Change Calibration – Understanding Your End Users

Whether you are a change leader, accidental or other, you’ll want some help to understand and explain the challenge that lies before you. If you are an intentional change leader, you will likely possess some of these data points. If you are an accidental change leader, you volunteered or were volunteered; this will hopefully help calibrate your Executives.

The Law of Diffusion

Simon Sinek often references The Law of diffusion in his “Start with Why” talks. The Law of diffusion addresses the people and their willingness to adopt new technologies. As you can see – most people will wait for the latest technology to take hold in one form or another. The Innovators can be considered your first wave to truly embrace technology. Think about the image of people camping out to get the very first iPhone release. But, on the other side are your Laggards. Laggards are exactly how they sound – these are your Luddites who still rock that flip phone.

The Gartner Hype Cycle

The Gartner Hype Cycle takes a technology perspective and maps the view of new technology over time. First, it introduces the technology and its increased expectations, followed by a dip into a new reality in the “Trough of Disillusionment” and then slowly climbing up into the “Plateau of Productivity.”

If you were to map them together, you might see something like the image below. The idea is a bit troublesome for me as it implies a fixed end to adopting technologies. Both people and process are in constant motion up and down (or left or right of) each of the curves.

The Kubler-Ross Change Curve

The Kubler-Ross Change Curve maps employee engagement over time when faced with Change. This could be considered another visual representation of the emotional underpinnings involved in the Law of Diffusion. The stages in the Kubler-Ross Change Curve are modeled off of the five stages of grief.

To summarize, creating Change is hard. In addition to the actual Change (process, people, or technology) that you are introducing, there are many layers to consider. When I first took on my first significant change project, I had no idea how resistant people would be to accepting the Change. I just assumed that my friends and colleagues would take the Change (even embrace it) – I was wrong. I hope the above gives you some data to show how arduous the journey is for some people and how hard it may be for you as a change leader.

The Marketoonist Perspective

References and Resources

For more on the Ross Kubler Change Curve – go here.

Executive Summary

• Change Leaders have a difficult job – but knowing your End User’s journey (and their resistance to change) is one way to understand why it’s so difficult and what to do about it.
• Understanding the Law of Diffusion and the Kubler-Ross Change Curve can help leaders navigate the process.
• The Law of Diffusion explains people’s willingness to adopt new technologies, from innovators to laggards.
• The Gartner Hype Cycle maps the journey of new technology, from high expectations to the “Trough of Disillusionment” and eventual productivity.
• Combining the Law of Diffusion and the Gartner Hype Cycle shows that people and processes are in constant motion.
• The Kubler-Ross Change Curve demonstrates employees’ emotional stages when faced with change, similar to the stages of grief.

Originally Posted December 26, 2018