code amidst the problems and the woes kept on  increasing. Because this was running in managed services mode, the extent of the damage was not fully realized by the customers yet and as such there were no impact to the expected behaviour of the features, but it was a probable question of time that such a thing would happen .  

 

I Suggested this CAP approach to the person in charge of the project and it was done as follows and the rest was history :-) ...

 

a. Leading Change:
The Group Leader (GL) of the team unanimously agreed to this approach and was wholly committed to this. With the help of a Plasma Screen TV(big size-visible to the whole floor), he made sure that the Jenkins tool's code analysis report is displayed on it, thereby showing the coding standard errors & performance errors for all the files that are developed on a daily basis. This was a big shot in the arm for the initiative owner

 

b. Creating a Shared Need:

As the initiative owner (who is a process-savvy person) explained the nitty-gritty of this initiative to the GL, by explaining the proposed steps and how to achieve each one, the GL included the other stakeholders who will help the developers in shaping up this technical journey and all stakeholders such as Technical Architects, senior/key developers,Product Owners and Scrum Masters.

 

The Senior/key developers took this to their respective teams. For implementing the initiative a team was formed with one Technical Architect, 2 developers and a Scrum Master... All of them volunteered themselves to do this activity, apart from their regular work.  

 

c. Shaping a vision:
It had a straight-forward agenda
1. Improve the Continuous Integration process and ensure developers check in their codes into the version control system (GIT) on a daily basis
2. Minimize the coding standards(Primary) and few critical performance(memory) errors through proper usage of Static Code Analysis tool (which existed in the project but was not utilized effectively).

 

For these 2 things to happen, it depended completely on the mindset of the developers.

 

#1 required changing of the habits of the developers' day-to-day habits (as they have to do check-out or Pulling out of the latest code from GIT and then applying their changes on top of that pulled code and at the end of the day or at a logical point, they need to push or check-in their code into the GIT).

 

#2 required that each developer integrate the static code analysis tool (which will help in proactively identifying coding standard errors and hence will prevent those errors from occurring while the code is compiled) on his/her own.  So both these things required a mindset change in developers.

 

These two things were measurable in terms of the number of code conflicts that each developer gets while trying to push or pull the code , in case of #1 and the number of coding standard errors/performance errors that is being thrown when the Jenkins report for code analysis runs for a developer's code (published through the giant plasma screen) in the case of #2.

 

Note, in the case of #1, the more conflicts that a developer gets, the more likely is his/her delay in doing check-out / check-in and adhering to the continuous integration process.

d. Mobilizing Commitment:
The implementation team had tried to implement these things first in its own sphere of work and implemented it with a fair degree of success. It also identified that displaying the count of coding standards error/performance error for each of the files, along with the name of the developer who had worked on it , was not a great thing to do. Reason was that the report was producing the name based on whoever had worked last in a file. But that developer need not have produced the defect (because the file was there before this process got started and it was throwing all open errors.) So in some instances, the name displayed was not the actual developer who created the defect. This was a lesson learnt for the team. Nevertheless the team became optimistic of taking this initiative to the next level

e. Making change last:
The implementation team started to showcase the achievements made in the last one month since the initiative was started. It showcased to the senior/key developers first (with a separate session) on how the coding standards errors / performance errors got reduced because of the initiative. Then this was taken to the whole team and then explained in detail as how this can be done effectively. The performance expectation of this initiative was also explained succinctly.

 

By having a proper Continuous Integration process, the team had reduced its build failures and because the software build was integrated with other automation tools

like Selenium, all of those tools got regularly triggered. The test case results were also displayed on the big plasma screen

f. Monitoring process:
As every team in the project started to implement this and each developer started to inculcate this change in his/her DNA, the result was there to be seen in the dashboard created by the team and was very much visible in the giant plasma screen.The coding standards error was very much less and no performance errors and code conflicts were happening very rarely only.  

 

g. Changing Systems and Structures:
The new codes being developed were not having any errors. But the old codes developed earlier (prior to this initiative start) had lots of errors and had there were too many file dependencies with other systems. So those files had a considerable chunk of code which had to be compliant with standards. Those files in this system and other systems had to be changed as well.

