Let's go through the steps of Kotter's change management approach.

Step 1: Urgency Creation

A change is only successful if the whole company really wants it. If you are planning to make a change, then you need to make others want it. You can create urgency around what you want to change and create hype.

This will make your idea well received when you start your initiative. Use statistics and visual presentations to convey why the change should take place and how the company and employees can be at advantage.

What you can do:

• Identify potential threats, and develop scenarios showing what could happen in the future.
• Examine opportunities that should be, or could be, exploited.
• Start honest discussions and give dynamic and convincing reasons to get people talking and thinking.
• Request support from customers, outside stakeholders and industry people to strengthen your argument.

Note:

Kotter suggests that for change to be successful, 75 percent of a company's management needs to "buy into" the change. In other words, you have to work really hard on Step 1, and spend significant time and energy building urgency, before moving onto the next steps. Don't panic and jump in too fast because you don't want to risk further short-term losses – if you act without proper preparation, you could be in for a very bumpy ride.

Step 2: Form a Powerful Coalition / Build a Team

Convince people that change is necessary. This often takes strong leadership and visible support from key people within your organization. Managing change isn't enough – you have to lead it.

You can find effective change leaders throughout your organization – they don't necessarily follow the traditional company hierarchy.

To lead change, you need to bring together a coalition, or team, of influential people whose power comes from a variety of sources, including job title, status, expertise, and political importance.

Once formed, your "change coalition" needs to work as a team, continuing to build urgency and momentum around the need for change.

Organize your team structure and assign responsibilities to the team members. Make them feel that they are important within the team.

What you can do:

• Identify the true leaders in your organization, as well as your key stakeholders.
• Ask for an emotional commitment from these key people.
• Work on team building within your change coalition.
• Check your team for weak areas and ensure that you have a good mix of people from different departments and different levels within your company.

Step 3: Create a Vision

When you first start thinking about change, there will probably be many great ideas and solutions floating around. Link these concepts to an overall vision that people can grasp easily and remember.

A clear vision can help everyone understand why you're asking them to do something. When people see for themselves what you're trying to achieve, then the directives they're given tend to make more sense.

What you can do:

• Determine the values  that are central to the change.
• Develop a short summary (one or two sentences) that captures what you "see" as the future of your organization.
• Create a strategy  to execute that vision.
• Ensure that your change coalition can describe the vision in five minutes or less.
• Practice your "vision speech" often.

If you are facing difficulties coming up with a vision, read chapter one (Mission and Values) of WINNING, by Jack Welch.

Step 4: Communicate the Vision

What you do with your vision after you create it will determine your success. Your message will probably have strong competition from other day-to-day communications within the company, so you need to communicate it frequently and powerfully, and embed it within everything that you do.

Don't just call special meetings to communicate your vision. Instead, talk about it every chance you get. Use the vision daily to make decisions and solve problems. When you keep it fresh on everyone's minds, they'll remember it and respond to it.

It's also important to "walk the talk." What you do is far more important – and believable – than what you say. Demonstrate the kind of behaviour that you want from others.

What you can do:

• Talk often about your change vision.
• Address peoples' concerns and anxieties, openly and honestly.
• Apply your vision to all aspects of operations – from training to performance reviews. Tie everything back to the vision.
• Lead by example .

Step 5: Removing Obstacles

No change takes place without obstacles. Once you communicate your vision, you will only be able to get the support of a fraction of the staff. Always, there are people, who resist the change.

Sometimes, there are processes and procedures that resist the change too! Always watch out for obstacles and remove them as soon as they appear. This will increase the morale of your team as well the rest of the staff.

What you can do:

• Identify, or hire, change leaders whose main roles are to deliver the change.
• Look at your organizational structure, job descriptions, and performance and compensation systems to ensure they're in line with your vision.
• Recognize and reward people for making change happen.
• Identify people who are resisting the change and help them see what's needed.
• Take action to quickly remove barriers (human or otherwise).

Step 6: Go for Quick Wins

Nothing motivates more than success. Give your company a taste of victory early in the change process. Within a short time frame (this could be a month or a year, depending on the type of change), you'll want to have some "quick wins " that your staff can see. Without this, critics and negative thinkers might hurt your progress.

Create short-term targets – not just one long-term goal. You want each smaller target to be achievable, with little room for failure. Your change team may have to work very hard to come up with these targets, but each "win" that you produce can further motivate the entire staff.

What you can do:

• Look for sure-fire projects that you can implement without help from any strong critics of the change.
• Don't choose early targets that are expensive. You want to be able to justify the investment in each project.
• Thoroughly analyze the potential pros and cons of your targets. If you don't succeed with an early goal, it can hurt your entire change initiative.
• Reward  the people who help you meet the targets.

Step 7: Build on the Change

Kotter argues that many change projects fail because victory is declared too early. Real change runs deep. Quick wins are only the beginning of what needs to be done to achieve long-term change.

Launching one new product using a new system is great. But if you can launch 10 products, that means the new system is working. To reach that 10th success, you need to keep looking for improvements.

Each success provides an opportunity to build on what went right and identify what you can improve.

What you can do:

• After every win, analyze what went right, and what needs improving.
• Set goals  to continue building on the momentum you've achieved.
• Learn about kaizen , the idea of continuous improvement.
• Keep ideas fresh by bringing in new change agents and leaders for your change coalition.

Step 8: Anchor the Changes in Corporate Culture

Finally, to make any change stick, it should become part of the core of your organization. Your corporate culture often determines what gets done, so the values behind your vision must show in day-to-day work.

Make continuous efforts to ensure that the change is seen in every aspect of your organization. This will help give that change a solid place in your organization's culture.

It's also important that your company's leaders continue to support the change. This includes existing staff and new leaders who are brought in. If you lose the support of these people, you might end up back where you started.

What you can do:

• Talk about progress every chance you get. Tell success stories about the change process, and repeat other stories that you hear.
• Include the change ideals and values when hiring and training new staff.
• Publicly recognize key members of your original change coalition, and make sure the rest of the staff – new and old – remembers their contributions.
• Create plans to replace key leaders of change as they move on. This will help ensure that their legacy is not lost or forgotten.

Conclusion

In the constantly changing corporate world, the one who welcomes the changes stays ahead of the competition.

If you are not much comfortable with changes happening around you, reserve some of your time to read 'Who Moved My Cheese?' by Dr. Spencer Johnson.

This will tell you the whole story about why the change is required and how you can make use of the change to excel in what you do.