How to build and maintain momentum behind a Sustainability Transformation

Any significant business transformation is always a major undertaking for an organisation and not to be undertaken lightly. The breadth and depth of the change required as part of a Sustainability Transformation only adds to the complexity necessitating additional forethought and planning. The societal threat from not addressing the Sustainability crisis is too high to allow risks to crystallise.

Whilst following good practices for transformation and change will help to assure success (Leading Change by John P. Kotter is a great starting point) we have found that five critical areas can be particularly beneficial to ensuring the success of a Sustainability Transformation:

1.    Create alignment throughout the organisation

2.    Make a visible commitment by updating the purpose, mission, and values

3.    Cascade responsibilities and empower staff to drive implementation

4.    Maintain rigorous ongoing review of progress

5.    Celebrate successes

By focussing on these measures above and beyond good practice, organisations can build momentum quickly and ensure it is maintained throughout the Sustainability Transformation and embedded into day-to-day activities.

1.    ALIGNMENT

Sustainability Transformation requires significant changes to the objectives, strategy, operations, and culture of an organisation – starting out on such a fundamental reconfiguration of the DNA requires the full senior management team to be aligned to the new direction to be successful. However, we have frequently found that few organisations undertake sufficiently rigorous, candid and objective discussions to understand whether they are aligned, and if not to do something about it.

Once reached, this level of consensus needs to be cascaded throughout the organisation to encourage all staff to make the behavioural and operational changes to contribute to the Sustainability Transformation. Building an effective coalition throughout the organisation helps to minimise the impact of naysayers, sceptics, and others seeking to derail the transformation, through peer pressure as well as top-down authority.

How this is achieved will depend on the exact situation of the organisation but three themes stand-out:

1.    Gain a rigorous understanding of the current status of the organisation through a detailed diagnostic and address the critical gaps identified

2.    Engage staff in the development of the objectives and improvement activities, both at a business-level as well as within their own specific areas of accountability

3.    Ensure that senior management act as evangelists for the transformation and model the necessary behaviours, encouraging similar of their teams

By following through on these activities the organisation can maximise the alignment to the transformation.

2.    PURPOSE, MISSION AND VALUES

A further way to signal intent and build further engagement is to incorporate Sustainability explicitly into the key documents which lay-out the critical beliefs of the organisation, most notably the Purpose, Mission, and Values statements.

These are frequently communicated publicly and can help to demonstrate commitment to external stakeholders, which has a self-reinforcing effect of bolstering internal commitment to deliver.

Equally it is essential to incorporate Sustainability into the organisation’s strategy, but as these documents are usually kept confidential within senior management they do not have the same impact on building momentum within the wider organisation.

3.    EMPOWER STAFF

Although senior management can make the big strategic resourcing and investment decisions to start to unlock Sustainability opportunities, many of the discrete operational and behavioural changes must be enacted by staff lower down in the hierarchy.

Whilst we have seen some organisations try to micromanage this cascade, in our experience it rarely works and actually contradicts the Sustainability ethos.

There is a much simpler way – empower frontline staff to identify and implement the changes themselves.

By leveraging the full workforce and incentivising them to deliver quick wins as well as identifying longer-term improvements the organisation can accelerate success. Empowerment can encompass both tangible (e.g., energy efficiency improvements) and intangible (e.g., cultural behaviour and attitudes towards diversity) changes

In a previous role, one of the founders of Smart Sustainability inherited a business in which the parent company had tried the micromanagement route and seen the transformation be stifled and rapidly stall as decisions took too long to make, if they were made at all. By empowering staff to make the changes he very quickly reestablished momentum and created substantial buy-in and initiated a new performance trajectory.

4.    ONGOING REVIEW

Transformations are seldom (if ever) simple linear processes which progress smoothly throughout – arguably if an organisation encounters no significant challenges, they have probably set themselves insufficiently challenging targets.

Sustainability Transformations tend to be complicated, messy, and iterative processes requiring substantial real-time as well as strategic problem solving. It is particularly essential to maintain oversight on key activities and performance to ensure they deliver to expectations, and so that appropriate rapid interventions can be made when they don’t

Many organisations establish a central Programme Management Office (PMO) to provide this insight. When led well PMOs can help to drive progress and clear barriers. However, the wrong approach can actually derail the initiatives the PMO was established to oversee – trying to oversee too many activities or micromanaging them seem to be particular favourites. 

An approach we have successfully deployed is the use of an independent chair for the periodic reviews facilitated by the PMO. They can either be a senior internal stakeholder who does not have direct accountability for the transformation, or an external facilitator to provide further impartiality – we have successfully acted in this capacity for our clients, as well as helping to set-up and coordinate PMO activities.

5.    CELEBRATE SUCCESSES

One of the easiest and most enjoyable aspects frequently overlooked by organisations is to celebrate successes once they are achieved, as management frequently are too eager to move on to the next set of activities.

However, this misses a vital opportunity to communicate the changes made, in case they can be deployed elsewhere, recognise the contribution made by staff, and reinforce to the wider organisation that the Sustainability Transformation is being successful to engender further engagement.

One organisation we worked with was beating itself up about the lack of progress but when we collated and reviewed the successes with their senior management team they realised that they had achieved far more than anyone individually was aware of, but had not been sharing or celebrating the breakthroughs they had made

How an organisation communicates and celebrates breakthroughs is very specific to the culture and situation. Simple durable tokens of recognition work for many (one organisation used engraved reusable coffee cups, which became a prized possession), others prefer one-off celebrations (drawing from a parallel theme – an annual safety BBQ was a hit with one company), or simply communicating the changes on noticeboards or information screens work for others.

Ultimately it is critical to make the celebrations work for your organisation, but they should not be forgotten.