 

The outcome was spectacular. All were changed in 3 months time and the quality of the system was really good in every aspect. The developers were happy to be part of this initiative. The icing on the cake was the CI process that the team had put in place (the team did create a pictorial view of what they had done) became the talk of the town in the entire vertical within the organisation.

 

2. Let me show another example of how CAP process was done in another project.
Agile Transformation for a customer relationship:

The projects were running in waterfall model and that had to be transformed to Agile model (Scrum framework). An agile Coach's service was sought to do this transformation. The GL, leading the change,  was committed to this cause. The agile coached formed a program transformation vision and developed Key progress indicators (KPIS) which were measurable and also laid out short term and long term agendas as part of this transformation. This was communicated to all relevant stakeholders.

The idea was to have transform one line of business (LOB) into the Agile way of working , taking one at a time and then replicate for the rest of the LOBs.

 

Few teams were formed after enlightening them, on the Agile transformation journey. All skepticism and fears were promptly addressed and the teams started to feel the positive impact as development life cycles became short and the interaction within the team and the stakeholders were quick and spontaneous, which was a new thing for many as their earlier model did not have this luxury. This increased the confidence of the teams to reach out to customers and business stakeholders for any business query. As the development cycles were shorter in period, the number of releases to production increased and slowly that line of business started to run using the agile way. This success was achieved relatively quickly and now the management was confident of replicating this in other LOBs. This was replicated in other LOBs as well and in 6 months time, the transformation had been done completely.

 

Because the team had moved to Agile way of working, the team had to change some of the supporting tools that it was using earlier. The requirements were earlier being tracked through word documents and stored in version control systems. But with the introduction of Agile. the team relinquished that and started to use JIRA tool. Suddenly all the huge documentation work that was lying in the existing model was gone and the team now had to do documentation only at a minimal level and the team started to use slack channels for communicating amongst its team members working across the globe rather than doing email communication. Overall this initiative changed the way how the teams thought about software development approach and this transformation was a massive success

 

Benefits of CAP:
1. It shows a systematic approach to make a cultural change in an organisation  
2. Because an initiative done through this approach mandates the explicit approval/  commitment of leadership/management team , it gives confidence to the employees that their effort on such an initiative will get the due recognition from the leadership/management and that can help in their career growth
3. A personal feel good factor can occur across the employees when the expected benefit is achieved and when their work gets recognised 

 

Conclusion:
In real life, every problem that we need to address , we need to take the human factor into account. Every change (read initiative) that we do or plan to do should pass through that 'human' aspect successfully . Else it would be deemed as a failure. CAP model provides a systematic way of doing that. How strong is the leadership/management commitment to the initiative and how clear is our vision and shared need shapes the success of the initiative, to a greater extent. Better they are, better will be the outcome(success).

 

For the sake of understanding more about change management frameworks, similar to CAP, there are other change management frameworks such as John Kotter's 8-step change model which is also akin to this in terms of the implementation steps and that is also pretty useful.

 

References :
https://www.isixsigma.com/dictionary/change-acceleration-process-cap/,
https://bvonderlinn.wordpress.com/2009/01/25/overview-of-ges-change-acceleration-process-cap/

Change Effectiveness Equation is a  famous equation Q x A = E is the one which belongs a GE Milestone which is called CAP (Change acceleration Process). It came as a forerunner to the six sigma methodology which was also by GE.

Jack welch launched the CAP around 1992 due to accommodate the fast changes and transformation in the world due to the Gulf war. Q is the quality /strategy of the organization, A is acceptation – people skills, team, E is the Effectiveness of the change.

 

After implementing a Work Out a model from Japanese quality circles welch understood the adoption rate is very less by the business . The reason of many projects to be derailed is lack of the time team spent on the cultural values.  The point of this model was if there is a zero in the acceptance of the business however effective the technical strategy is the effectiveness will be zero.

 

Project leader quantify these components to maximize the effectiveness:

1. Project leader can be committed to lead the change till the end of the project
2. Changing the mindset of the employees
3. Measure the progress of the initiative continuously
4.  Bring changes in the system and organization structure to accommodate large scale changes in project.

