Written by Louise Fogstrup

Louise is an executive advisor and sparring partner to top executives in various industries. She is an experienced leader and enabler of change management and business transformation, motivated to create impactful and sustainable change. With board experience, she is in a unique position to understand and advise boards strategically during the change process. Learn more about Louise here.

Have you ever wondered why some organisational changes just don't stick, no matter how clear communications are or how safe and supported the teams feel? The answer may be more practical than you expect; we can trace it back to a lack of what we call the "hard side of change" in the change journey.

No, I’m not speaking about making change journeys more difficult, they are complex enough! I’m speaking about the not-so-glamorous but essential aspect of any transformation that is often overlooked, in favour of the “human” elements.

What is the Hard Side of Organisational Change?

The hard side of change refers to the environment in which we want the change to take place, such as the structures, processes, technology, and culture of an organisation.

Think of it as the sturdy backbone that gives a body its form. Without it, everything collapses.

Hard vs Soft: What is the difference?

Hard Side of change: Ensures the organisation, its structures and systems support the desired change.

Soft Side of change: Supports the people with their personal change.

Why is the Hard Side of Change Important?

Ignoring the hard side is like trying to build your business without a strong foundation. Balance is key. When both sides are in harmony, that's where sustainable change happens.

We often see change initiatives fail when companies ignore the critical hard factors. Without addressing hard issues first, transformation efforts will falter before the people side can make an impact.

Balancing the Two Sides of Change ©Enabling Change

Case Analysis: The Green Tech Giant’s R&D Overhaul

Let us consider an illustrative, hypothetical example about the relevance of employing the hard side of change.

Imagine a multinational environmental tech company, let’s call them EarthGem Ecosystems, looking to revolutionise their Research and Development (R&D) department. They are implementing new, top of the range equipment, looking at speeding up the way they work and retraining the staff to handle these new machines. The CEO is bubbling with enthusiasm and invests heavily in innovative training programs for the R&D team, aiming to boost creativity and collaboration.

Kickoff day is a hit, and the team has bought into the vision! This is going to be a game changer! But five months down the line, things start to unravel. Why? The new project management software wasn’t integrated effectively, leading to confusion and missed deadlines. Furthermore, the company still adhered to their old rigid approval processes, stifling the newfound creativity and creating frustration with everyday operations and new projects that take ages to get the green light.

Despite the new equipment and the team’s eagerness and advanced training, the surrounding environment wasn’t adapted to support the innovative approaches. The outdated governance setup and cumbersome processes were at odds with the department's new dynamic goals, hindering effective transformation.

This is a classic case where the hard side — the software, the governance and processes — failed to align with the desired change, making it nearly impossible for the revamped R&D department to achieve its potential.

Enabling a Balanced Organisational Change Process

So, what can we do to avoid the fate of the fictional EarthGem EcoSystems? To ensure that the change we undertake is balanced we must consider the following:

From an internal perspective, we need to address:

Structure and Setup: Making sure they act as enablers for our intended ways of working post-change.

Processes & Ways of Working: Adapting them to reflect our desired operational methods.

Technology: Utilising technology, data, and AI to facilitate the change we aim to achieve and challenge ourselves on whether we have created the right foundation to make the most of technology in our area.

Competences and Capabilities: Evaluating whether we possess the necessary skills or if we need to develop or acquire them.

Leadership and Culture: Ensuring they support our vision. This also involves assessing our reward systems and how we acknowledge behaviours and performance.

Hard side of transformation ©Enabling Change

From an external perspective, we must consider our relationships with suppliers, collaborators, stakeholders, investors, various interest groups, and political dynamics.

It is important to note that the external environment is in fact becoming increasingly critical to change journeys.

A road map to implementing the Hard side of change

To ensure these areas are covered effectively, follow these key steps:

1. Conduct a change impact analysis. Before diving into training and motivational sessions, analyse the expected change impact across the relevant areas. How will each area and team be affected by the change?

2. Based on the change impact analysis, evaluate your current setup, governance and ways-of-working. Are they aligned with the new goals?

3. Once you understand (and can communicate) the required level of change, then you can detail the concrete changes needed to succeed and scope your implementation, both for the hard side and the soft side.

4. After you have prepared the change process and support, you can start implementing the change.

5. Both during and after, you monitor and adapt to ensure you take the actions needed to succeed instead of the planned actions. Constant feedback and learning loops are essential for any successful change. Keep an eye on both internal and external factors and be ready to tweak things as needed.

6. Leverage Data and Analytics. As for any other area, we must use data to track the effectiveness of the changes being implemented, both to ensure we deliver the desired outcome and to ensure we deploy our focus and resources in the most effective way

7. Offer ongoing training and development opportunities so that everyone is up to date with new processes and technologies. Embed continuous learning in the work environment (could be through your change agents), because learning as part of everyday life provides more efficient outcomes

Successful sustainable change involves both the hard and soft sides

If there is something our collective experience has taught us at Enabling Change, is that the hard and soft sides are equally important.

The soft side has been spoken about extensively in recent years and you can find some of our articles exploring the soft side of change here:

Authentic Leadership in Times of Change

The Role of Psychological Safety in Enabling Successful Change

It pays to bear in mind however, that the hard side of change is also key. It’s the environment that will either support or hinder your efforts.

As you embark on your change journey remember to look beyond the actual change and how you can support the individual to ensure that the way you are organised, the way you work, your technology and your processes and what you reward, all support where you want to be.

We invite you to check out our Enabling Academy, where we have a lesson covering the Hard Side of Change in more detail. We can also work with you through our different Enabling Academy packages, offering various levels of customised support to help you ensure that you have both the hard and soft sides of change covered in your organisational change journey. Contact us for more details.

References and further reading:

Article: “Change management is bigger than leadership” by Gregory Shea and Cassie Solomon, March 29, 2013, for Harvard Business Review
https://hbr.org/2013/03/change-management-is-bigger-th

Sustainable Strategic Change: Why the Hard Side Matters