6. Description of Complexities of Change
As are the complexities of the environment in an organization, the complexities in an organization are multiplied by the complexities of change and then multiplied by the risk of change that increases by the variable “time”. It is important to differentiate between the three. Again, complexities of change are the complexities and challenges that arise from the variables that come from change multiplied by the factor of time (the variables that can arise just by the passing of time). And the complexities of the environment are the difficulties and variables that arise from the strains and challenges of an organizational environment, and that multiplied by the variable factors of time.
Each complexity has its own axis with multiple variables that can cause change, which is multiplied by the variable factors of time. And of course, time is its own axis. Plus each variable on each axis has its own axis on each axis of change, and that is multiplied by time. And the role or result of time is the creation of change, or at least increasing the risk of change. And the risk of time also increases the risk of variables and change in the environmental applicators of change, and that multiplied by the factors of time as well.
In other words, one could become quite irritated by these complexities and their just-about uncontrollable or very difficult-to-overview-able ramifications and consequences. Change on one simple axis can likely be manageable. On two axis change complexities may become little more challenging to manage. Change variables on three axes are probably just about very difficult to manage. And multiple change axes on each of the three main change axes will create likely just-about impossible management tasks. That kind of a complexity left unmanaged would likely result in failure of the change project.
Examples of variables on the axis of Change multiplied by time, in the subject organization:
6.1. Project adjustment by stakeholder change and/or adaptations
Projects have to be adjusted and modified due to the change-out of stakeholders when someone quits, is laid-off, or is moved to a different department. Some stakeholders in the subject organization were also promoted and also demoted to different positions with different responsibilities. Upper management shifted organizations and their responsibilities around without detail knowledge or understanding of all processes.
The associated knowledge about the project status was either not completely passed on or fell under the table completely. Departments where shifted around in the organizational infrastructure. And with an awe of amazement observed upper management how a market was opened with marketing materials translated into an incorrect language. So materials in English had to suffice in Malaysia. Nobody volunteered to take responsibility for the error.
As a consequence to staff, teams, and departments shifting and changing responsibilities, and some others leaving jobs or being promoted to other responsibilities left gaps in responsibility and accountability. It also led to information gaps of project statuses and project direction. This took place because employees lacked communication and the time of transitioning from old jobs to new job responsibilities and the leaving an old job behind with having appropriately turned over previous job and project intelligence over to the knew person(s) or teams in charge.
The lack of communication occurred primarily because staff was too busy and also pressured by new management and new responsibilities to take over new responsibilities. And to the other hand, when jobs and responsibilities and even entire departments and teams shifted or were closed-out, left-off tasks were disregarded. Nobody seemed to have an interest in what the former staff and stakeholder knew about the project.
6.2. Regulatory Affairs Law Changes
Laws for importing goods may be, and in fact are actually changed from time to time. When a product is already or become non-compliant with the local market’s distribution regulations, the importing company needs to make adjustments to the product, the labeling, and the associated market materials. Claims need to be changed, statements rewritten, and even product ingredients / recipes need to be reformulated. The entire organization is affected by this change.
In the worst case a product must be pulled from the market until a new compliant product can be reintroduced into the subject market. Inventories are transferred to other markets. Labels in various alternate languages are sent to the market and applied by hand. And sales personnel need to be trained about new product conditions and on how to sustain customer satisfaction. For customers, any change, especially the one that could put the subject company into a devious light, is difficult to accept. The customers had already adapted to a given product and now must accept the change, and even having to find a different product that will work for them.
In the best case when product change requirements occur, the labeling has to be changed. In the case of the subject organization, the company was informed that it violated the local trademark law. It had forgotten to register the trademark in the local market before a deadline 2 years earlier.
As a consequence all product distribution came to a halt in a European market for two weeks. Employees had to unpack tens of thousands of liquid dietary supplement packages and cross out the TM on the label. The shrink-seal on the bottle neck had to be also removed and then all repackaged.
This specific change or adaptation led to much contention among customers, distribution, and customer service departments. The legal department was forced to make an official statement after a couple of weeks because customers demanded an explanation why the authentication seal of the product had been removed. Customers thought they were shipped previously opened product and that perhaps someone tampered with the product. The legal department wanted to protect the integrity of the company and hoped that the problem would just go away by itself.
