Tap the Power of Emotion to drive corporate change

“The Heart of Change”
By John P. Kotter
Harvard Business School Press, 2002



The myth that denizens in the corporate world are rational – or cerebral -- has long been shattered. But, the way our corporate leaders manage organizations and people betray their hard-to-break habit of going into long-winded analysis, dishing out cold facts and colder figures.

Thus, they succeed more in boring their peers and subordinates rather than in igniting their enthusiasm for goals to be achieved or, at the very least, for the job at hand.

But times have changed – or have they? Has the bastion of cerebral managers been demolished by the decisive march of “resonant” leaders. A landmark book titled “Primal Leadership” by Daniel Goleman (who also authored an earlier work “Emotional Intelligence”) prompted renewed interest in the power of emotions to move and lead people.

And yet resonant leadership was – and is -- demonstrated by leaders in times past and present – from Moses to Mandela, from Martin Luther to Martin Luther King, from George Washington to Winston Churchill, from Simon Bolivar to Tony Blair, from CEOs Jack Welch to Bill Gates.

It is thus appropriately not a discovery, but a re-discovery, of a type of leadership that “connects” to the hearts of people. Someone said that a leader is allowed to fail in many things, but never must he fail to “inspire.”

The more recent beneficiary of this return to “resonant leadership” – one that inspires people (as opposed to “toxic leadership) – is the science of managing and effecting change in corporations. A book, titled “The Heart of Change,” addresses issues and narrates real-life stories about change campaigns that worked in large enterprises simply because they decided that “the heart of change is in the emotions.”

Kotter, the author, is categorical about the message of his latest book: “People change … because they are shown a truth that influences their feelings.” Kotter bats for shocking, or grabbing the attention of, people so that, first, they “sit up and listen,” and then are suitably empowered to embrace and initiate change.

This is an engaging and useful book, since it lives up to the promise of its sub-title which runs, “Real-Life Stories of How People Change Their Organizations.”

The narratives revolved on the Eight Steps for Successful Large-Scale Change. The steps are as follows: Increase Urgency, Build the Guiding Team, Get the Vision Right, Communicate for Buy-in, Empower Action, Create Short-Term Wins, Don’t Let Up, and Make Change Stick. Kotter calls these steps “a flow in a successful change effort.”

Every point made by the author on the Eight Steps was illustrated by a number of stories written by real people – some named, some not.

In the first step, “Increasing Urgency,” the book tells of a story titled “The Videotape of an Angry Customer.” It’s the story of a customer suitably frustrated by the seeming lack of listening skills of the front liners of a company. The narrator, presumably a top manager, decided to video tape the “angry customer.” He did not use the usual memo or speech extolling the virtues of customer relations, but showed the video tape to the firm’s managers and employees who got the complaint in the raw. Result: Most agree that they must do something about it.

Another success story, this time dealing with the refusal of people to change a work process, is about building an aircraft. A guy called Koz (author failed or decided not to give him a title) wanted to change the way an aircraft is assembled in many locations – resulting in ineffective quality control, delay in delivery of parts and high costs. In a management meeting, he announced: “We are not going to move an airplane until it is complete in its position… Until the plane is done and done right, no movement. Period.”

Kotter’s immediate commentary: “Everyone thought Koz was off his rocker.” But since Koz cannot be moved to abandon his decision, people followed his orders. As a result, quality has gone up and all aircraft have not only been on time, “they’ve been early.” Until today, says the book, the “story is still being told.”

Stories abound in this book. The tale of “Gloves in the Boardroom,” where 424 types of gloves were displayed at the large expensive table, delivered the urgent message to change a policy among division presidents of a conglomerate. There is story of a courageous CEO who refused to hang his portrait alongside portraits of former CEOs of a company since 1885. He did even more to shock the old timers: He removed the other portraits and, in their place, showed pictures of customers’ stores.

What the book is saying in stories and commentaries is that people respond to the need for change if they are confronted the truth – in a compelling or shocking way. That’s driving change through the gut.

And when you succeed in introducing change, improve processes dramatically, and evolve a completely new culture – how do you make sure the resulting changed culture stay as such. The book offers stories to illustrate the ever-present risk for people to revert to “good old tradition”. The tale, “The Boss Went to Switzerland,” is so familiar it could happen to a CEO who was successful in his role as “change leader,” only to come back after a three-year absence that the people went back – if I may say so – to worshipping the Baal of bureaucratic fat and smugness.