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Following 3 years of toying with the idea and after more than 20 years of using Microsoft Windows, I recently switched to a new Apple Mac with it’s unique operating system.  ”I am a Mac” now though I’m using the Mac version of Microsoft Office to aid my transition. This helps but it’s still very different to working in the Windows environment.

The new machine and software are really good but I know it will take months to acclimatise to the OSX way of thinking. Routine tasks are all taking slightly longer than before and I am feeling less productive all day, every day. I am conscious of my “discomfort” as I stumble over tasks and actions which have required little thought or hesitation for many years.

Much of my tacit knowledge has been rendered irrelevant and I am experiencing, first hand, the impact of change which so many team members feel when we implement new software. The worst thing is, having overcome my resistance to change (stalling for 3 years), I now have nobody but myself to blame!

Photo:Flying Fin, Flickr

In our personal lives, we tend to stick with tried and trusted solutions until we are personally convinced the grief involved in learning something new is worthwhile and the benefits we will gain justify all the effort we assume is required to make the switch.

It’s pretty common for people to overestimate the difficulty in switching and many service companies rely upon this reluctance to switch – retaining customers is always easier than winning new ones. This is why companies often prefer to grow their market-share through acquisition rather than organically.

People are right to consider changes carefully. It’s rare to make a switch that involves no “pain”.

Apprehension

Change can be uncomfortable and almost always requires significant effort to unlearn old routines and learn new ways of doing things. While on the “learning curve”, we slip back to being “consciously incompetent” – things are unfamiliar.  We recognise how much there is to learn in the new environment and can become concerned when proficiency seems so far out of reach.

These concerns are magnified when we consider new-fangled practices might be dangerous or risky – just watch anyone learning to swim or ride a bike to observe behaviour that seeks to avoid or delay being asked to leave safe ground.

Given the inertia most people show in their personal lives, why do people expect us to feel differently when our organisations are changing the way we work? After all, we aren’t even the ones choosing to enter into the unknown, “they” are doing this to us and we have no control over what is happening!

In that context, why is it individuals’ reticence or concerns are sometimes treated like difficult behaviour? Instead of “managing resistance”, change projects would benefit from encouraging people to voice and share their worries and concerns, listening carefully to the issues raised and supporting people through their individual learning journeys, tackling area of anxiety and helping them to re-establish their “conscious competence”as quickly as possible. Read the rest of this entry →

Photo : DeclanTM, Flickr

In 2010, Attractor identified some challenges for the future of the NHS Electronic Staff Record (ESR), in particular suggesting the changing strategic picture in the NHS would have a big impact on deployment and implementation of additional features. While the “new look” NHS seems very slow to materialise, a world of increasing decentralisation and delegated authority must call into question the suitability of a national IT solution.

In a sign that Attractor wasn’t alone in identifying this question, the Department of Health wrote to NHS organisations recently, stating a late 2010 review had supported the concept of retaining and expanding the ESR solution from 2014 onwards.

While this strategy will undoubtedly require an appropriate  competitive process at the end of the existing contract, but it seems clear those actively managing the system and the contractual relationship with McKesson consider ESR has a long-term future.

From January through to June 2011, most NHS users of the ESR system will have experienced a major overhaul in the way the system looks and feels as well as significant enhancements in the solution’s functionality and “reach”.

As well as introducing a whole new look for core application users – which has generally been received positively – there are important additional features being introduced for learning management and administration, solutions to many user-identified problems and a move to switch all NHS organisations over to use of smartcards for controlling access to staff records.

These features and the parallel development of the National Learning Management Solution (NLMS) demonstrate the clear view of some who retain the vision that a national IT solution can be an important strategic enabler for the NHS. Unfortunately for many NHS teams, these new challenges have had to be managed at a time when available resources from the Department of Health and locally have been under increasing pressure and some have found it very difficult to make progress with some of the expanded functionality.

Read the rest of this entry →

In the current climate, perhaps it is unsurprising NHS organisations are looking for clear financial justifications for making any investments in projects which will take some time to complete and deliver benefits. When resources are tight and a number of core corporate functions are being subject to scrutiny and pressure, people are not sure there is a financial justification for starting any new work.

Having had the Electronic Staff Record (ESR) in place since 2008 (at the latest), many NHS organisations have deployed self service tools in some shape though few appear to be making full use of all it’s key features.

Too many NHS Trusts have been “piloting” ESR Self Service for a long time, with only a small number of people across the organisation using some of the tools available. This pattern suggests NHS organisations have commenced deployment without a clear strategy or vision about how they want to change the way they work.

Like many large projects, it can be all too easy to fall into the trap of focusing on the technology rather than the desired business change.

Undoubtedly, self service tools face special barriers in a healthcare environment. Not everyone has routine access to a computer and the NHS workforce has been relatively late in adapting to new computing technologies generally. With effective planning however, these challenges can be appropriately addressed and overcome.

In part though, the lack of progress on ESR Self Service reflects an innately conservative approach of corporate teams to the introduction of new technology – possibly not an issue special to the NHS. To the extent that self service encourages devolution of control and decision-making away from corporate centres, it is quite natural for those teams to express concern about risks and potential loss of control.