 

Change Effectiveness Equation

The formula for Change Effectiveness is  QxA = E, where it key components are mentioned below

Q - Quality

A - Acceptance

E – Effectiveness

 

Above equation can be defined as effectiveness of any initiative is equal to the product of the quality( Technical) & acceptance (People) of the strategy.

E.g. Score of Q= 100 , A=0 E= 0 ( Best solution/strategy will be not effective till the point acceptance is not there in people)

 

How to quantify these components to maximize the effectiveness

 

Key to this equation is how much best solution we can build and if there is low acceptance of the solutions in people and whole initiative will be not effective, so to maximize effectiveness we have to work on both quality of technical strategy with increased acceptance towards the solution from people/users.

 

Below are some of the key things which can be performed to maximize effectiveness by working on quality and acceptance of solutions.

 The 1^st step toward maximizing effectiveness of strategy is to create awareness of need for change & negatives of current situation among the users.

• Need to show benefit of the changes and what good things will be preserve from present.
• Need to evaluate impact of changes on people and overcoming potential resistance or perceived loss here we can use participation and Involvement Strategies and Tactics create sense of ownership in the desired change.
• Create a proper plan for change which should consist of
  • Description -  Present (As-is) vs after change
  • Communication plan – Inform everyone and keep up to date with change
  • Recognition plan – Reward people who support the change efforts
  • Guidelines - Define standardized process , clear roles and responsibility to reduce conflicts
  • Measurement – MIS to track success

 In short good change plan with people awareness and involvement will results in maximize effectiveness.

 

Change Effectiveness Equation
The formula for Change Effectiveness is  QxA = E, the main components are as below:

Q - Quality
A - Acceptance
E – Effectiveness

The above equation can be defined as the effectiveness of any initiative is equal to the product of the quality we can term it as (Technical) & Acceptance from (People) of the strategy.
For any successful effectiveness people, acceptance is a must for any change to implement.
E.g. Score of Q=100, A=0, E=0 (Best solution/strategy will be not effective till the point acceptance is not there in people)

How to quantify these components to maximize the effectiveness is something very important and the key to this equation is how much best solution we can bit and if there is low acceptance of the solutions in people and whole initiative will be not effective.
So to maximize effectiveness we have to work on both qualities of technical strategy with increased acceptance towards the solution from people or users.
 
Below are some of the key things which can be performed to maximize effectiveness by working on the quality and acceptance of solutions.

The 1st step toward maximizing the effectiveness of the strategy is to create awareness of the need for change & the negatives of the current situation among the users.
•    Need to show the benefit of the changes and what good things will be preserve from the present.
•    Need to evaluate impact of changes on people and overcoming potential resistance or perceived loss here we can use participation and Involvement Strategies and Tactics create sense of ownership in the desired change.
•    Create a proper plan for change which should consist of 
     - Description -  Present ( As-is) vs after change
     - Communication plan – inform everyone and keep up to date with change 
     - Recognition plan – Reward people who support the change efforts
     - Guidelines - Define standardized process, clear roles and responsibility to reduce conflicts
     - Measurement – MIS to track the success
 
In short good change plan with people, awareness and involvement will result in maximize effectiveness.

Change effectiveness Equation:

 

Bringing in Change has been one of the toughest and challenging irrespective of the change.  We all enjoy the status quo which have been very comfortable with and it becomes very difficult to adopt. However, a change should begin with oneself.

 

 

Being a leader / advocating change in the organization, it is important to bring in a design the change in a methodical way. Let us not forget that we need to bring in changes along with the day to day work and it does take a toll for the leaders to get the people on their side of the change.

Many times, the leader and the close members are so engrossed with the change that they do not understand and help the rest of the larger team, organization understand how we help them navigate the change. Not that there is always resistance, but they do not know how to adopt to new change. Hence there will be a need to hand hold and take them along in the journey.

