Leadership in Sustaining Transformation Momentum: A Flywheel Effect

Modern-day businesses are constantly evolving, and thriving in such an evolving landscape requires more than just moving forward; it requires sustaining the changes to build a promising future. While ‘movement’ is about initiating action or change, ‘momentum’ is about sustaining it. As change catalysts, leaders in an organization fuel a continuous drive towards transformative change. Hence, leadership strategies must help organizations achieve that momentum. Through this discourse, we will understand the role of leadership strategies in sustaining transformation momentum, how leaders can drive transformation alignment, and why leadership timing must align with an organization’s transformation maturity stage.

True Organizational Transformation: Gaining Momentum

The foundation of transformational momentum is built on the question of ‘why.’ It is a purpose that resonates with every level of organizations. Momentum is an authentic and meaningful cause that drives commitment and trust amongst the workforce. True organizational transformation is propelled through middle management, the backbone of organizational success. While turning vision into reality, middle managers act as the bridge between the strategic vision of top leadership and the day-to-day operations. By excelling in diversity of thought and approach in a meta culture, these leaders steer the ship toward unified success.

Senior leaders must move beyond the outdated concept that their role is just to direct. Navigating true organizational transformation to achieve momentum requires the empowerment of the middle managers alongside the entire workforce. Sustaining momentum encompasses three ‘Ms’:

• Meaning: If a transformation is not purpose-aligned, it is likely to fail after a certain period of time. Organizational leaders must ensure that their change goals align with a purpose that matters to employees. This ignites employees’ intrinsic motivation.  

• Measurement: Change should always be measurable. With clear and relatable metrics, leaders and employees should be able to connect with the ongoing transformation. This empowers the team to follow their progress closely and savor each small victory, fueling their drive and building lasting momentum.

• Masterful Communication: As a leader, you must always be able to articulate the vision you have for the organization’s future to your employees. The leader's communicative power may include storytelling to make the vision look tangible and inspire the workforce to work towards that vision.

The combination of these three elements not only ensures a true transformation but also a momentum to sustain that change.

Unveiling the Concept of Momentum: The Flywheel Effect of a Change-Driven Growth

Jim Collins, in his book ‘Good to Great’, has introduced the concept of ‘The Flywheel Effect.’ According to him, “No matter how dramatic the end result, good-to-great transformations never happen in one fell swoop.” Building a great company cannot follow a one-size-fits-all approach. There can’t be a single defining action or one groundbreaking innovation to achieve sustainable organizational growth. It requires relentless pushing of boundaries. The process of establishing change-driven organizational growth is similar to that of pushing a gigantic flywheel relentlessly, turning it up and down, and building momentum until it reaches a point of breakthrough and beyond.

Jim has described the process beautifully in the book, extracting the true essence of achieving transformation momentum: “You keep pushing in a consistent direction. Three turns ... four ... five ... six ... the flywheel builds up speed ... seven ... eight ... you keep pushing ... nine ... ten ... it builds momentum ... eleven ... twelve ... moving faster with each turn ... twenty ... thirty ... fifty ... a hundred. 

Then, at some point—breakthrough! The momentum of the thing kicks in in your favor, hurling the flywheel forward, turn after turn ... whoosh! ... its own heavy weight working for you. You’re pushing no harder than during the first rotation, but the flywheel goes faster and faster. Each turn of the flywheel builds upon work done earlier, compounding your investment of effort. A thousand times faster, then ten thousand, then a hundred thousand. The huge, heavy disk flies forward, with almost unstoppable momentum.”

Success came from each push building on the last, every effort stacking up until the transition was finally achieved.

Leadership Strategies That Could Sustain Transformation Momentum

We perceive transitions by what they look like from the outside, and recognize what it must feel like to those going through them on the inside. In this section, we will discuss leadership strategies for sustaining transformation momentum and examine what it takes to successfully navigate transitions. 

Sustaining momentum after a change implementation can be a real challenge for any organization if it thinks implementing the change was the only tough job. Whether your company is restructuring a department, driving cultural transformation, or rolling out a new system, sustaining momentum after the implementation is pivotal to ensure long-term success. 

Organizations often experience a sharp decline in engagement and energy once they are done with the change implementation. This is where the role of leaders comes into play, ensuring that they hold onto their long-term success. The following are some effective leadership strategies that could help sustain transformation momentum.

1. Celebrating Early Wins Instead of Declaring Early Success

Motivational theories, such as Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, Herzberg’s Two Factor Theory, and more, emphasize the importance of recognition in motivating employees to perform well. By recognizing their efforts, rewarding their performance, and celebrating small achievements, leaders can significantly improve their performance and their organization’s performance as well.

While transitioning and even after the transition, leaders should celebrate early wins to validate the effort and reinforce the belief that the change is working. However, they should not consider the milestones as the endpoint, keeping in mind that this is just the beginning for them. 

2. Reinforcing the “Why” Driving the Change

Over time, people often forget the ‘why’ that once inspired and propelled the transformation. Reiterating the purpose to align it with the goals and the process is an important and conscious move that every leader must take to achieve momentum.  

3. Empowering Middle Managers and Employees

As we mentioned earlier, middle managers are the driving force behind a change implementation, and empowering them also ensures employees remain driven. Leadership timing in transformation maturity is pivotal. The timely deployment of leadership strategies must align with an enterprise’s transformative maturity stage. 

A true leader adapts their approach, shifting from a directive, vision-setting style in early stages to a more inclusive, empowering, and delegating style as the transformation matures. Delegating and empowering middle managers is one such leadership approach that aligns with transformational stages. 

4. Keeping Leaders Visible

Senior leaders should always be at the forefront of the change. Not only during the launch phase, but even after. A consistent engagement of leaders implies commitment and priority, gaining the trust of the people working under them. This helps in managing people in the long run and achieving a sustained transformation momentum.

5. Embedding Transformation into Culture and Processes

A sustainable change can only be achieved when leaders build a change-driven culture by integrating new behaviors into training, onboarding, operational strategies, and performance reviews. Revising policies and keeping the KPIs and team routines aligned with the change could help leaders embed change into the culture.

6. Staying Agile

Flexibility is the key to success, and change is all about adaptability to new things. With continuous feedback loops, leaders can adapt to what’s working in their favor. Through surveys and group discussions, organizations can gather feedback and integrate that feedback into their strategy and decision-making.

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