By Mike Myatt, Chief StrategyOfficer, N2growthIs leading change difficult? Only ifyou don't know what you're doing. As much as some people want tocreate complexity around the topic of leading change for personalgain, the reality is that creating, managing and leading change isreally quite simple. In fact, catalyzing and leading change isn'tvery daunting at all if you understand a few key principles. Toprove my point, I'll not only explain the entire change life-cyclein three short paragraphs, but I'll do it in simple terms thatanyone can understand...Identifying the Need forChange: The need for change exists in every organization.Other than irrational change solely for the sake of change, everycorporation must change to survive. If your entity doesn'tinnovate and change with market driven needs and demands itwill fail...it's just that simple. The most complex areasurrounding change is focusing your efforts in the right areas, forthe right reasons, and at the right times. The ambiguity and riskcan be taken out of the change agenda by simply focusing onthree areas: 1) your current customers...what needs to change tobetter serve your customers? 2) potential customers...what needs tochange to profitably create new customers? and; 3) your talent andresources...what changes need to occur to better leverageexisting talent and resources? LeadingChange: You cannot effectively lead change withoutunderstanding the landscape of change. There are four typicalresponses to change: The Victim...those that view changeas a personal attack on their persona, their role, their job, ortheir area of responsibility. They view everything at an atomiclevel based upon how they perceive change will directly andindirectly impact them. The Neutral Bystander...This groupis neither for nor against change. They will not directly orvocally oppose change, but neither will they proactively get behindchange. The Neutral Bystander will just go with the flow notwanting to make any waves hoping to perpetually fly under theradar. The Critic...The Critic opposes any and all change.Keep in mind that not all critics are overt in their resistance.Many critics remain in stealth mode trying to derail change behindthe scenes by using their influence on others. Whether overt orcovert, you must identify critics of change early in the process ifyou hope to succeed. The Advocate...The Advocate not onlyembraces change, they will evangelize the change initiative.Like The Critics, it is important to identify The Advocates earlyin the process to not only build the power base for change, but togive momentum and enthusiasm to the change initiative. Once you'veidentified these change constituencies you must involve all ofthem, message properly to each of them, and don't let up. With theproper messaging and involvement even adversaries can be convertedinto allies.Managing Change: Manging changerequires that key players have control over 4 criticalelements: 1) Vision Alignment...those that understand and agreewith your vision must be leveraged in the change process. Thosethat disagree must be converted or have their influenceneutralized; 2) Responsibility...your change agents must have asufficient level of responsibility to achieve the necessaryresults; 3) Accountability...your change agents must be accountablefor reaching their objectives, and; 4) Authority...if the firstthree items are in place, yet your change agents have notbeen given the needed authority to get the job done the first threeitems won't mean much...you must set your change agents up forsuccess and not failure by giving them the proper tools, talent,resources, responsibility and authority necessary for finishing therace.There you have it; in three short paragraphs I've given youthe formula for change, and the question now becomes what will youdo with it?