Most business leaders, at least once in their careers, have to lead their organisation through a deep crisis that threatens the company’s very existence. This could be a major downsizing exercise because of developments in technology that changes the dynamics of how a business operates. Those who have been through such major upheavals will tell you that navigating in business turbulence is no easy task.
I remember distinctly the early nineties when a number of academic gurus proclaimed their messianic recommendations on how to re-engineer business organisations. Very respected experts like Michael Hammer, Peter Drucker, and Tom Peters were the darlings of business schools trying to sell their services to business leaders in search of the silver bullet that would save their organisations from obsolescence.
My own experience is that one learns much more about business process re-engineering by getting first-hand experience from organisations which have navigated in business turbulence and sailed home safely, even if with their sails badly battered.
In the mid-1970s, I visited Mo I Rana in Norway where I experienced first-hand the outcome of re-engineering of two major Norwegian companies: a steel company sailed the turbulence successfully, while an arms company failed to reach port because they never managed cultural change successfully.
I have no hesitation in acknowledging that the most difficult aspect of re-engineering is changing the culture of an organisation. If at least 80 per cent of the employees are not behind their business leaders in the process of changing the business culture of a lame organisation, the chances of failure will be high.
My interest in the subject is ongoing. I prefer to familiarise myself with real-life case studies than the theory one finds in management books, however articulately this theory is explained to the readers. The most recent example of business re-engineering that is still ongoing is that being undertaken by the Vatican. This is not primarily about theological renewal, even if this renewal is in fact being proposed by the Catholic Church’s CEO, Pope Francis.
The re-engineering of the Vatican’s finances is facing serious turbulence despite the good intentions and efforts of the Pope and his secular assistants
I am here referring to the shake-up that the Pope is trying to bring about in the Vatican Curia that is a real business in the true sense of the world. The Vatican is asset rich with a portfolio of valuable properties throughout Italy, but especially in Rome.
The Vatican also has a number of other business lines including the management of money received from the faithful throughout the world, the process of declaring a person a saint, a pension fund that covers all present and past Vatican employees, as well as numerous other investments in stocks and shares.
Yet the Church finds itself without proper financial management. Pope Francis seems to want to change the culture where presently the Vatican’s wealth is managed more for the interest of a few cardinals and their cronies rather than for the benefit of the multitude of poor people who could do with a little support from their Church. Via Crucis by the Italian TV journalist Gianluigi Nuzzi is a lively account of how the re-engineering of the Vatican’s finances is facing serious turbulence, despite the good intentions and efforts of the Pope and his secular assistants.
I suggest that those who are involved in changing the cultures of their organisation to enable them to survive and prosper should read this book to understand the risks one takes when trying to deal with the barons of power who, to use a Biblical metaphor, are no more than “wolves in sheep’s clothing”. Back stabbing, leaking of sensitive information, greed, avarice and other diabolical tactics are the weapons used by those who fear losing their ill-gained privileges when a business leader opens a small window to let some fresh air enter the corridors of power of an ailing organisation.
Another practical example of what navigating in business turbulence is like can be found in an interview of the Harvard Business Review with CEO of Eni, Franco Bernabe. When Bernabe was appointed CEO of Eni in 1992, his mission was to turn a lame giant dominated by internal and external politics into a lean company that was ready for privatisation.
Despite the resistance of Eni’s old guard management who even threatened to sack him, Bernabe succeeded in turning around the fate of this oil giant. Yet Bernabe declared: “the process of cultural change is a continued one, and we still need to aim aggressively at developing a more entrepreneurial attitude at Eni.”
johncassarwhite@yahoo.com