 

 

 

Five things that can help us to handle the Change management better is by ensuring there is least resistance, how will we do that as leaders;

1.      Engaging the team members at the early stages for them to own the actions and allowing the changes to be embraced by all involved

2.      Bringing in clarity on roadblocks that we will collide if we continue with the status quo

3.      What is in it for me: Visibility on the Vision and the benefits that it will bring in the long term should be higher than the resistance to change.

4.      Start small, incremental changes, reaping small benefits for one to get comfortable and accept it slowly.

5.      Consistently monitoring across the change cycle

 

Every person becomes important and can add on to strengthen the change management.

A change effectiveness equation is a product of quality of the technical strategy (Q) and acceptance of that strategy (A)

Therefore, Change effectiveness equation E = Q X A.

The Change Equation, developed by Richard Beckhard and David Gleicher, is a simple change model that shows us how to engage individuals at all stages of the change process in order to achieve successful organizational change.

 

Note : Credits to the respective pictures inserted from the google search.

Q x A = E - Change effectiveness equation

GE established their Change Acceleration Process thirty years back  . One component of that process was the Change Effectiveness Equation denoted as Q x A = E. This equation implies the Effectiveness (E) of a change is equal to the product of the Quality (Q) of the change and the Acceptance (A) of that corresponding change. 

 

In simpler words :

• Q here denotes Quality or technical strategy of an organization for a change initiative. In the context of Six Sigma this will imply $$ , resources, tools/techniques, software e.g. Minitab, hardware like computers etc.
• A here imply Acceptance or also called Cultural or soft strategy. This includes resources skills like interpersonal skills or team management skills or facilitation skills etc.
• E here means Effectiveness of deployment of a change initiative

To sum it all, it means that effectiveness (E) of all change initiatives (including six sigma) at an organization is a multiplication effect to the technical (Q) and cultural (A) strategy. 

 

Let us take an example:

Say an organization is seeking to implement a new way of assessing and rewarding its staff. A lot of time has spent in putting together a suitable scheme. The scheme is not perfect but it gets a reasonable Q score of 7 out of 10.

 

Constraints :

However, the organization does not consider how it will gain acceptance for the new scheme, it fails to provide strong leadership and the need for change is never properly communicated. Hence, scores achieved can only be 2 for the A side of the equation and the culture does not change. As a result the new reward scheme is never properly implemented, and soon the organization reverts to the old way of doing things.

 

According to our Change Effectiveness Formula, we would expect to see a change that was only 14% effective (7 out of 10 multiplied by 2 out of 10), or, a pretty ineffective change. 

 

Addressing limitations/constraints:

To manage change effectively, it requires an understanding of both Q and A sides of the equation.  There are number of approaches that can be used that consider the A side, ensuring that stakeholders and organization culture are considered in the improvement program thereby, yielding the highest possible effectiveness and impact for the change, meaning performance improvement that can be maintained.

 

When working in the process improvement space, practitioners and organization get too focused on the quality of a solution (Q). We use all the right tools, identifies the root causes, and map out the future state beautifully. We pilot and prove the results with the hypothesis testing, new systems put up in place, and we get ready to move into production. But equally as often, these different solutions are not as effective as they could or should be because we ignored the other half of the equation which is  - acceptance of the change (A) by the people or resources doing the work in the new processes and systems.  Attaining a high E can bring the difference between success or failure. Most discussion or efforts center on quality. While as important as quality is, equal attention or effort should be on the acceptance of an idea or presentation?

 

Often, it just makes sense to ask a few team members "how do you think this idea is going to land?" and then make changes accordingly.

E = Q x A is a very simple equation, though there is nothing simplistic about it. In fact, if you run the numbers, you would be surprised to see to what happens to be true of any multiplication equation. An increase in the smaller of the two variables results in a greater product than increasing the larger one. Take an example, where Q=7 and A=3, it would give you an overall effectiveness of 21. Most left-brained practitioners tend to continuously improve quality, and pay little attention to acceptance.

 

When you improve the quality of an idea while keeping acceptance low, than improving acceptance while leaving quality alone which implies from 30 to 42, there is a significant improvement by 40%.  Accelerating A with Q constant: one could also invest time and effort to raise acceptance from the initial 7 X 3 = 21 to a 7 X 10 of 70 which lands a whopping 233% improvement. The key call out as a leader is that you should ask yourself if you have succeeded in creating widespread acceptance. It is difficult than most people think. What is required is selling the idea to a few key stakeholders, seeking their input, onboard them and make needed adjustments as required to earn their acceptance.

