Highlights from Fall 2008 Issue

Feature

 

Why Do Change Efforts Fail? What Can Leaders Do About It?

James Edwin Kee and Kathryn E. Newcomer

 

A recent study, published by the Center for Creative Leadership, reported that between 66 and 75 percent of all public and private change initiatives fail—a depressing statistic for those who seek to change an organization. The study identified a resistant organizational culture as the chief culprit.

Another recently completed, intensive two-year study of large-scale changes in six public and nonprofit organizations focused on the roles leaders play in initiating and implementing change efforts. The findings suggest that change efforts typically fail as a result of the shortcomings in change leadership, including insufficient advocacy for the change or failure to understand responsibilities in the change initiative, insufficient attention to the complexity of the change itself and the potential risks introduced by the change initiative, inadequate engagement of critical stakeholders affected by the change initiative, inadequate understanding of the organizational culture in the leaders’ own organization as well as in the organizations networked in the change effort, and inadequate understanding of the organizational capacity needed to implement and sustain the change.

This article identifies strategies and tools for leaders entrusted with leading change and transformation initiatives to combat these potential failings. It offers a vision of leadership—transformational stewardship—that calls for leaders to balance the imperative for change with important organizational and stakeholder values, while ensuring that the changes made are in the general public interest. It draws from the author’s work to offer guidance for leaders charged with stewarding public resources as they implement public- and nonprofit-sector change initiatives.

James Edwin Kee is a professor in the Trachtenberg School of Public Policy and Public Administration, George Washington University (jedkee@gwu.edu). Kathryn E. Newcomer is a professor and associate director of the Trachtenberg School (newcomer@gwu.edu). They also are co-directors of the Midge Smith Center for Evaluation Effectiveness. Their latest book, Transforming Public and Nonprofit Organizations: Stewardship for Leading Change (www.managementconcepts.com/pubs), contains an extensive bibliography for those interested in further reading on this subject.

 

 

 

noVEL sOLUTIONS

 

Transforming the Military Health System

Perry R. Cooper, Roger E. Miller, Donald L. Faust, and Daniel Kachenchai

 

The Military Health System (MHS) is the nation’s largest and most complex integrated health care delivery network, offering worldwide support for more than 8.5 million beneficiaries through sixty-three direct care hospitals, several hundred outpatient clinics, and multibillion dollar, multiyear contracts with privately run health plans. Through the military services, the MHS also provides state-of-the-art battlefield medical treatment to troops deployed overseas.

As in most delivery networks, personnel costs are the single largest expense in the $32 billion-per-year Defense Health Program (DHP) budget used to finance MHS peacetime operations. Medical materiel costs are the second largest expense. Pharmaceuticals, medical-surgical supplies, and biomedical equipment items cost the MHS $4.14 billion in fiscal year 2007. Improved cost control in this area could benefit the DHP and military services overall. 

This article describes the current and possible future processes the MHS uses to identify, assess, and select the medical-surgical products used to treat patients in peacetime and wartime. It outlines processes used in other government and private health care delivery networks, proposes a number of “best practices” that the MHS could potentially adapt to its needs, and suggests the scope and kinds of benefits such adaptation might produce. Increasing costs and stagnant efficiency in an environment of increased geopolitical entanglements point to the need for improvement of the system. Increased standardization of medical materiel is a best practice to improve cost control and efficiency.

Col. Perry R. Cooper is the Director, Medical Logistics Programs, Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense, Health Affairs, Force Health Protection and Readiness. Roger E. Miller is a health care systems and logistics specialist at LMI. Lt. Col. Donald L. Faust is an Air Force resident research fellow in the Training with Industry Program at LMI. LT Daniel Kachenchai is a Navy resident research fellow in the Training with Industry Program at LMI.  

 

 

 

WORKPLACE LEARNING

 

The Talent Factor

Tony Bingham

 

People—their knowledge, skills, and attitudes—are at the top of the mind of most senior executives because they know that in the knowledge economy, employee capability is the key to success. No longer are systems, processes, and technology the differentiators for organizations: these are becoming commodities. Today, people are the only sustainable competitive advantage. This is one topic on which senior executives and agency leaders universally agree.

For decades, organizations have developed employee capabilities through traditional practices such as succession planning, mentoring, coaching, and training. Now, pressure for improved performance and shorter cycle time raises new questions about old practices. Organizations find they cannot muster the talent they need when they need it to meet key goals. In government agencies, the challenge is amplified by the retirement of large numbers of managers and executives now and in the near future. Some estimates place the number as high as 50 percent by 2010.

One result is that talent management—as an organization-wide approach to leading people—is gaining prominence and growing in scope in the public and private sectors. Formerly, if learning professionals played a role, it was typically related to career planning for individuals and education for particular groups of employees. Processes such as recruiting and succession planning were the responsibilities of human resources (HR) departments. This article examines how today, when know-how is the true competitive advantage, managing talent is taking on new dimensions centered on learning and development.

Tony Bingham is president and CEO of ASTD (American Society for Training & Development), the world’s largest association dedicated to workplace learning and performance professionals.