Managing Change: From a Rules to a Customer-focused Culture
A government agency was set up to interpret complex benefits legislation and regulations in terms that could be understood by the general public. The agency carried out its work with extreme accuracy and recruited managers and staff who had an empathy with rules and accuracy. However, in recent years the customers of the agency have increasingly insisted that the agency provide more guidance in explaining service options available to the public, instead of just interpreting the rules.
The Executive Board drew up a plan for to help move the agency from a rules-based culture to one more sensitive to customer needs. However, it is anything but easy to change an organization which has for many years been required to translate act for act and rule for rule into terminology that could be understood by the general public and which was totally free of errors into an organization which adopts a creative and results-oriented approach to the legislation and regulations. The staff need to learn how to view the subject matter from a different perspective, and they require different form of management – and this can’t be achieved simply by prescribing new procedures or appointing new managers.
Fundamental changes of this nature can be implemented only with a knowledge of people’s characters and the form of management they will need. The Management Drives test provides the necessary information; the six colors used in the analysis indicate their drives.
The breakthrough
Ultimately virtually all managers and staff took the Management Drives test. All individuals could then see their primary drives; for example, were they largely driven by rules, figures and accuracy – or by complex issues, and by getting results.
This information about the drives (‘colors') of the managers and staff was then used to draw up teams with drives most appropriate for the specific tasks. For example, a “Blue” team is ideal for checking tasks and an “Orange/Yellow” team for result-oriented tasks. Moreover excellent results could also be achieved by mixtures of value profiles; for example, an “Orange / Yellow / Green” manager with an excellent feeling for the market’s needs (“Orange/Yellow”) who is able to explain these needs to his “Blue/Green” team in a sociable (“Green”) manner. The team’s “Blue” value profile guarantees that the work will be of a high quality and free of errors.
This knowledge of each other’s drives not only resulted in teams with a more appropriate membership and an improved division of the tasks and roles; it also resulted in improved communications and an improved working climate – and consequently, in improved effectiveness and efficiency.