 

The elements in the Change Effectiveness Formula to maximize the effectiveness are: 

• Understand the formula Q x A = E
• Define the stakeholders (stakeholder matrix)
• Understand that resistance to change is natural
• Identifying four types of types of resistance when considering the Six Sigma formula for success: Technical, Political, Cultural and Individual
• Understand the stakeholder analysis chart/graph
• Understand threat opportunity matrix along with modifications of systems and structures
• People Element of  Problem-Solving and how people & Solutions Work Together for Process Improvement

Conclusion:

For any organization to be successful in true sense with any meaningful process improvement initiatives, one cannot only focus on the “Q” part of the equation. Focus, structured, well thought planning to address “A,” the acceptance of a solution, alongside the “Q,” the quality of a solution is the only way to maximize the overall effectiveness of the solution. To quote and modify a well-known saying, “if you are failing to plan for change acceptance, then you are planning to fail.”

Change effectiveness equations

Effectiveness of a solution (E ) = Quality of the solution (Q) X Acceptability of the solution (A)

 

Change effectiveness equation was practiced and endorsed by GE as “Change Acceleration process” (CAP). The need for a CAP was coined when GE started noticing low adoption of improvement solutions throughout the organization.

Multiple studies were conducted to understand the challenge with adoption of new solutions and why change is not well received. One of the key insights from the study revealed that high-quality technical strategy solutions do not guarantee success, i.e. it was noticed that a high percentage of unsuccessful projects had brilliant technical solutions. Further studies into this area revealed that, there is a lot of focus and attention put into the technical strategy or quality of the solution, hardware/software, effort put to train the employees etc. However, very limited or no attention is given to the cultural factors or acceptance of the solution by employees who are impacted by the change. As such, the lack of acceptance and participation from the employees usually derail the project and this summarizes the challenge with effective change management.

 

Change effectiveness equations helps to resolve the aforementioned challenges and Q x A = E is the most simple way to describe this equation, Effectiveness ( E) of any initiative is equal to the product of the (Q) Quality of the technical strategy and the (A) Acceptance of the said strategy. To further simplify this equation, paying more attention to the people aspect of the equation is as important as the technical aspect.

To further explain this concept, we will consider using multiplicative relationship of the variables in this equation.

•   E= Q X A, where Quality (Q) is 10 and Acceptance (A) =0, the effectiveness of the solution E will be zero, i.e. Q (10) X A(0) = E(0)
• E= Q X A, where Quality (Q) is 6 and Acceptance (A) =6, the effectiveness of the solution E will be zero, i.e. Q (6) X A(6) = E(36)
• E= Q X A, where Quality (Q) is 9 and Acceptance (A) =9, the effectiveness of the solution E will be zero, i.e. Q (9) X A(9) = E(81)

 

In summary, the Effectiveness of a solution or strategy deployment can only be improved with developing a “shared need” very early in the project and continue to build momentum on the change initiative. Some organizations practice preparing their people /organizations for the change by answering most important human aspect “WIIFM!!” or (what’s in it for me). Increased acceptance significantly improves the project start and completion timelines, as there is faster consensus building and less numbers of non-compliance. It ensures there is enough support and acceptance to the project solutions, positive participation from customers and suppliers, and the most important, the deployed change is sustained. Improving acceptance also ensures change is visible, consistent and tangible.

Q x A = E is an equation which belongs to another GE Program called CAP (Change Acceleration Process). It was intended to bring cultural change in the organization to face fast changing world. It was launched around in 1992.

 

For any strategy to implement in the organization, It is important that organization is ready to deploy the effect of change.

 

To elaborate Q x A = E, is a secret formula that helps one to understand and importance of change management.

 

Q x A = E, is Quality x Acceptance = Effectiveness

 

Where Quality is of improving your product or process with the results you are expecting

Acceptance is also called cultural strategy which includes people skills, facilitation skills and etc.

