6 Rs of Behavioral Change

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Business Transformation initiatives are typically undertaken to solve a pressing issue, bring about improved performance, or to serve customers better.  A critical element of the success of such initiatives entails transforming the existing behaviors of the employees across the organization.  However, this isn’t a straightforward task.

Attitudes and practices get reinforced in people by following established routines day in and day out.  Such practices become a part of an Organizational Culture over time.  Ingrained organizational behaviors and practices aren’t considered burdening until the organization’s performance starts declining considerably over time.  That’s when the leaders start thinking about changing these beliefs and habitual actions.

Psychology and Neuroscience can help enterprises change the deeply embedded attitudes and practices of people and replace those with new beliefs and practices.  Leading organizations are using psychology and brain research to induce successful change.  Specifically, they focus on the right priorities to enable Organizational and Behavioral Change and take the following 6 steps—or 6 Rs of Behavioral Change:

1. Recognize
2. Relabel
3. Reflect
4. Refocus
5. Respond
6. Revalue

Let’s dive deeper into the first 3 steps critical to render behavioral change.

Step 1 – Recognize

The first step involves the leadership reflecting on the behaviors that are required to be transformed.  Leaders are responsible for articulating the future vision of an organization, prioritizing and implementing initiatives to achieve the vision, and take measures to tackle disruption caused by technology and rivals.  Self-Reflection on undesired behaviors by role models (including senior leaders) is essential to make other people ponder over their behaviors.

Leadership behaviors inform the workforce about the Transformation required, assist in championing the agenda, and make these behaviors resonate across the board.  Individuals, in turn, should contemplate on the alignment of their behaviors with their personal / organizational goals, think of new improved ways of doing things, and dump convenient yet unproductive behaviors.

Step 2 – Relabel

The 2^nd step of the 6 Rs to Organizational Change necessitates categorizing and naming the flawed or unfit behaviors.  Neuroscience research has revealed that by naming behaviors and understanding that thoughts are merely ideas, persons with Obsessive Compulsive Disorder can disregard useless thoughts and behaviors that trigger them to wash their hands again and again.

Relabeling thoughts allows individuals to stop reflecting on useless thoughts.  Likewise, in an organizational setting leadership needs to evaluate which shared thoughts don’t work well, categorize them, and communicate the reasons for their unsuitability across the organization.

Step 3 – Reflect

In this step, senior management replaces outdated beliefs and behaviors and outlines the vision or desired objectives and behaviors.  The outlined desired objectives and behaviors need to be explicit, translated into daily actions, and attractive to the people.  This may warrant training of people to reflect on the desired expectations and behaviors collectively.  Effective communication of benefits of altered objectives and behaviors assists in subsiding the unrest associated with change in people and relaxing their mind and thoughts.  This must include informing people that uncertainties are part of business and that they should keep their focus on organizational values and what matters most during change.  Reflection creates a sense of ownership among employees that is otherwise difficult to be achieved by any cascaded top-to-bottom directives.

Interested in learning more about the other steps or Rs critical to engender Change ?  You can download an editable PowerPoint on 6 Rs to Behavioral Change here on the Flevy documents marketplace.

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Organizational Design (AKA Organizational Re-design) involves the creation of roles, processes, and structures to ensure that the organization's goals can be realized. Organizational Design span across various levels of the organization. It includes:

1. The overall organizational "architecture" (e.g. decentralized vs. centralized model).

2. The design of business areas and business units within a larger organization.

3. The design of departments and other sub-units within a business unit.

4. The design of individual roles.

In the current Digital Age, there is an accelerating pace of strategic change driven by the disruption of industries. As a result, to remain competitive, Organizational Design efforts are becoming more frequent and pervasive—with the majority of organizations having experienced redesign within the past 3 years. This has only been exacerbated by COVID-19.

Frustratingly, only less than a quarter of these Organizational Design efforts are successful. Most organizations lack the best practice know-how to guide them through these Transformations effectively.

Learn about our Organizational Design (OD) Best Practice Frameworks here.