7 The Batteries of Change
The Batteries of Change
The Batteries of Change model was developed at the Vlereick Business School in Belgium along with the Royal Military Academy of Belgium. We chose this model as the framework for this unit partly because it was developed by a collaboration between a business school within a university and with a unit of a military organisation.
The principles of the Batteries of Change are focused on four elements of an organisation’s reality:
- its formal element which here we call the rational/formal element;
- its operational element; followed by
- its strategic intent; and finally
- its emotional/informal.
These four elements are set out in a framework that has six areas that are the underpinnings of ways to create excellence and success.
Here is a version of the whole framework which may be useful to you in your work and your project. You may wish to explore this and apply it throughout the unit.
Adapted from De Prins, P., Letens, G., & Verweire, K. (2017). Six batteries of change. Lannoo Publishers; Page 21.
You would have already been wondering about the use of the batteries concept. And yes you are most probably correct in your assumptions that this is very much about energy and the battery metaphor is about the energy around change and the way that energy is used towards achieving change and powerful outcomes.
The metaphor is about managing and directing the organisational energy. It takes energy to get things done. Every organisation has energy and focus. The Batteries of Change model helps to identify where the energy is and where it is working well. These pockets of energy can be used to build other parts of the organisation. If a culture is energised it is very useful to help make changes and drive other parts of the organisation that need to evolve.
Joie de Bradley WIGGINS (SKY) Vainqueur du tour de France 2012 – © William Morice / MaxPPP (CCA-2.0)
The Batteries of Change approach was used by the Sky Racing team that propelled Bradley Wiggins to his win at the Tour de France in 2012. Now competitive cycling may not be your thing but we are sure you can imagine the complexities of the individual, team and organisation operations that are necessary to help an individual ride a bicycle for 21 stages for more than 3,400 kilometres through France against the world’s best riders and beat them all!
These are the principles of the approach. It looks for improvements in every part of a system and tries for as many wins as possible. The effect of these wins, small and large, leads over time to significant gains. Along the way emotional and people-related challenges typically arise especially when change is involved. Along with these improvement gains the focus is on building and enhancing a powerful culture and connection in teams and between the people in those teams.
The academics and serving military personnel who built the model realised that much of the linear thinking that was a significant part of military training was no longer as useful as it had been. They also realised that there were significant capabilities throughout the military that could and should be leveraged. They also were aware that the world has become and continues to become more complex and ambiguous.
This level of complexity requires organisations to be ambidextrous1: able to refine what they do on a daily basis and also learn and do new and very different things.
Key Takeaways for Later
- Later on, I will help you to explore the concept of ambidexterity and organisational congruence, which helps to inform the researcher and change agent of the overall strategic intent and strategic intention, and the necessary alignment or ‘congruence’ to achieve success, and make the link with the 6 Batteries.
- The overall theoretical foundations of the Batteries of Change are built on three components of human capabilities. The three components make up the attitude formation and change model.
- Together, a focus on both organisational congruence and attitude formation will help to drive change. This combination may be useful for you in your project.
One of the most significant innovations in the framework was the recognition of the importance of the emotional side of organisations and the people in them. This is especially important when it comes to change. Change is very much about influencing and convincing people.
The Batteries of Change framework is based on the ability to recognise this powerful human motivation mechanism and put it to good use to create great organisational outcomes.
Activity
OK, enough of this for now! We want you to think about a highly functioning organisation or situation and start pondering why it is successful at what it does. I want you to think about the components of the Batteries and also the metaphor of the battery giving energy to the various parts of the organisation.
Tip
If you are lost here is an option:
If you have an IKEA near you, go for a wander. Look around and just think about all the pieces and how they come together in the store you are in and in the hundreds that are all over the world all operating in roughly the same way selling pretty much the same products and providing roughly the same services.
Discussion
What did you identify as key elements in the context you explored?
What could you take and apply in your workplace?
Might this be a possibility for your project?
Here is part of a more complete audit.
Six Batteries of Change Core elements to explore to share
Here is a more complete diagnostic set.
Co design Batteries of change handout v0.2
Here is an image of one of the templates.
Here is the foundation of a later activity. If you wish, you can take a look and apply this as a diagnostic in your workplace and project. The scoring details is useful now.
Here is an idea for a Team-level diagnosis. Using the templates, give your Teams virtual or actual coloured circles. Keep the number of circles limited so that there is true discriminatory thinking. And ask for observations and scoring on each of the statements.
The patterns tell their own story. Take a peek
