How can I play a central role in the emerging ecosystem? (Part 3)
Note: If you haven’t been following along with this series on change management you can find the previous articles here and here. I would recommend checking them out if you haven’t, otherwise you’ll feel like you’ve jumped into the pool with your clothes still on 😜.
Today we are back into the McKinsey and Co article and working our way through the second question of the reinvention change level: How can I play a central role in the emerging ecosystem? According to the article this question is really challenging you to consider your work within a larger, more interconnected, and consolidated context. One example provided refers to European retailers working more closely with meat suppliers and even animal feed producers to create higher quality and more sustainable food.
Obviously, most of us aren’t thinking about building sustainable supply chains for meat (unless that’s your area of research), but this question is really asking where to invest your resources in the new ecosystem you step into with your reinvented research program. Creating an ecosystem map can help. Here you will identify the central players, relationships, and dynamics that could influence your new research program. The goal here is to see the big picture, and the interconnections, so you can achieve your impact.
In the central players bucket you might start by looking into other research teams working on the problem you hope to solve. How does their definition of the problem align with yours? How is it different? How have the set up their research work? Who are they working with? Do they have expertise on their team that you don’t have? Where are these experts from? Where are they receiving their funding? Is the funding government sponsored, or from a private foundation? Are there community or non-profit organizations working in the space? Who and where are they?
In the relationships bucket you might start with your own newly created team. How does your team want or need to work together? How well do you know each other, and things like preferred working styles and communication modes? If there are areas for improvement, how can you begin to address them? Do you need some additional meetings to codify standard operating procedures for the team?
Working out from your immediate team, and thinking about your academic department or unit, have you looped in your direct supervisor (i.e. your department chair) to the changes you hope to make to your research program? Have you communicated any potential implications this transition will have to your current productivity and commitments? Are there resources your chair might offer to assist with this transition (i.e. think anything from a course release to offering department meeting space or assistance from department administrative assistant with finding and booking meeting times)? It is also worth discussing with your chair the alignment of your new research program with the standards of your discipline. Do you know what that alignment looks like? Do they have some advice for how to make that case as you work towards getting tenured and/or promoted?
Moving out an additional circle you also want to think about how you discuss your future work within your discipline more broadly. Where will you publish your work? What meetings should you be attending? Which of the community or non-profit organizations should you be in touch with?
The final bucket of your ecosystem scan is dynamics. Here you can begin to note how your central players and relationships work together (or not). Maybe the team you’ve built is just (chef’s kiss) perfect, but your department chair wants or needs you to chair a search committee for a new faculty member in your department in the next semester. Or maybe your team is missing some serious talent in a research method you need to start your research program.
None of these roadblocks should be considered deal-breakers for your new program, but they do require some forward thinking and planning, which is what we will be diving into next week, when we answer the question, “What organizational rewiring can help us shift?”
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