in the Oxford Dictionary it says the following:
noun
1. a marked change in form , nature, or appearance:
British society underwent a radical transformation
(also transformation scene) sudden dramatic change of scenery on stage
a metamorphosis during the life cycle of an animal
Physics: the induced or spontaneous change of one element into another by a nuclear process
2. Mathematics & amp; Logica process by which one figure , expression, or function is converted into another one of similar value
3. Linguistics: a process by which an element in the underlying logical deep structure of a sentence is converted to an element in the surface structure
4. [mass noun] Biology: the genetic alteration of a cell by introduction of extraneous DNA, especially by a plasmid
the heritable modification of a cell from its normal state to a malignant state
in change management
There seems to be agreement in change management that transformation is about significant change, maybe even massive change. It is very different to continuous improvement which is about making small incremental changes by improving aspects of the work in hand as ideas arise. Jim Collins likens continuous improvement to making many pushes on a huge flywheel, making it spin faster and faster and faster. There is a great deal of merit in this.
the sigmoid curve
In his book, the Empty Raincoat, Charles Handy talks about the sigmoid curve as the natural life cycle of an organisation (or indeed of any entity). As shown below, the entity has a natural growth to peak performance and then a decline to certain death. Handy proposes that change needs to happen at point A, before performance or growth peaks. Changes of this nature, which effectively mean reinventing the entity, I would suggest, are transformation.
curves within curves
My good friend and colleague, Martin Carver, always reminds me that there are "curves within curves". This is a vital point in change management. Think about it this way: an organisation may have many departments or divisions and each one will have its own life cycle. Departments come and go even though there is no re-invention of the organisation. The same can be said about any component of the organisation: systems, processes, teams, people, behaviours. Any significant change that fully redefines or re-invents any component can be thought of as "transformation" of the part. But it is not transformation of the organisation as a whole. These are important lessons.
back to energy
Now I said I'd get back to my thoughts on energy transformation. So here we go.
We can think of any part of an organisation as having energy. Think about it. Have you ever described a process, system, person, team, behaviour etc as "powerful"? Of course, we all have. And clearly power is about energy. In my piece on a time for transformation I spoke about the situation in apartheid and the "dark energy" associated with it. I spoke about how Mandela transformed the situation. Indeed he did. He took that dark energy and turned it into something wonderful. He used the vision of the rainbow nation as the catalyst for the transformation. In simple terms he saw a better future. There was clearly something powerful about apartheid - it was just a very dark or negative energy. Mandela was the transformer for that energy.
transforming systems and processes
When we describe systems and processes in energy terms we might say things like:
- there is a blockage or bottleneck
- the system is sluggish
- it is inefficient
- it is draining our energy
- it is doing my head in!
cultural transformation
I guess we're getting the hang of transformation by now and hopefully the "energy" slant is proving helpful. Corporate culture is an area where the energy slant is extremely useful. We all know of organisations or places where the culture is oppressive, negative, angry or stifling. I guess there will be lots of public service organisations facing cuts all over the world right now where some of these labels might apply. When resources are cut but the boss is shouting for standards to be maintained, who couldn't forgive people if they got a little angry in the workplace. In such situations, cultural transformation is absolutely necessary and possible.
a better cup of coffee
I heard a wonderful and simple story of transformation the other day where in the UK NHS, in one hospital a manager was having to do more with less and achieved this by improving the quality of the coffee for patients and staff. I know what you're thinking - and I was too! How could improving the coffee help in times of scarcity? That's just the point. In times of scarcity, we think cut, cut, cut. Here was someone who, in dialogue with a bright and commercially-minded supplier took a step back and got creative. They replaced the "ordinary" coffee with the posh sort you get from Starbucks and Cafe Nero, complete with choice of types, and the funny corrugated cardboard cup holders. They put the price up from £1 to £2.50 and guess what? The coffee sales in volume went up and the profits soared. As far as I know the NHS gained an income stream and the everyone won.
massage and yoga
Now maybe its already happening but the coffee story got me thinking. What else would the captive patients in hospitals like to buy? Maybe massage, yoga, books, who knows? If we got really creative maybe hospitals could be self-funding? No, I'm kidding. But what about the effect that caring suppliers might have on patients? Would they get better quicker? Would that save the NHS money?
stop people getting ill
I was told by my professor when I was studying reliability for my MSc that there was a very powerful formula that said simply anything you wisely invest up front will give a tenfold return down the pipeline. Now I was really sceptical about this at first but I have seen this to be so time and time again, in safety, maintenance, environmental protection and people development. In Primeast's talent liberation programmes, managers frequently take on board actions that deliver at least this level of return. So with the NHS, why not spend money on helping people to keep fit and stay well and reduce the burden on our hospitals.
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