It's welcoming people, amazingly jagged mountains, fantastic beaches, and sensational food is enough to bewitch any visitor.As change or project managers we usually plan our approach in managing change from a top down perspective.

We look at what senior executives would like employees to change, how much change is required, what benefits would be achieved through change, and which parts of the organization would need to change.There is the usual focus that change leadership is critical and that without strong senior sponsorship that the initiative will fail.

On top of this, if there is any resistance, the leader needs to identify these and overcome them in order to successfully drive the change successfully.This all sounds like the standard recipe for change success does it not?

And the farther I go the more I notice at the abundance and variety of fish and coral around me.When we surround ourselves purely with the top down approach of change, we start to develop a fixed mindset of how change should be done.

However, when we start to adopt a user mindset, an employee lense of change, we start to see things very differently.The diversity of the ocean and the diversity of employeesSimilar to the fish in the sea, there isn't one type of employee.

Different employees have different concerns, just like in the ocean there is star fish, tetra, gold fish, carp, etc.Whilst we cannot cater for every type of individual employee concerns and interests, it is also important to be able to see through impacted employees and what they are seeing.

Successfully achieving business outcomes through change requires good people change experiences.

This could involve anything ranging from manager discussions, online discussions, avenues for peer conversations, senior leadership behavior and supporting collateral.Designing a great change experience for employees working in an organization is no different than designing a great quality of life for dwellers living in a particular city.

A city needs to focus on having a vibrant economy, happening retail scene, good access to parks and nature, great transportation links, and developed sports and arts scenes.

In a similar way, in organizations we need to focus on designing a range of experiences so that employees are not only engaged but supportive where the organization would like to move to.There are foundational ways of engaging with employees during change that apply for all organizations, such as manager-employee conversations, authenticity, and clarity of the message, and involvement in the change process.

A dynamic change champion network supporting various change initiatives.A well-organized change champion network provides great development opportunities for employees to get involved in change initiatives.

At the same time, there are always those who need a lot more clarification, support, and hands-on experience to feel confident.

With the increasing popularity of agile, change practitioners are also rushing to re-position and tailor their work to support the agile environment.On top of the basic agile ‘manifesto’ that outlines agile principles, there are now numerous organizations providing the technicalities of how to implement and support agile.

Agile may be applied to a project team, program, or portfolio level.I went through the Scaled Agile certification process and was amazed at how much basic common change principles are embedded within the agile approach.

Through the multi-day training course, case studies and the examination, I was quite interested in how a lot of foundational change principles that are common sense for us in change management tools, are somehow ‘new’ for technical leads or project managers.

Agile incorporates what change managers have been calling out all along.

Therefore, when there are problems and opportunities for improvement the first that comes to mind is usually a technical fix.

We all know of Technology departments that are fantastic in designing technical solutions and features to resolve problems.However, the agile manifesto is focused on people and interactions.

The super popular Kubler-Ross model was used to explain the grieving process and later became adopted as a change model.

Kubler-Ross developed this model after observing the emotional transition of terminally ill patients, from shock, denial, anger, depression, acceptance and integration.

Step 5 is about enabling action by removing barriers and friction – anticipating and working on these obstacles will enable change success.Moreover, the language we use in organisational change management tends to be about managing negative incidents.

A key focus we have is about anticipating and managing employee and stakeholder resistance.

restructuring, outsourcing, and system replacement.

However, there is opportunity for us to adopt a more positive approach to inspire change, versus aiming to manage the negative aspects of change.When I was working a psychologist I remember meeting Martin Seligman when he was visiting Sydney, Australia.