Effectiveness is of deployment of anything for a change initiative

 

Few key components for effective change management:

 

·       Strong Leaders to provide direction and drive the change and ensure it is successful

·       Clear vision for the future and motivating the entire group involved for the commitment to achieve the goal

·       Constant communication on need for the change by the leadership and progress towards the goal

·       There is always a Resistance for any change, Resistance should be managed well without ignoring

·       Change in culture is important and encourage change to make it easy to achieve

 

By keeping in mind, the above components while deploying any change. Results are promising for the project leader to be successful

 

Note: Unsuccessful in deploying will have the opposite impact to win the change.

 

When we wish to improve the performance of an organisation it will be default have changes by design and they are inevitable . We must know how to manage the changes and in order to do that we use Change effectiveness formulae

                              Q x A = E

 

 

Change Effectiveness equation is used in a program named Change Acceleration Process which was proprietary method of GE named CAP and this was a more like a pilot to Six sigma implementation to bring cultural transformation  

This was used in GW during early 90’s amidst Gulf war and Internet explosion and Globalisation as a transformation tool .

 

The Equation is given below

 

 

 

Q X A = E 

 

In which

 

Q – depicts Quality and or Technical strategy of the Organization for a change initiative . Even resources like tools ie Minitab etc  are also covered under Q

 

A depicts Acceptance or Cultural Strategy or Soft strategy which includes People skills , Interpersonal skills , Team management skills and Facilitation skills .

 

 E is the Effectiveness of deployment of change initiative or management

 

Most of the times there will not be major problems in achieving Q as its more like an resource /method and hence SOPs and KRAs can bring the effect in this element .

 

A is the challenge as people are involved who have variety of personalities and attitude which have to be managed . Hence it is important to concentrate more on A by bifurcating and expanding in depth

 

We can expand A – Acceptance in to Accountability and also Ability to accept which are measurable and thus we can have AAA in the system

 

 

In order to manage the change the leader should take in to account all the elements and monitor and managing change effectively by implementing a Change Acceleration Process Model  which can be seen below with elements in order

 

Related to Project Management as how a Project Head or Leader can effectively manage CAP .

 

Its called the CAP method which is all about monitoring whether you are doing the right things at the right time and it’s a Risk Management  tool  by which we can decide the prioritization and also monitor the associated responses .

 

CAP stands for

 

C – Categorize Risks

A – Assess Risks

P- Prioritize Risks    

 

We can create a Risk Register to capture all elements

 

C- Categorizing Risks can be in to  the following

 

Scope / Schedule / Budget and Quality .

 

In some projects we can also use RBS – Risk Breakdown Structure to have a more granular approach

 

A- Assessing  Risks can be in to  the following

 

Qualitative Risk analysis and Quantitative Risk Analysis so that all the risks are assessed with significance

Normally Qualitative risks are measured in the following scale

Very High / High / Medium /Low / Very Low

We can also  use Probability /Impact matrix with a scale of 1 to 5

Quantitative Risk analysis is tedious and only if very critical micro elements are going to affect the project it is done and in such conditions following methods / tools can be used

Sensitivity Analysis / Monte Carlo analysis / Expected Monetary Value / Decision Tree Analysis and Three-point estimation tool

 

P-Prioritising risks   Risks can be in to  the following

 

We have to prioritize in order to obtain most value for our efforts .

Pareto principle talks about 80% of issues in the project will  come from 20% of your risks and hence its important to prioritize by assigning proper human resources as Risk owners so that immediate action is taken by them once the threshold is crossed .The risk owner should have Risk Response Plans including contingency plans and fall back plans –Plan B

One more advantage is this will help us to reduce cost

 

 

Background:

In 1989-90, under the direction of Jack Welch, GE launched a team based problem solving and employee empowerment program called as “Work out” modelled after the Japanese quality circles model. Though the model was a huge success, but the rate of adoption through the business was not good. This frustrated Welch. This made Welch & GE realize that everyone was entering an era of constant change and there was a need to adapt to the changes. Only the fastest ones could be the survivors.

