WorldCC Things That Matter Webinar Q&A
Stephen Bruce introduced our concept of ‘Things That Matter’ to WorldCC members on 29th Feb 2024. Thanks to Sally and Tim for hosting. The webinar can be found here and the slides are available to download here.
Thank you to those who participated – there was excellent engagement and a number of questions were raised during and after the session which we’ve started to answer below.
Are you talking about a ‘bottom>up’ approach?
Yes and no. It’s more ‘middle>out’.
Value Management can be initiated ‘top>down’ (usually requiring a ‘transformational leader’), or ‘bottom>up’ (usually requiring a ‘change champion’). In practice, attending to things that matter and engaging the people most passionate and responsible for them ends up looking more ‘middle>out’ (regardless of how it may be initiated).
Are you against ‘top>down’ approaches?
No, not when they engage people on things that matter.
We absolutely support ‘top>down’ change when it is authentic and focused on things that matter. The issue people are finding out the hard way is that conventional ‘top>down’ approaches typically fail to account for the things that matter, leading to things going horribly wrong.
What’s wrong with ‘top>down’ approaches?
Top>down’ approaches increasingly fail, often catastrophically.
Top>down’ approaches can sometimes be necessary and can sometimes work (usually in simple scenarios and where everyone involves is clear about the things that matter). But, the evidence of conventional ‘top>down’ approaches failing (sometimes catastrophically) is mounting up. We advocate for a complexity aware, people centred and value led approach that could be viewed as ‘middle>out’ – that said, it can still be initiated ‘top>down’, as long as it engages people on things that matter and responds to what they say.
How do you get ‘buy-in’ from senior levels?
Get ‘buy-in’ by engaging people on things that matter and diagnosing the symtoms of what’s not working – to generate a business case.
Getting senior level ‘buy in’ for a new way of doing things requires an understanding of what matters to those key decision makers and what’s going wrong with those things that matter. If senior level decision makers are somewhat out of touch with things that matter and where they might be going wrong, try diagnosing the symptoms of what’s not working yourself, or with your team. Reports generated from this diagnostic can be used as a ‘business case’ for change. If senior level decision makers are in touch with things that matter – involve them in the diagnostic.
How do you get ‘buy-in’ from both parties (to a relationship)?
Clarity on things that matter (and what’s not working) provides a shared space for adult-adult conversation and constructive negotiation.
Any degree of clarity about things that matter enables a shared space for adult-adult conversation. Not only do things that matter (and especially Value Codes) draw people in, they enable focused attention and constructive negotiation. It reduces confusion and misperception (and the resulting clashes and conflict) and lets each party declare where there should be some ‘give and take’. If you set out all the things that matter with progressive states of ‘what good looks like’, and then engage people to evaluate where you are and where you want to be – you can negotiate reasonable targets. It doesn’t mean everything has to be perfect or forced on one party by another – instead you can have constructive dialogue about where to put most attention (e.g. “if we focus on ‘x’, then ‘y’ may suffer in the short term, us that acceptable?”, etc)
How do you get ‘buy-in’ from senior levels of a partner?
Build trust by sharing the things that matter to you, where your people think you are and what’s not working – be prepared for differences of perception.
Set out all the things that matter to you (and what you think matter to your partner), with progressive states of ‘what good looks like’, and then engage your people to evaluate where you are and where you want to be, then share that with your partner(s). Any degree of clarity about things that matter enables a shared space for adult-adult conversation. Not only do things that matter (especially in Value Code form) draw people in, they enable focused attention and constructive negotiation. It reduces confusion and misperception (and the resulting clashes and conflict) and lets each party declare where there should be some ‘give and take’ – you can negotiate reasonable targets.
How do you get general ‘buy-in’ for this approach?
Get ‘buy-in’ by starting small, gather evidence of things not working and associated things that matter to build a business case for change.
To get ‘buy-in’ we recommend you start small, accumulate evidence of what’s not working and what matters, and ideally find a Transformation Leader to sponsor you. If you know what matters and who it matters to, we can offer you a diagnostic that builds you a ‘business case’ for change.
Things That Matter’ sounds good in theory, what about in practice?
Value Management and ‘Things That Matter’ is grounded in practice (it’s not ‘theoretical’ because it’s complexity aware, people centred, and value led).
Our Value Management approach, based on things that matter, is very much grounded in practice. In order to explain it, we’ve had to unpack what works and what doesn’t. Our journey began with us supporting and realising the immense value and practical impact of Waitrose’s Supplier Relationship and Development programme. Practical implementation came first. Profound and unexpected benefits and insight emerged from it. Our approach is (has to be) complexity aware, people centred and value led. That can sound like theory, but it’s grounded in practice. Practical implementations range from highly sensitive Defence contracts to small workshops, with things that matter varying massively in scope and number (from 5 to hundreds). More detail on practical implementation can be found here and case studies are available on request.
How does this relate to different levels in the organisation?
Can this resolve issues from competing / clashing initiatives?
Is this just another competing initiative?
It’s hard for people to discern what matters?
How do you get started?
How have other people done this?
How do you mitigate shifting sands?
How do you get people to rally around a single approach?
Are you seriously telling us that we’re not clear about the things that matter?
How does this relate to what we’re already doing?
What’s the point of all this?
