Not All Change Is Progress: How Great Leaders Know the Difference

New isn’t always better. In fact, some organizations are not failing because they refuse to change; they are failing because they are changing too much too quickly. When people experience change frequently, they stop seeing it as productive and start seeing it as confusing, distracting, and exhausting. Today on The Champion Forum Podcast, we are talking about what happens when change goes too far. You’ll learn how to identify the difference between change and progress and the three questions that you should consider before implementing a new product or process.

A few months ago, I had an amazing opportunity to work with an exceptional executive team.  They brought me in to help them lead some change initiatives. During our discovery call, they said their people always resist change and that they needed help with several new change initiatives. I quickly learned that the issue wasn't that people resisted change.  Frankly, it was because the people were experiencing change fatigue.  The leadership team was saying things like, “If you aren’t changing, you are dying,” “Change is good!” and “We need to reinvent ourselves.” All of these phrases are valuable, but they can also lead to creating change just for the sake of it.

New is not always better, and not everything old is broken.

Take Cracker Barrel, for example. Cracker Barrel’s attempt to modernize its legacy brand, including redesigning its longtime logo, sparked major backlash and was ultimately reversed. With CEO Julie Masino stepping down and David Deno taking over, the bigger story isn’t about the logo itself, but the leadership lessons that come with changing a brand people feel deeply connected to.

Great leaders know the difference between what needs to change and what needs to be protected. One of the easiest things for a leader to do is to walk into an organization and start changing things. Sometimes we do it because we genuinely believe the organization needs to evolve. Sometimes we want people to know that we’re working hard and staying relevant. But leadership is not measured by how much you change; it is measured by whether the changes you make actually make things better.

Not all change is progress. Cracker Barrel had to ask itself, how do we modernize the business without removing the very things that made people love the business? As a leader, you need to ask yourself how you move forward and solve dysfunction without losing tradition and stability.

Q: Have you ever made change just because you felt like it would increase momentum? What change did you make? How did people respond? Was it effective? Why or why not?

3. Questions to Determine If Change is Beneficial

1. What Problem Are We Actually Solving?

This question because it forces us to move away from preference and toward purpose. For example, let's imagine you're leading a sales organization. You walk in and immediately decide: "We're changing the sales process." The first question is this: Why? Being outdated alone is not a reason to change. You have to identify what is broken. Otherwise, you will not be able to identify what your solution fixed.

Before you change something, be able to finish this sentence: "We are making this change because..."

2. What Are People Emotionally Attached To?

Here's where leadership gets more complicated. People don't experience organizations purely through logic. They’re emotional, their identity is attached to their work, and they may be nostalgic about the company or product. Leaders must understand that something with little emotional value to you may have enormous emotional value to someone else. Don't automatically assume those things are irrelevant because they don't appear on a spreadsheet. Culture isn't always measurable, but that doesn't mean it isn't valuable.

So before making a major change, ask: What does this represent to the people affected by it?

3. Can We Modernize Without Losing Our Identity?

Sometimes leaders believe they're facing a choice to keep everything the same or change everything. Those aren't your only options. You can modernize while protecting what matters. In fact, I think that's one of the great challenges of leadership. Preserve the core, but improve the experience. Your job is to figure out what the core is and protect it. The changes you make should always support what matters most to you.

The New Leader Tax

Whenever you step into a leadership role, you're tempted to prove your value quickly. You want results. You want everyone to see why you were chosen. And because of that, new leaders can become addicted to change. Sometimes the most intelligent thing a new leader can do during the first few months is not change anything. First, identify what is working, what is broken, and which parts of the culture people believe are worth protecting.

Q: Describe how you felt when you first became a leader. What prompted you to make your first change? How did you know it was the right choice? What, if anything, would you do differently when taking over a new team in the future?

Application Activity:

Evaluate the last three changes you made in your team or organization. Answer these three questions about each change:

1. What problem did I want to solve? Make sure that your answer is specific and measurable.

2. What might people have valued about the old way that I didn’t understand?

3. How did you create change without losing the core of the organization?

How did you do? If you feel any of your recent changes failed to produce the desired result, ask yourself why. Seek feedback from your team. Find out if anyone is experiencing change fatigue. And finally, look for ways to tie your change back to what matters most.