6.3. Product market demand change (consumer requirements)
Consumers are the ultimate leaders of an organizations’ success. As such, no matter what the organization does, the consumers buy the products according to different criteria. If they can find the same product elsewhere for less money or better conditions that are more appealing to them, they will switch.
In the case of the subject organization, the organization began pushing the original liquid dietary supplement product, however instead in 1 liter bottle packaging in ½ liter bottle packaging. Because of its direct sales methods that allowed the genuine distributor earn his/her commissions much excitement drove the sales when introduced. Soon however, the sales dropped and the organization had to move back to only the 1 liter packaging.
This was a double change that took place within 1 year. At first the organization drove a change without asking the market, the consumers, just based on gut-feelings that may have made sense in one market but not in Europe. As a result, the value of the product in the 1 liter bottle packaging was reduced. The organization had previously even years before began pushing the 1 liter packaging with the approach that 1 liter juice is the minimum really before one might see health and wellness improvements. The ½ liter bottle in that market suggested that ½ liter was sufficient which undermined the purpose of the 1 liter bottle.
The first change created much resistance from local management. Because local management did not agree with the new ½ liter bottle approach, they were inclined to sabotage the ½ liter bottle approach in their market. And they did succeed, eventually.
6.4. Market adjustments (new markets and consolidating marketing materials)
The subject organization began its business operation in Europe, right when Europe began uniting its economic interests known as the European Union (EU). Marketing materials were put out in the applicable languages and according to what was known then as the importation and regulatory affairs requirements. As the market begun to adjust to products being imported and sold, the European Union made adjustments to regulatory affairs requirements.
New markets / countries began to join the EU. The subject organization had its product previously sold in such market(s) and with the joining of the EU, some products and their supporting marketing materials became incompliant. Other products and materials were suddenly allowed under the new EU regulations. This restricted some sales and opened the door for new revenue.
As a result, the marketing department, the local sales and market management, customer service, and IT were departments always very busy, trying to adapt and adjust to new information. Mostly these departments, together with production, distribution, and the supply chain were always reacting to the changes instead of planning the change themselves.
Inventory of outlawed product had to be relabeled and moved from one warehouse to another where the product was compliant. Supply chain / production had to reformulate product ingredients. Marketing had to rewrite, modify, and redesign articles, claims, labels, visual and audio support materials, etc. And local management together with customers and distributors were protesting against the change, leading them to circumvention and selling product illegally.
6.5. Competitive advantage – change due to competition
The executive management of the subject organization created a conflict with various employees. Some people were fired and a new organization was created. The subject organization suddenly had a direct competitor.
This was the beginning of the liquid dietary supplement competition. First, for about 10 years, only one company was the product leader in the World with in the liquid dietary supplement industry. Today there are more than 50 competitors with more coming out of the wood work every year. The market is saturated and organizations must find their competitive edge.
At first, the subject organization did not listen much to its customers. It pretty much pushed its products without market and consumer studies. Because so many other similar competing products in the liquid dietary supplement industry are on the worldwide market, the subject organization can no longer dictate the product. It is now asking its customers of what they would like.
The battle between the competitive organizations has begun. The competitors are checking each other out and legal and regulatory affairs experts are trying to find matters of incompliance, one against the other. This information is then passed on to diverse local authorities. As a result, the subject organization was charged several times with illegal importation or the sale of illegally imported product.
6.6. Examples of variables on the axis of the Environment multiplied by time, in the subject organization…
The environmental variables are affected by the elements of time as well. Environmental variables are causes by the people who work in the organization and the climate created through politics. The environment is also affected by external impacts onto the various employees, the managers, product development and sustainability. As internal policies, politics, and communication clash and conflict with the external ones, the environment internally in which the employees work in affects the productivity of the organizational processes.
6.6.1. Cultural background change through employee/stakeholder change (new employees or lay-offs)
Employees were changing departments because they were either promoted or departments’ focuses were rearranged, or layoffs took place. Every time new employees started working on the project, new ideas and points of views emerged. It was not a bad thing to get fresh eyes look at the change project. To the contrary, it aided in the improvement of the marketing material effectiveness.
