The world has changed in so many ways in the past two years. Suddenly, we recognise that so many of the things we do in business are past their sell by date.
That especially applies in maximising human performance. A new mindset and methodology are required – especially when it comes to delivering large scale change projects.
First, pause and consider how momentous the changes are. The workplace is unrecognisable as hybrid and home working become the norm for most.
The workforce is unrecognisable, in the era of the war for talent and the great resignation. The marketplace is unrecognisable in many sectors, driving a different approach and different demands from customers. The acceleration of technology and automation in the past two years makes so much more unrecognisable from life before COVID.
Amid such seismic shifts, our approach to improving performance can never be the same again. After all, the definition of insanity is trying the same old things and expecting a different result.
At Black Isle Group, our passion is creating a new mindset and methodology for delivering projects and change. We started by looking at what others do outside the world of business.
We enlisted the help of Sarah Broadhead, a psychologist to many elite athletes, including the double Olympic gold medallist in taekwondo, Jade Jones. She told us that their key had been to focus on the process and not the big goal at the end of it. In other words, you take the dream of Olympic gold and break it down into the everyday actions
In the lead up to the London Olympics in 2012 this meant, Sarah and Jade would compile a list each week. It would cover what the teenage athlete would need to do around sleep, diet, stretching, strength, technique, and many other things to move towards her dream of gold. It meant around a dozen specific actions each week. That translated into more than 50 small steps each month, more than 500 every year, and between 2,000 and 3,000 across an Olympic cycle.
At the end of each week, athlete and coach would review their progress and agree the small steps for the following week. On this eight-year journey to double gold they were constantly being distracted by things which could push them off course or break the new habits they were embedding. But the everyday actions brought them back on task.
We decided to take that methodology of our Olympic athletes and support it with an innovative, easy to use technology called Nudge. It sits on the smartphones and PCs of team members.
Through the tech we nudge our clients to carry out those everyday actions which will take them closer to their goal. It is constantly working to help individuals avoid distractions and stay focused on the key things they need to do.
We blend the Nudge tech with ten-week focused sprints and give everyone in the team a coach. We also use the tech and the coach to connect people. Through a highly sophisticated reporting suite we bring comfort to the bosses giving them a real time view of what’s happening out there in the hybrid workplace.
Hey presto when we used this approach, we discovered that the world changed, and performance rocketed. People, culture, and strategy became much more aligned. Targets were smashed, engagement soared and performance went through the roof.
Take, for example, the managed IT and solutions provider, VCG. Following an acquisition, their big project was to bring together two teams and two cultures while coming out of the COVID pandemic. They wanted to accelerate sales, increase employee engagement, and deliver several behavioural changes across the business.
We brought the VCG team together to establish clear goals and to motivate and inspire them for their ten-week sprint. We worked with them to help create the right “everyday actions” to achieve their BIG goals. We coached senior leaders and helped them peer coach their colleagues in the business.
We rolled out our Nudge technology so that the VCG team got daily reminders to keep them on track. They described our reporting suite as “gold dust”. Most of all it helped everyone maintain connection.
The results even took us by surprise! They put a stretch target on attracting new business into their sales pipeline and over-achieved that by 360%. Employee engagement went through the roof. They created a performance coaching culture, just like Sarah Broadhurst and Jade Jones.
The group head of sales at VCG, Jeff Wheeldon, said, “The numbers were superb. But the standout for me, is seeing the inter-team coaching and support. That is what makes a team succeed together. There is no doubt this approach achieved much more togetherness.”
Everyone out their needs to be thinking of a different way of doing change projects in this new world of work. The old ways won’t crack it. We believe that the focus on everyday actions, the guidance of Nudge technology and the gold dust of real time reporting is a game changer in the world of project delivery.
Jeremy Campbell, people & business transformation expert and CEO of Black Isle Group.
