Culturally, we admire change agents: People who disrupt the status quo, break things, reimagine what the future looks like. In associations, leaders are often encouraged to be the sworn enemy of phrases like “but we’ve always done it that way.” Transformation doesn’t happen by staying in well-worn ruts.

One thing that is less discussed while we’re handing flowers to those change agents, though: They can’t make change on their own. They need allies, staffers, stakeholders, board members, and others to understand what the change is going to be, and get buy-in for it. That process was on my mind when I was writing “Change Done Right,” one of the articles in the latest batch of Associations Now Deep Dives. In it, I speak with Debbie Witchey, the new CEO of the Association for Behavioral Health and Wellness. Change is on her agenda, but she’s also been figuring out how to bring the relevant people along for it.

To do that, she has the assistance of the previous CEO during a transition period, and she’s done a listening tour with board members and staff. But she’s also taken care to let people know that the listening tour eventually ends and that she’s fully settled into the role of staff leader. “We told them that starting, November 1, I’m their point of contact,” she says. “The outgoing CEO is there to advise me for the month of November, not to advise them.”

Moreover, Witchey has been clear that she won’t rush into big changes, but may make relevant ones. To that end, it’s important not just for the listening tour to surface sources of frustration for the organization, but also to establish a tone from the top about how communication is handled. 

The benefit of the listening tour is to go in wide open. Nothing is sacred, nothing is protected.

Julia A. Johnson, Wipfli

“When we are in a leadership role, we tend to create patterns of behavior in terms of how we interact with one another,” says Julia A. Johnson, director of organizational performance at the nonprofit consultancy Wipfli. “There can often be topics that may be cloaked or protected. So the benefit of the tour is to go in wide open. Nothing is sacred, nothing is protected. The CEO should come into those conversations with candidness and tact, asking clarifying questions. What I suspect may happen is that an incoming CEO may discover themes within the organization to address. The communication strategy may not have cascaded down. How decisions are made haven’t cascaded down.”

Those listening-tour meetings are also good opportunities to float trial balloons about how people might respond to changes. “While you’re doing that listening, also set that stage for pieces of your vision,” says Candance Chow, managing director and cofounder of NextGroup, LLC, a support firm for nonprofit leaders. “You can always say, ‘Here are my early thoughts. Here’s what I’m seeing.’ Within four months, you should have some viewpoint on where the organization should go. Much longer than that, you’re going to start losing people.”

And that’s the tricky part about the listening tour: People want to be heard, but ultimately they also want to be led. Hearing out where people are struggling is an excellent first step. But it needs to be done with a plan to be the person who handles the solutions.

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