He then formed a team of consultants (including Steve Kerr who was to become the GE’s first Chief Learning officer) to study the best practices in change management and suggest a tool kit that Welch’s managers could easily implement. The result of this was the “Change Acceleration Process, commonly known as CAP)

Concept & components of Change Effectiveness Equation

This team of consultants went ahead and studied hundreds of business initiatives & projects. One of their understanding was that just a high-quality technical solution may be insufficient to guarantee a success. It was observed that a high number of failed projects actually had an excellent technical plan. The team also found that it is the lack of attention to the cultural factors that derail the project at the time of failure & not the technical strategy. Failure here is defined as failing to achieve the anticipated benefits from the project. These are benefits that are assumed at the start of the project.

In order to describe this in a simpler way, the team created a Change Effectiveness Equation QxA=E

Quality of product x Acceptance =Effectiveness of the initiative

This means that the Effectiveness of any initiative is equal to the product of the Quality (Q) of its technical strategy and the Acceptance of that strategy.

This means that the people side of the equation is as important to the success as the technical side of the strategy. The team used a multiplicative relationship so that if there a zero acceptance, the total effectiveness of the initiative will also turn zero regardless of the strength of the technical strategy / implementation.

 

As a project leader, one must be able to measure the change management to assess what is working and what isn’t from people / employees’ perspective. One of the method is to define certain Change Management metrics & KPI’s which will help measure, quantify and maximize the effectiveness. Some metrics & KPI’s that can be implemented for effectiveness are:

·       Employee Readiness assessment results

·       Employee engagement & participation measures

·       Employee Feedback

·       Communication effectiveness

·       Training participation & effectiveness measures

Most of the companies nowadays are working on constantly improving things, whether it is people, process, infrastructure etc. and towards that one of the thing that every company encounters is how do they effectively do change management.  and this is where Jack Welch from GE along with his SMEs and Consultants after significant years of research and analysis came up with an equation.. Change Effectiveness Equation.. 

 

Change Effectiveness Equation is defined in following way: Quality (Q) X Acceptance (A) = Effectiveness (E) i.e. in simple terms it is the product of Quality (Technical change) and Acceptance of the change and it is measured/called as Effectiveness.

 

In other words, this means that we can have the best possible Technical solution (infra, process, procedure, tools, techniques) that is available for deployment, but it is not going to be effective, until and unless we look at the culture, the fabric of the company, and most important asset, the employees; and align them towards this change.. Only if the employees and the culture of the company are aligned towards this change with answers to the questions like below, the Effectiveness will be close to 100% and if the employees are not aligned then the Effectiveness can also be 0%.

 

1) What is our current situation and is this change needed at this point?

2) Why is this change happening now? 

3) Is this the best possible solution to the problem identified?

4) How is this change going to happen?

5) What is there role in this change?

6) Who is going to lead this change?

7) How this change is going to impact or benefit them?

 

For any change to happen in a most effective way, following procedure needs to be followed

 

 

1. Management needs to be aligned and lead from the front.

2. Current state of the process needs to be established, with all the relevant, complete and correct information.

3. They need to taken into confidence and align all the other necessary stakeholders (IT, HR, Finance, Admin and most importantly Ops people) depending upon the project needs or scope, using the above 7 questions.

4. A clear and transparent plan needs to be created and communicated to all the relevant stakeholders

5. Necessary resources needs to be mobilized towards ensuring that the plan needs to get executed and the desired goals are met, like owner, timeline, milestones, date of completion and measure of success. If required align KRAs and KPIs of the relevant people towards this.

6. Enable a tracking mechanism to ensure that all the parameters are tracked and reviewed from time to time with all the relevant stakeholders to ensure alignment and compliance.

7. Impart necessary training to the required people, and review the progress

8. Create a reward and recognition framework to reward the employees involved in this change  

9. Once the change is implemented, create an audit mechanism using lead and lag measures to ensure  endurance. 

 

 

The Change Effectiveness Equation, “Q x A = E” was coined by GE Consultants as part of a tool kit that GE managers could easily implement to manage change known as the Change Acceleration Process (CAP).  The tool kit was created at the behest of Jack Welch, the then CEO of GE who recognised the importance of people and wanted to speed up the rate of change as well as improve up take of new initiatives within GE.

