From sayings to clichés

Clichés. Old worn out clichés. We’ve all heard it before, we’ve heard it repeatedly and even before the sentence is completed we finish it for the one speaking it.

Here are some of the examples:

1. “No man is an …… island.”

2. “An ounce of prevention is better than a pound of……. cure.”

3. “Health is….. wealth…..”

4. “Better late than….. never.”

5. “Birds of the same feather……. flock together.”

I’m sure you’re getting the point. Now in many business seminars this is one cliché I keep hearing all the time.

“The only permanent thing in this world is….CHANGE!”

I’ve had participants complain that the speaker… (that’s me…) mouths clichés left and right. And I will admit it but here is the key.

The reason why sayings become clichés is because they are often true.

Cliché’s won’t go away. Same thing with change. (Now that’s an original line if you want one….)

The first rule of business is the same as the first rule of life: Adapt or die.

The greatest cause of death among established companies is their inability to adapt to changing circumstances.

The Sony Walkman did not change to digital and allowed the Ipod to take over their throne. Traditional ice cream stores and restaurants did not change to fast food format and only the early adapters are reaping the rewards today.

But do you know that change is a huge leadership challenge.

There are two glaring examples we can see: General Electric’s corporate portfolio changes every time. Today when you talk GE you are not merely talking about refrigerators. You are talking about a wide range of high value products and services that cover practically every major industry. PepsiCo, which began life selling just colas, gets the majority of its sales and earnings today from its non-cola divisions. Here is the key: An organization that embraces change and executes it efficiently can evolve and thrive.

But change is a leadership challenge.

So many things happen inside the organization but the public does not see it.

Famous author Jim Collins says it right in his book “Good to Great.” Collins says:

“Picture an egg. Day after day, it sits there. No one pays attention to it. No one notices it. Certainly no one takes a picture of it or puts it on the cover of a celebrity-focused business magazine. Then one day, the shell cracks and out jumps a chicken. “All of a sudden, the major magazines and newspapers jump on the story: `Stunning Turnaround at Egg!’ and `The Chick Who Led the Breakthrough at Egg!’ From the outside, the story always reads like an overnight sensation as if the egg had suddenly and radically altered itself into a chicken. 

“It’s a silly analogy-but then our conventional way of looking at change is no less silly. Everyone looks for the `miracle moment’ when `change happens: But ask the good to-great executives when change happened. They cannot pinpoint a single key event that exemplified their successful transition.”

I have been invited to speak on change.

Perhaps my corporate clients see me transitioning from a “Garments Manufacturing and Retail person to corporate training, writing, broadcasting figure and this is why they invite me to talk about change and innovation. But this is what I tell my participants all the time: “People will not change unless they are given new information which leads to new ideas and when executed correctly and stubbornly would produce new results.”

Now here is the big surprise. Execution alone will not hack it. John P Kotter, former professor of Harvard Business School, and author of the book: “Leading Change” says:

“How do you get people to change? The central issue is never strategy, structure, culture or systems. All those elements, and others, are important. But the core of the matter is always about changing the behavior of people, and behavior changes happen... mostly by speaking to people’s feelings:’

So here’s my question. You are a leader and you want to effect change in your organization. Are you speaking to your people’s feelings? Are you giving them new information that would lead to new ideas that would produce new results?

It’s easy to say: “Change is necessary” but the leader is humbled with the understanding that change entails a lot of personal heartfelt investment behind the effort. Connect with your people and always remember that change is a leadership challenge. It takes great leadership skills to cause change to happen.

(Take a tour of my new web site: franciskong.com and send me your feedback. You can also listen to my radio program “Business Matters” aired 8 a.m. and 6:30 p.m. daily over 98.7 dzFE-FM ‘The Master’s Touch’, the classical music station.)