Need to Adopt a Bottom Up Change Strategy

Towards the end of last year, the Kenyan State was enmeshed in many depressing scandals ranging from widespread corruption, sleaze, land grabbing to massive cheating in national examinations. That means consistent supply of scarcity mentality oriented citizens is ensured. Should this not be source of great worry for this country?
We need to learn from the great early Egyptian Civilization amongst others. When they could not withstand continued moral decadence, they ended up collapsing. As a country, we must avoid heading the same direction, through implementing urgent measures of reversing these negative trends.
Particularly, there is need to harness conducive environment of doing business, for all the stakeholders to reap maximum benefits. Notably, the small and medium enterprise sector is more susceptible and would easily succumb to unfavorable operational climate. We can only hope and pray that the envisaged approach will focus towards eliminating not only the existing challenges, but also the culture that facilitates occurrence of the same.
Nonetheless, it’s easy to realize that a top down approach of eliminating the challenges could be short lived. After the press loses the momentum of reporting on the challenges, we are likely to return to business as usual. Nevertheless, there is hope if readers and the various authorities can embrace an idea that involves thinking outside the box.
Sometimes in the year 2007, we were engaged for a specific mission by an industrial area based manufacturing company. They needed development of a training solution that could transform the behavior and practices of the organization’s shop floor staff. The management could no longer tolerate their attitudes towards not only work, but also the employer’s stake. There were numerous malpractices that variously impacted negatively to the organization’s well being.
Some of the employees had served for 30 years plus, yet the company still needed them, despite the shortcomings. Seemingly, dismissing them all at once would have meant closing the production department. It is in this regard therefore that we were tasked with developing and delivering a customized transformation solution for the company.
Achieving the objectives meant re-branding the thought process of the employees. Did they understand the company’s purpose? How did their personalized interests fit within the bigger picture? These and many other questions guided the transformation process, which ended up becoming a great success.
We knew that because we were paid within a week after the training, instead of the earlier indicated 30 days. Why should we have withheld your dues, after such commendable efforts? The general manager wondered.
Secondly, we received a great feedback letter, which confirmed that the client’s objectives had been met beyond their expectations.
Soon thereafter, we conceptualized a fully fledged bottom up organizational transformation process, which included two more levels. On one hand is that for the middle level staff, while the other is meant for the senior management. The organizational memories of as far back as 2008 are still fresh for those who have now and then experienced the transformation solution (now dubbed as Inside out organizational re-branding strategy). We excitingly continue serving the needs of these clients, even up-to this day.
The lessons learnt from this transformation solution indicate that when problems are sorted out from a bottom up approach, the likelihood of positive change and therefore their elimination becomes enhanced. The good news is that the same lessons can be cascaded to not only universities, but also secondary schools through empowerment with the requisite life skills.
To demonstrate this, we have continually been engaged to deliver career choice and talent alignment strategies in various forums. A recent case involved a national school, whose 270 (two hundred and seventy) form two girl students experienced career choice and alignment guidance. After the empowerment session, the girls were eager to select the optional subjects amongst mandatory requirement of 8, from the total of 11.
Many questions were meanwhile raised, but one of them stood out. “Now that we are properly empowered with career alignment at this early stage, how shall we deal with our parents, some of whom had already decided which careers we will pursue after school? The girl wondered aloud.
This question rekindled memories of June 2013, when a similar one was raised, after delivering a presentation to graduating 4th year students of one private university. They were undertaking a course titled Total Quality Management (TQM), and needed advice on how the theoretical lessons applied to the practice.
During the talk, it emerged that some of the then students were deeply entrenched in careers that had been chosen for them by their parents, which now required some re-alignment. All the university students needed to do was to engage their parents and enlighten them appropriately, in line with the lessons learnt.
The case of the form 2 girls is however delicate, as it’s unlikely that they can be allowed to advise their parents. Nevertheless, they were advised to introduce their parents to this column as well as the author’s other writings, for them to be appropriately empowered. This is so because we are now in the highly competitive 21st Century, whose dynamics are totally different from those of the 20th Century.
Imperatively, we can’t any more face the 21st Century, while largely endowed with or glued to the 20th Century mentalities. That is naturally the genesis of the elaborate negativity experienced in the society. Luckily, the same could now be corrected through a bottom up empowerment strategy, which must essentially involve the school system.
Most importantly, we need to align talent at the early stages in life, if we expect to reap the full potential from our paper loving human capital. That will help them to naturally develop the capacity to attract deserving rewards, thus escaping the inclination towards the now highly prevalent negativity.
Meanwhile, the class teachers of the 270 form two girls have already organized an empowerment session of the entire teaching fraternity, in their national school. This will most likely help everybody in the school to be reasoning from the same perspective, as from 2016 onwards.

Meanwhile,

• At what stage of the performance cycle is your business organization operating?
• If you wanted to holistically and strategically transform the fortunes of your organization, where would you start?
• Did you ever know that we can help your organization to completely transform direction for the better in only 2 – 3 days?
• Did you also know that we extend PERSONALIZED and MONEY BACK GUARANTEES on the respective solutions?
• How about starting with a non committal, one on one discussion on how the transformation can be achieved?

We are only a phone call or email away

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