For the change professional, stakeholder commitment is a crucial element in successful corporate change. Ideally, when working through a corporate change, the stakeholders will represent a fixed cast of players that are committed to seeing the process through from beginning to end. This situation avoids having the project bog down due to a learning curve for new stakeholders and the occasional Johnny-come-lately second guessing that can go on when a new person enters a project mid-stream. Nevertheless, the growing trend in the business world is to use position rotation to enhance employee value.
While, generally, position rotation is good for corporations, it can have a pronounced impact on stakeholder commitment to a corporate change process. There is no set period for position rotation. It can run as short as 18 months, but the average is three years before lateral rotation or promotion. Now, if the stakeholders the change professional is looking to enlist are early in their position, getting commitment for a corporate change project is easier. However, if they are late in their rotation, gathering this commitment can be more difficult.
Their hesitance may be a simple case of not wanting to stick the next person with a project they don’t want or won’t believe in. If they know who will be taking over their position, they may want to discuss it before agreeing. In essence, they are engaging in good career politics by not leaving the bag in someone else’s hands.
The other possibility is that they don’t want to sign off on a project only to have it come back to haunt them later. Statistically, change projects have a poor success rate. The potential stakeholder may be considering their legacy and don’t want to be associated with a potential failed project; especially if they will be leaving before the project concludes. The change professional needs to be conscious of these considerations when approaching possible stakeholders.
