How I Led Organizational Change With the 30:30:30 Formula (And You Can Too!)

In my experience as a business coach spanning two decades, I have observed that most professionals are enthusiastic about organizational change as long as they only need to talk about it in theory. The prospect of actual change can be daunting and uncomfortable, but it is most definitely the only constant and, hence, necessary. Any organizational change is a shared procedure, which means people in different roles with the relevant power, competence, and designation need to come together and construct change.

What is Organizational Change?

In the business coaching context, an organizational change does not mean making a particular change; here, the focus is to construct learning possibilities between leaders and teams to develop flexibility and capacity to embrace vulnerability while encountering unknown and nonsuitability of pre-defined solutions. Openness in the team and teams to embrace unknown problems and unpredictability of the market activates the potential to innovate approaches to gain market share.  An organizational change would also mean responding to a variety of customer needs, keeping up with competition in the market, and the new norm post-COVID-19, where the employees also demand flexibility from organizations to adapt to working from home, flexible working hours as well and to work onsite.  Overall, an organizational change would mean encountering new demands, embracing diverse views in teams, and evolving as a resilient organization. 

Why is Organizational Change Important?

Companies, like people, have personalities. And just like people, some companies welcome change while others resist it. However, if we have learned something from history, it is this: adapt or die is a universal truth we can always rely on.  Learning about success and failure while constructing change in organizations for the past 20 years, I found where the leaders in relevant roles took a shared responsibility along with the business coach to construct change, the transformation is smoother and more successful. When there is resistance and power struggle among the leaders within the organization, failure is imminent. 

Hence, the first step in business coaching is to assess whether there is a willingness to take shared responsibility amongthe leaders along with the business coach. 

The 30:30:30 Formula for Organization Change

Many colleagues and associates have asked me if there is a secret sauce to achieving organizational change smoothly. And I always pitch the 30:30:30 formula in such scenarios. The 30:30:30 formula can be a guiding frame for any business coach to develop co-constructing procedures within an organization leading to change.

30:30:30 formula dictates that 30% of energy to construct change needs to be invested by the leadership of the organization, 30% of energy needs to be invested by the middle management and executives, and 30% of energy is invested by the consultant/coach. The last 10% is the allowance for forces that may support or hinder the development of team spirit among employees to construct change. This 30:30:30 also connects the top, middle, and bottom layers of an organization.

Now, let me illustrate the success of the 30:30:30 formula for organizational change using two examples. First, a case study of an organization that did not follow this rule and then one that did. 

Case Study 1: 20:10:60

Initially, the executive director wanted a trial of the work I was offering to solve some of the prolonged issues limiting the organizational growth of this software company. I requested his leadership team to come together for this. A team of six key people who can influence change in the organization assembled. When I met the team, I briefed them on the purpose of the meeting and asked them to identify and describe areas where they would like to implement change again and again. 

Around ten key points that were draining the organization’s money and resources were identified by the team. When the discussion progressed to resolve these key issues, I suggested how employees could be brought together and how this change could be facilitated. The learning design I proposed led to too many questions, and I got trapped because of my own ideas in solving their problem. This is because I, as a coach took more than 30% responsibility to show changes.

Learnings From Case Study 1

Looking back, I realized that I did not facilitate the session in a way that allowed the leadership to take responsibility for change. I missed a chance to impact the change in the organization. The trial failed, and I lost the contract.

If I had a chance to do it again, I would ask the leadership team to dialogue in front of me on how they could approach this situation, what worked in the past and what did not, and what they would like to do differently now.

Case Study 2: 30:30:30

A General Manager who was handling three factories asked me to develop team spirit in one of his factories. I contracted that a triad of initiatives amongst the leaders, the middle managers, and the coach would be needed for the project to work. 

I started my coaching work with the leadership team, and along with the leadership, I started identifying the right people who needed to be involved in the change initiative. The team that could construct change was the VP of Operations, GM Operations, the Plant Manager, and some floor Supervisors.  I asked them to share examples of where they see teamwork and where they see a lack of teamwork. As they were sharing examples, I could objectively see many areas where the leaders could have taken steps to ensure teamwork.

I did not confront or question them on the examples. As a coach, I empathized with the leaders. In the process of listening and empathizing, I set up a learning context through which the team members can learn through their own patterns of action.

This helps to develop self-awareness and shared reflective competence within the team, which will support them in sensing gaps and possibilities for teamwork. This kind of learning method can be seeded and sustained in the organizations. 

Learning From Case Study 2

If I had led with my recommendations in the beginning, I would have lost the momentum that needs to be developed among leaders to construct change.

As a business coach, I keep checking situations where I exceed my 30% share in leading the change. If I notice I am overdoing it, it becomes an opportunity for diagnosis of where the responsibility is evaded within the organization.

From then on, the 30:30:30 formula has been my mantra in guiding organizational change. And now, it can be yours too!

NOTE: The views expressed in this article are those of the author and not of Emeritus.