Successful communication in change management, with videos

Change Communications & Kotters Model

Change management is the most important discipline in business management to adapt to rapidly changing environments and remain successful.

For a successful change process in a company, it is necessary to transparently inform employees and other stakeholders at every step. Communication should not only provide employees with information, but should also touch them on an emotional level. This means that employees must feel understood through communication and reflect their concerns. As a result, resistance can be reduced and fears of change can be reduced.

Videos are one way to make the communication of changes more emotionally tangible. Thanks to audiovisuality and the use of storytelling, they are perfect for conveying information and reaching people emotionally.

Loud Kotter's change management model Every change in a company goes through 8 stages. Our tip: See every single stage as an opportunity to create transparency through videos and reach all employees emotionally. In the following, we'll show you what the individual videos could look like based on the 8 steps.

1. Communicate the urgency of change ‼️

A good start to change communication would be a short, impressive video that shows the company's current challenges and problems and makes it clear why a change needs to take place right now. The consequences can also be shown if there is no change. The video should then be shared with stakeholders to spread the sense of urgency within the company.

2. Gain support

A video can be produced here that shows the various groups of stakeholders and leaders who support change. Senior managers are particularly important here in order to demonstrate support from the very top. There, they can also share why they support the initiative and what benefits they see in doing so. At the same time, the benefits of the change for individual stakeholders can also be shown. Employee generated videos can be decisive here to avoid the statements being made as if they have been made. The video will then be distributed internally and externally to demonstrate existing commitment and attract new supporters.

3. Communicating the vision of change

The broadest possible dissemination and a broad understanding of the vision and goal of the change is important so that stakeholders remain motivated. A video that conveys the vision and strategy for change in an easy-to-understand and appealing format can be a great help. The concrete next steps of change can also be listed here in order to give employees a clear idea of what is in store for them.

4. Remove barriers and increase acceptance

Where there is change, there are questions and concerns. The same questions often arise and it is a good idea to share an FAQ video with the company, which summarizes all the answers. At the same time, the benefits of the change for individual stakeholders can once again be made clear. At this point, however, it should be mentioned that a forum must still be given in which employees can express their concerns. Otherwise, concerns cannot be reduced sustainably. Anonymized surveys about concerns can provide such a secure forum for employees.

5. Show that everyone can contribute to change 🧑 ‍ 🤝 ‍ 🧑

Employee generated videos also help here. In short clips, employees can show how their initiatives are driving change in the company. The videos can be distributed internally to inspire and motivate others to take action as well.

Seeing how your own colleagues can help shape the change creates a sense of community and motivates.

6. Communicate successes

If changes are made measurable and goals are planned on the basis of clear roadmaps, successes can also be seen quite quickly. For everyone involved, celebrating successes is a reward for work done — it is therefore almost the most important step in the process of change. People want to repeat this feeling of success over and over again. This effect can be used by producing videos that show how milestones in the change process can be achieved after just a short period of time. This shows that the change is bearing fruit, which motivates employees.

7. Use momentum

Once the change initiative is launched, it is crucial that it does not lose speed. This can be prevented by shooting Best Of videos that remind you again and again why the change is important, who supports it all and how close success is. By repeating how much progress the change process has already made and how all colleagues are working on it, employees keep the vision in mind and do not lose sight of the goal.

8. Protect change

Once the goal of the change process has been achieved, care must be taken to ensure that employees do not fall back into old patterns of behavior. This can be done through before/after videos. These should once again make it clear what was gained as a result of the change and which threats were averted. This once again demonstrates the value of the initiative.

Tutorials are just as important so that all employees in the company know how processes have changed. This prevents employees from feeling left alone with the changed environment.

How can change communication be made as efficient as possible with videos?

When it comes to videos, many immediately think of thousands of euros and millions of hours of capacity that flow into a single video. In contrast to change processes, which are undeniably complex and time-consuming, videos are no longer so today. With software such as cofenster, videos can be professionally produced by all employees in a very short time, cost-effectively and without previous video production knowledge.

• Storyboards and screenplays can simply be submitted with a sharing link, into which the videos can be inserted immediately.
• For the post-production In the end, no special knowledge or skills are required anymore.
• By Templates in corporate designare all videos automatically always fire compliant.

This creates professional videos for all stages of the change process in a very short time.