08 May CHANGE MANAGEMENT: STEPS TO SUCCESS
Shifting market needs and continuing technological innovation will bring more and constant changes to how media businesses must operate. To succeed, INNOVATION MEDIA believes that leaders in the news industry will need to improve their transformation skills, implementing a constant loop of change management best practices.
The media industry was one of the first to be hit by the digital revolution.
Media companies had to adapt and change fast in order to survive. The fact that the industry was hit first does not mean that the disruptive phase is over. Quite the contrary. The survival of your business will depend on your leadership’s ability to make both small adjustments and radical changes to your editorial, operational and commercial models, time and time again.
However, change remains one of the biggest leadership challenges faced by any organisation, with most failing to achieve the expected outcomes.
In 1996, Harvard’s John Kotter published Leading Change, now considered a landmark book in change management theory. In his research, Kotter found out that only around a third of all change programmes succeeded.
In 2008, a survey of executives from around the world by consultancy firm McKinsey reached the same conclusion: Businesses remain more likely to fail than to succeed with their change programmes.
Change at media organisations can be particularly challenging, often involving complex stakeholder relationships and very public adverse publicity. Local legislation restrictions, industrial relations issues and political pressure can add to the many hurdles that change leaders must overcome in order to ensure their success.
INNOVATION MEDIA has analysed successful (and unsuccessful) change programmes implemented by media organisations over the years. To succeed, these are the steps change-leaders must follow:
This article, along with many, many more is available in full, within the pages of our Innovation in News Media 2019-2020 World Report, available for purchase in print or digital edition.