During the development of the Equation, the team studied ongoing projects and business initiatives and one of the key insights was that application of tools and frameworks is not sufficient to ensure success.  Majority of the failed projects had the best technical tools but failed to provide attention to the cultural factors. 

The Change Effectiveness Equation, “Q x A = E” helps in determining the importance of cultural acceptance of the change.  It explains that the Effectiveness (E) of any initiative is equal to the product of Quality of the Change(output) (Q) of the approach and the Cultural Acceptance (A) of that approach. 

In my experience, being part of some of the successful and few unsuccessful projects where in the change was driven, the key components for successful change management are:

·         Strong leadership driving the change

·         Clear goals and objectives which is motivating as well

·         Communicate the need for adoption of the Change

·         Listen to the resistance to Change and manage the resistance

·         Drive the culture change in the organisation and prepare them to be more open

As you can observe, none of these components mention the technical tools or frameworks but speaks about people and managing people.

A project manager can quantify the key factors in the equation to drive his decisions and ensure that the project is change ready.  Working on the equation mentioned, the Project manager will have to rate and score both “Q” (Quality of the Change) and “A” (Acceptance of the Change) in scale of “0 to 10”. 

For example, PM scores Q as 9 and A as E then the Change Effectiveness Score is 27:

In this case, if the PM focuses on improving the quality of the Change and improves to 10 from 9 then the Change effectiveness score will be 30 which 3 more than earlier score.

However, if he can work on Change acceptance and improve it by 1 point to 4 keeping the Quality score at 9 there will be a huge jump in the overall Change Effectiveness score to 36:

This example also helps in proving how important the acceptance of Change is as well to ensure success of the projects.

 

Cost Effectiveness Equation belongs to GE Program called Change Acceleration Process (CAP). It was launched around 1992 and socialized to many businesses around the world at GE.

QxA = E

Q – Depicts technical strategy or Quality of an organization for a change initiative. That is, $, resources software. Eg: minitab, Computer hardware, etc.,

A – Depicts Cultural, Acceptance or soft strategy which includes people skills, interpersonal skills, team management skills, facilitation skills, etc.,

E – Depicts Effectiveness of deployment of a change initiative

Simple way to define QxA = E is the Effectiveness ( E)of any initiative is equal to the product of Quality (Q) of the technical strategy and acceptance (A) of that strategy.

If you take any project failures, it is not only because of technical skills.  There are many projects are using excellent project tool and technology experts also fails in the new strategy.

QxA = E.

The organization should give more priority on A (Acceptance) side of the equation which is nothing but

Depicts culture. Lack of Culture causes project failure in many organization. We need to build the culture. Good Technical tools are not enough to bring the success.

There are five key elements when managing change in projects.

1. More focus on the Acceptance (Culture) side of the equation.

2. Strong leadership

3. Clear Goals and objectives

4. Manage Resistance.

5. Effective communication

Focus on the Acceptance (Culture) side of the equation:

The change in culture brings the Successful initiatives as output which automatically improve the performance of the organization in short span of time

Good Leadership: Group of people who providing the direction to be very strong in Encourage, motivate, inspire the team and challenge the team to give the best at work.

Goals and objectives: Clear vision for the future and that vision should motivate and inspire others in the team.  Clear and difficult goals are great motivating factor

Manage Resistance. Any organization face the resistance whenever the change is proposed. Those to be effectively managed. Make sure those are not interfering the progress of the changes in the organization. Also we should not completely ignore the resistance. It should be listened and managed.

Communication:

Communication plays an important role in any organization. Leadership should frequently communicate the need for the changes, the future vision and goal. Many changes are failed in the organization because of lack of communication. Effective communication resolves many conflicts in the organization.

There were 2 parts to this question. Part 1 has been answered very well by all the participants. Some have detailed out GE's Change Acceleration Process as well. However, there are only a couple of responses where I could get to see some specific pointers for the second part of the question (quantification of the equation).

  

There are two winners for this question - Ajit Pathania and Manish Prasad.