By Stacey LeBreton-Klusman

Published in: "Back to Basics, Tried and True Solutions for Today's Leaders"

What is the connection between change and M&M's? Change and M&M's are alike because if you have only one small change or one M&M, most people enjoy it. Not only do they enjoy it, they want more. The same applies to change in a company. Change is uncomfortable, especially big changes. Interestingly, you will find that if you only make a small change to a process or procedure, generally most people don't mind. When the individuals find out that the change is beneficial, they want more.

The key to remember is that too much of anything is bad. If you were to eat three pounds of M&M's, your body would not like it and, for revenge, make you very sick. This can be compared to change. Even changes that are wonderful and beneficial can be uncomfortable. When change is too big or has too many elements, the whole organization will be uncomfortable, perhaps even sick. Often at that point, the entire change initiative is abandoned and they justify why they don't need to change at all.

As companies attempt to define what changes need to be made for an organization to improve or obtain their strategic goals, this can be looked at as multiple areas that need attention. Let's use an example of five areas. Let's further say that each of these five areas has hundreds of little changes necessary to fulfill the change initiative or obtain the strategic goal. Now, visualize three pounds of M&M's in a glass bowl. You will see five colors: green, red, brown, yellow, and blue. There are hundreds of each of these colors. Each one of these colors represent one of your projects and each of the individual M&M's represent a task, objective or change that needs to be implemented.

As your company tries to implement the change, try to focus on just one color at a time. Some people try to combine their goals into unattainable projects, (try to eat the whole bowl of M&M's at once). That's when we have to keep the projects attainable. Those involved with the change process must be reminded to not only know what color M&M they are trying to reach, they need to pick out just one M&M at a time.