Changing roles and the culture of collaboration
Impetus to the project
When we approached subject:RESOUL for support, it was already clear that a far-reaching change in the bank's credit department would take place (and had already begun - reducing FTEs and, in the long term, eliminating a hierarchy level while still ensuring very good performance and completion of the workload).
Specifically, this meant
building up the internal organization according to subjects independently of previous teams; increasing networking among each other and establishing flexible changes of work areas as the norm - in short: promoting growing together and more holistic thinking,
accompanying team leaders into their new role (disciplinary leadership only); establishing coordination independent of disciplinary leadership, and enabling more responsibility at all levels,
ensuring a capacity balance between the employees in the overall department for being able to react flexibly to workload fluctuations, and
thoroughly accompanying the employees during this change and making sure that their voices were being heard in the process.
What we did
First, we formed a steering committee to keep an eye on the overall change and derive measures for improvement.
We established consent-based decision-making as an instrument for greater participation and acceptance of responsibility. At the same time, we specified roles and clarified expectations between levels.
We accompanied team leaders into their new role (away from professionalism and toward purely disciplinary leadership). In regular sparring sessions, we reflected on the entire change process with the department management.
We supported individual subdivisions (segments), the team leader level and the steering committee with workshops on purpose development, team development and process optimization.
Experience and result
Certainly, a cultural change is a major effort for everyone involved. Nevertheless, everyone could quickly notice some positive developments:
An increasingly better functioning steering committee with a clear purpose and continuously changing members through open elections.
Extensive evaluation to keep an eye on the impact of the change and to identify further need for change
Processing of additional applications through good capacity balancing
Regular publications on the new collaboration on the intranet and invitations to report in other areas
Growing together of the management team
What our client says
In our team, we faced the challenge of maintaining the department's ability to function and keeping up the high quality of its work results, despite significant staff reductions. At the same time, we aimed at preparing employees mentally for more frequent and far-reaching changes in their working environment, based on the ongoing modernization process of the bank. At the same time, every individual was supposed to increase their scope of action.
With the help of subject:RESOUL we could master the painful departure from teams and old role patterns which had existed for at least 10 years, as well as the transition to a new, more network-based and active community. Ewa Hüls-Kubisa and Johannes Sattler taught us valuable techniques of working together, brought us face to face, and patiently guided us into unknown territory. Now we experience the successes and know we can do much more...
Cornelia Sels, Department Manager KR2