The combination of hesitant corporate teams, competing priorities, financial pressures and institutional constraints has the potential to make many NHS organisations seem increasingly archaic to “modern” managers from forward-looking healthcare and private industry and a new generation of employees now joining clinical teams from universities – who are familiar with the features of modern self-service technologies including sites like Amazon, Lastminute.com, iTunes and Facebook.

Like many organisations then, the NHS has been relatively slow to implement self service tools in the workplace. It is all to common to hear the business benefits of ESR Self Service have yet to be fully understood or, more importantly, realised in practice. How can this be successfully approached? Read the rest of this entry →

At its conference in June 2010, the NHS Confederation published a report challenging the wisdom of constant NHS reorganisations. In “The Triumph of Hope Over Experience”, the Confederation examines a history of rapid and turbulent creations, mergers and disestablishments over 20 years.

Presenting a very interesting analysis of structural change in the NHS, the Confederation’s stated aim was -

“to review the history of restructuring, what is known about its results and the reasons for the pattern of increasingly frequent organisational change to draw out some important lessons that are particularly salient at this time.”

In some respects the report’s messages are relevant to other areas of the public sector. Attractor would encourage leaders of QIPP, Total Place and Efficiency and Reform programmes to read the report as they set about tackling the current financial crisis.

The report suggests a tendency to enthusiastically advocate reorganisation as a solution to all problems, regardless of their nature. It indicates reorganisation can provide opportunities for politicians to demonstrate action, for managers to advance careers, remove “problem people” and take generous redundancies – none of which have anything to do with the “reason” for making change. But the forces supporting reorganisation seem stronger than those resisting.

The Confederation recommends far closer scrutiny for such proposals, better review of the results of organisational change and holding proponents to account for results. In conclusion the report recognises the need to embrace change but expresses strong doubts over the kind of top-down redesign that has been all too common.

“Organisational change is necessary to allow organisations to adapt to changes in the
environment. Experiment and evolution may be a more effective approach to this than
insufficiently intelligent design.”

The analysis and conclusions are clear and ring true. While changing the shape of an organisation can support other business change, simply “moving the chairs around”, redrawing boundaries or lines of accountability rarely addresses fundamental or underlying systemic problems with the way “real work” is organised, supported and delivered.

Weakness in resource allocation and deployment, business processes and systems, communication and information-flows, skills and competences are best addressed by action “close to the coalface” with the teams who are delivering services – not by fiddling with the tiers of management way over their heads. This might suggest programmes like “Total Place” – close to customers and service delivery – are more likely to succeed than other approaches. Read the rest of this entry →

Too many organisations respond to emerging challenges by re-organising departments, teams and jobs – hoping this will improve performance.

It can be hard to recognise when problems relate to deep systemic issues though easier to spot poor employee performance.

Changing structures seems, for some, an easier option than exploring and addressing business process change, which can be complex, or tackling known individual performance issues, which is often personally challenging. Read the rest of this entry →

Photo:Bitterjug, flickr

During 2008-09, NHS organisations deploying ESR (an ORACLE-based human resources and payroll solution) worked to address early challenges with initial deployment.

Most are now in the process of refining practice to gain benefits and many are at the early stages of planning to deploy self-service.

Organisations should not dismiss lightly the effort needed to address stakeholder concerns and revise business processes when implementing self service. Nor should the ongoing challenges of systems management, user administration and support be ignored.

It is possible, though, to address these challenges effectively and there are some large prizes availble for those who do so successfully. Read the rest of this entry →

When all the jigsaw pieces seem in place, still organisations often cannot deliver what is expected. Clearly, while people may be your most important asset, you know they are also the single most unpredictable element in the organization.

Photo:pwrgrl09bc, Flickr

Technical issues commonly, understandably perhaps, dominate project work and discussion. This can be very negative if it reduces the space and time required to effectively address change.

Change is the purpose of the vast majority projects!

Marrying PRINCE project management methodologies with whole systems thinking, Attractor can help you engage important stakeholders.

 Effective engagement can strengthen their participation and contribution, buildng support and identifying real challenges as you build solutions to tomorrow’s challenges.

Attractor has a track record of delivering new teams, improved working practices and modern IT systems for workforce management, human resources and payroll operations.

With extensive experience within the National Health Service, Attractor can help you navigate political challenges, clarify your priorities, identify opportunities to deliver improved business outcomes, higher levels of efficiency and reduced costs.

Attractor has particular expertise and experience with ESR (Electronic Staff Record), the ORACLE-based integrated HR and Payroll system used across the NHS and can support organisations that -

• are unsure how to use the system effectively in their business context,
• are keen to realise benefits but unclear where or how to start,
• want to progress to implement new functionality – usch as self service, OLM, or interfaces

Ensuring key business results and governance issues are address during the planning and deployment phase, Attractor will support you reviewing business processes, introducing new ways of working, managing the transition for teams and selecting appropriate performance measures and benchmarks.