Change Case: Supporting employees as a company split in two

Situation:

A large financial institution faced with new risks and regulations, decided to break up their institution and was concerned about losing both focus and staff due to the structural changes.

Intervention:

Workshops were designed for all levels within the most deeply impacted divisions. The sessions worked on two levels, on the surface they explained the rationale for change and worked with the groups to spot opportunities to be proactive about assimilating the new structure; meanwhile, the sessions worked on the undercurrents of fear, resistance and negativity by equipping people with approaches to interpret what was happening and providing a both public and private forums for discussing how the changes were impacting them.

Results:

The restructuring, which included relocating entire departments and establishing new reporting structures, was deemed a success - particularly for retaining staff through the process and for stabilizing a volatile situation into a model that was not only compliant to the new market conditions, but was also widely regarded as a more effective organisation. As one employee said, it was 'a change for the better'.