Ongoing revisions were however counter productive because rather than going forward with the completion of the projects, these new views led to print material revisions. And revisions cut into the timeline of the project completion deadlines. This required multiple revisions of the print materials and careful modifications of each print run in respect to quantity. Limited or smaller print quantities made some print projects too costly. As a consequence affected markets did not receive adequate print materials to support their marketing efforts.
6.6.2. Intelligence gain or loss through departmental changes and employee hiring or lay-offs
Just like above, similar changes in the intelligence gain or loss area took place as did with the cultural background changes due to employee hiring and lay-offs and department responsibility changes. Intelligence changed with the diversity of people hired due to prior knowledge they brought to the project team.
Some stakeholders had different educational academic achievements than others. And everyone showed some kind of a sign of a different upbringing. The biggest effect of these cultural differences was the communication methods. Some stakeholders just knew how to better or more efficient communicate one with another while others struggled with it.
Not only actual knowledge or intelligence brought to the table was the cause of variability of the project change but also how they changed or impacted the communication method. Usually the more intelligence on the subject matter the stakeholders brought to the table of discussion the more changes of marketing materials were made. And intelligence based, or prior-knowledge based changes were not just a matter of the marketing material but also a matter of stakeholder personalities, affected by their own intelligence contribution.
It appeared the more someone had to bring to the table the more challenges of communication and getting various areas to agree on one project conclusion. It resulted in timeline delays and in friction between people. At the project manager’s own discretion, projects had to be moved forward in order to get the work done. When stakeholders felt their intelligence was not a factor included in the change project decisions, resistance to the progress of the project was made, even to the extent of attempts to sabotage the project with the help of higher management influence.
And layoffs from a team of stakeholders, or the switching around of responsibilities and new stakeholders coming to the meetings became more a point of frustration than a positive surprise. The new ones did not know where previous discussions were left of and those stakeholders hat were still on the team were worn out trying to get the project moved forward and finished. And of course, the new stakeholders would quickly pick up on it that their refreshing spirit and new point of views were rather unwelcome.
6.6.3. Language barriers between stakeholders
Language barriers are any barriers that arose due to lack of communication and information dissemination of viable stakeholder and project information. Language barriers between stakeholders were due to departmental boundaries, job boundaries, and conflict between departments. Language barriers also occurred because of stakeholders’ country of origin diversities, actually speaking different native languages, educational differences, communication skill backgrounds, time differences from one office location to the other, and operational processes and communication methods such as having to rely on the internet or email correspondence.
Education differences in stakeholders, one being for instance highly educated in his/her own field of information technology while another one was highly educated and experienced in local market sales presentations. Both stakeholders understood the changes from their view that had to be made to the marketing materials and how it would affect their work involvement. But as differences of opinions and different views arose of what and how literature or support materials had to be changed and modified, it became more challenging to get these two parties agree one with the other.
6.6.4 Market to headquarter time differences
The local market to headquarter time differences required some flexibility in working hours on both ends. When a market was for instance ahead by 8 hours over the headquarters, the project manager had to be in the office earlier in the morning to accommodate the working hours of the local market positioned stakeholders. When working with multiple regions affected by the same marketing material changes that had to be coordinated and one market was 8 hours ahead and the other market was 14 hours ahead, phone calls became increasingly challenges.
During the project duration, the project manager had found that emails had to be used more frequently to communicate proposed changes to the materials by one stakeholder. Sometimes it was not uncommon of having to wait several days before local market stakeholders were able to respond to approve change requests.
When contra-changes were proposed back and forth from one market stakeholder over the headquarters and then again by other stakeholders located all over in the world, project completion became increasingly challenging. It was found much more effective to complete a change project when stakeholders could sit around a table and get all changes to the materials worked out right then. But because the market locations, various stakeholders that needed to be included in the material changes, it was virtually impossible to have onsite meetings with all together at the same time.
Communicating with electronic mail was of course a positive way to bridge the time differences. One could work on the changes and edits of a marketing literature and then respond back with approvals. The challenges were however interpretations and clarifications between HQ and the local market stakeholders. And on top of it was also the matter of the missing facial expressions or tone of voice. When the project manager needed to rely on email correspondence misunderstandings often led to conflicts between stakeholders and project manager. And every body wanted to be accommodated in his/her own time regardless of time difference while every market demanded to have equal treatment and the same marketing support materials that other markets had.