WHY RESULTS DON'T ALWAYS HAPPEN

Senior executives and organizational leaders are very vulnerable. Like the Wizard of Oz, a good part of their power and might is an illusion.

If you are like many executives, you were promoted because you have exceptional ideas, outstanding strategies, great plans and in particular you are able to make things happen. But now, as the organization's leader, you have to make things happen through everyone else. Now, your success is measured by someone else's installation of your plans. Somehow you have to make those below you as effective as you are. Just telling people to do it does not work, especially when there are some people who would sooner your plan did not work! For years, executives have faced the stark reality that their authority was limited and determined by the rank and file.

Every day, newspapers are full of executive appointments -- successful managers being elevated into vulnerable positions. Whether they succeed or fail and how they will be judged now depends on their ability to get their ideas installed by others. The ivory tower has crumbled, and there are thousands of fired and over-stressed executives who had wonderful plans but nobody would install them.

Often there is a wide gap between policy enunciated at the executive level and what actually happens throughout the rest of your organization. Filters such as fears, perceptions, organizational levels and political motives remove or distort information going to and from you.

It's common for the executive to be left out in the cold, out of touch with reality and holding a different perception of what's actually happening in the organization. Political games are played in the organization and as a result confidence throughout the organization in the accuracy of communication leaving and entering your office is lowered. Policies and programs are therefore not installed as expected. Plans and images that were so clear in your mind simply don't unfold the way they should.

When the organization fails to install your plans and policies, your credibility is lowered and your judgment is questioned. Power doesn't automatically come with your executive title but a lot of stress and anxiety usually do.

The results achieved by executives and managers can be represented by the following formula:

RESULTS = PLANS  x  INSTALLATION  x  MAINTENANCE

RESULTS -- key measure of executive performance

PLANS -- plans used here is a generic term for anything you want to install such as an idea, procedures, programs, policies, systems, strategies, skills, values, organization structure or corporate culture.

INSTALLATION -- make it happen

MAINTENANCE -- keep it happening

Results, the key measure of management performance are determined by not only the plans a manager has, but also whether these plans are installed (make it happen) and maintained (keep it happening). Failure to install and/or maintain a plan frequently results in the plan being labelled poor or inappropriate. But that may not have been the case and the baby gets thrown out with the bath water.

In the past few decades there have been thousands of examples of failed attempts in the public and private sectors to improve the quality and effectiveness of organizational life. Examples can be found in participative management, quality circles, quality of work life (QWL), strategic planning, matrix organizations, management and leadership training, Affirmative Action, pay for performance, quality assurance, social democracy and pay equity. The instances when these experiments failed was not because the ideas were poor, but rather the installation most likely was faulty.

From: Robert H. Kent, Installing Change: an executive guide for implementing and maintaining organizational change, Winnipeg: Pragma Press, Inc., 1989, pp. 1-3.

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