Blog - Change Facilitation a New Practice?

Location: Blogs The Change Management Blog
Posted by: Holger Nauheimer	7/26/2007 8:02 AM
Some will say that change management or change facilitation that many of us will prefer to call it, is a relatively new practice. It is not. Jethro, a biblical figure lived some 3.500 years ago and has sometimes been called the first international management consultant. His experience of change facilitation that is recorded in the Bible book of Exodus chapter 18 is probably the one of the first written sources of change facilitation that we can find and to me it is challenging to see how we still are struggling with many of the same problems that they faced back then. The context For those of you who are not familiar with the story, let me give you a short summary. Jethro was living in Egypt and was father-in-law of Moses. Moses, the great liberator who was chosen by God to lead his people from the oppression under pharaoh and to take them to the “Promised land”. In the story we find Moses with his people somewhere in the Sinai desert but the whole expedition had stopped. In this situation Jethro moves to visit his son in-law and came “to Moses where he was camped in the wilderness, at the mount of God.” Moses did not only find himself in a physical wilderness, he was also in a management wilderness and due to the last, his mission had almost broken down. The text gives us the picture of an over centralised organisation that is brought to a standstill under its own burden. “And it came about the next day that Moses sat to judge the people, and the people stood about Moses from the morning until the evening. Now when Moses’ father–in-law saw all that he was doing for the people he said. What is this thing that you are doing for the people? Why do you alone sit as judge and all the people stand about you from morning until evening?” Analysis What was the problem in this situation? Lack of mission, vision, strategy or what? Moses had a clear mission, to move from the oppression in Egypt to the Promised land, but he and his people were brought to a standstill under the pressure of internal problems and the lack of a structure to solve those problems. “Because people come to me to inquire of God. When they have a dispute it comes to me, and I judge between a man and his neighbour and make known the statutes of God and His laws.” The consultant’s conclusion was quite clear, “The thing that you are doing is not good. You will surely wear out, both yourself and these people who are with your, for the task is too heavy for you, your cannot do it alone.” The first decentralised problem solving organisation? Then the consultants move on to describe a new organisational principle. If we analyse this carefully we find that there are at least three important principles. 1. Decentralisation Jethro outlines what looks like a traditional hierarchical organisation build on “leaders of thousands, of hundreds, of fifties and of tens”. Each minor question should be dealt with locally and only major issues should be allowed to move up the chain of command. In Norway we have a proverb that goes something like this “the person knows best where the shoe is hurting that has it on its foot”. The principle is the same that understanding of specific problems is best locally and should be taken care of locally. 2. Accountability A clear organisation facilitate accountability. “And let them judge the people at all time”. 3. Decision-making is different from vision and strategy In traditional centralised hierarchical structure one often finds that problems are passed up the chain of command expecting for solutions to come back. Jethro indicates something different. The overall level of responsibility of the leader is not decision-making but strategy and vision. In the words of Jethro it says: “then teach them the statutes and the law, and make known to them the way in which they are to walk”. Moses was called to lead his people from the oppression of Egypt and lead them to the Promised Land, in order to do that he had to let go of the daily control and decision-making and leave that to others so that he could concentrate on maintaining their strategic vision and values - to reach the promised land and to maintain the law of God. Decision-making had to be left to a structure of middle management empowered to find solutions to whatever daily problems might arise. Is Jethro still relevant? It is not only for the decentralised organisation that one could say that Jethro is still highly relevant. His principles of leadership have stood the test of 3.000 years and if taken into consideration would have solved many of the problems that we face today. Jethro outlines three fundamental leadership principles: Competence Identity Integrity In his own words it reads: “Furthermore you shall select out of all the people able men who fear God, men of truth, those who hate dishonest gain;”… Competence is specific according to the needs of each position. Identity has primarily to do with understanding the overall strategy of an organisation and the way business shall be carried out. Integrity and honesty should be a prerequisite for any leadership position but as we have continuously learn from management scandals even in the largest corporations it is obviously not so. Not long ago I discussed these leadership principles with one of my clients. The client a medium sized industrial European company with more than 2.000 employees. One challenge in the company is an old centralised structure with two many staff and management layers that among other issues is occupied with control. But if you have competent leaders who understand the strategy, have their identity and loyalty to the company and who also are honest, why then do you need all these control functions?

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