Sometimes people want the new way, and the company’s own rules push them back to the old one. It can be a bonus plan, or a report that still measures last year’s priorities. This Practice finds that rule and changes it.

A tool that supports it

Structural Barrier Removal is a way of acting, and several tools can serve it. A classic one is “Force Field Analysis,” from the social psychologist Kurt Lewin.

The idea is that any situation is held in place by two sets of forces. Driving forces push toward the goal. Restraining forces hold things where they are. You list both, side by side, and then you can see what the change is up against.

For this Practice, read the restraining column and look for the items that are structural, such as a rule or an incentive. Those are the ones a leader can remove with a decision.

When to use it

Use it when a change is understood and wanted, and adoption has stalled anyway. Listen for “I’d love to, but” in meetings. When the “but” points at a rule and not at a person, there’s a barrier to remove.

You need the authority to change the rule, or a way to reach whoever has it. When people are still learning how to do the new thing, what they need is practice, and no rule has to change.

How to use it

  1. Ask the people doing the work what makes the new way harder than the old one.
  2. Draw two columns on a shared screen: what’s pushing for the change, and what’s holding it back.
  3. Mark the items in the second column that come from a rule or an incentive.
  4. Pick the heaviest one and change it. If it isn’t yours to change, bring it to the person who can, with the cost written down. Giving up a rule you created yourself is the hard part.
  5. Announce the new rule and say which change it’s there to help.

Example

A support team was asked to write help articles so customers can solve simple problems alone. Three months in, almost no articles exist. The team is still scored on tickets closed per day.

The usual way “I need everyone to make time for help articles. It’s a priority.”
The Practice “We asked you to write help articles, and we still count only tickets closed, so every article costs you on the scoreboard. Starting this month, a published article counts as five tickets.”

The request didn’t change between the two answers. The second one fixes the scoreboard, and writing an article stops being a penalty.

Phrases you can use

  • “What makes the new way harder than the old one?”
  • “Is anything in how we measure you working against this change?”
  • “That rule made sense before. Does it still help us?”
  • “I can change that today. Consider it done.”
  • “That one isn’t mine to change, so I’ll take it to finance this week with the numbers.”
  • For a leader, when someone does it: “You found the rule that was in the way. What’s the next one on your list?”

How to know it worked

Adoption moves in the weeks after the rule changes, without another speech about priorities. People also start naming barriers on their own, because they’ve seen one disappear. Over time, checking rules and incentives becomes part of planning any change at the company.

In a Skill Deck Track on Change Management, a person can choose this Practice, and the meetings they already have show when they use it.

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