Apprehension is a common side effect of dealing with the prospect of change. Change is scary, no one questions it. But how you handle fear is a strong indicator of how you will handle change. Whether you’re a leader tasked with creating and implementing change or an employee who will feel the effects, doing something new, different, and out of the ordinary takes hard work, determination, and a little faith.

All too often, however, great leaders give in to this pressure. Managers move up the corporate ladder seeking more responsibility and, yes, more compensation, but have never really been trained or educated to navigate the challenges facing a manager or leader. Then all of a sudden smart, hard-working people are on the top rung and they’re like, “Now what?” His boss walks in and says, “We’re going to start doing things a little different around here and I want you to implement that.” Talk about instilling fear! So naturally there are mistakes that are made along the way. Your chances of allaying fear before it arises are dramatically increased if you become aware of these pitfalls before embarking on your new strategy or plan with your group.

Author and thinker extraordinaire John Kottler wrote a book called “Leading Change.” He points out that while we strive to focus on the positives and “what to do” tactics, it’s also important to look at potential mistakes that can occur. Kottler suggests that while there are many different types of missteps people can make, there are eight critical ones. If you could reduce the error rate early on, you could make the change process a little less painful, maybe even exhilarating.

Let’s take a look at those situations that Kottler believes are the biggest mistakes, and then think about how you can avoid making them.
1. Forgetting that change has to happen quickly. If you don’t light that fire in your employees or customers, they won’t be motivated to contribute and your efforts will fail. Be sure to create a sense of urgency for the need for change. Show what could happen if the change didn’t happen now so your team fully understands the consequences.
2. Not forming a team that guides the change. Creating change is hard work, but many companies assume otherwise. If you don’t have a guiding coalition that will institute the vision, you will fail. This team must believe in the vision and keep moving forward to create the necessary changes.
3. Lack of clear vision or foresight. How are you going to get people to buy in and believe in what is happening if you don’t have a clear vision of what is needed? And even worse, what if you have a fantastic vision but don’t communicate it? Your employees and customers don’t really know what’s going on. Without a clear vision, your tactics and strategies for change will become confused and your efforts will lack direction. Be clear about what you want to happen so that others understand it too.
4. Forgetting to communicate the vision. As eluded above, if you have a great vision but don’t communicate it to your team, your efforts will fall short. Unless you have everyone on board helping, even if it requires pinpointing short-term sacrifices for long-term gains, you’ll never create change; you will only create the fear of the unknown. People want leaders to guide them, and communication is essential to doing this successfully.
5. Letting obstacles get in the way of vision. Negative attributes in any circumstance will blunt positive movement, so don’t marry yourself into trying to fulfill a new vision using old structures and standards. Whether it’s a middle manager who doesn’t agree with the change plan, or an organizational structure where current jobs don’t encompass enough responsibility to make the change, you need to remove any roadblocks (potential or actual) that might stop the change. process. .
6. Not making plans. Notice I didn’t say “plan.” You need to have short-term and long-term plans for how you are going to achieve your goals. If you plan to achieve short-term goals, chances are you will achieve them. If you just talk about them and wait to get to know them, you are taking a passive approach to creating change. Be proactive. Look for ways to set achievable goals throughout the year, and then set plans and strategies to achieve those goals. Ultimately, all the small goals earned should contribute to the bigger long-term plan.
7. Celebrating victory prematurely. Of course, this is very easy to do, but make sure that while you should praise the achievement of short-term goals, the game isn’t really over until you’ve solved your biggest problems.
8. Not implanting the new way of doing things in the culture of the company. It is one thing to successfully solve and meet your goals. Another thing is to live according to the new mantra. Change has not been truly successful until you have ingrained it into the culture of those with whom you do business.