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How can we overcome cultural resistance?
In our previous blog (posted on 30th August 2019) we discussed how resistance to IT cultural changes can obstruct organizations from strengthening their enterprise security posture. In this blog, we are going to discuss five ways how this crisis situation can be handled effectively by assuaging the workforce’s fear and misconceptions.
Meeting/ Brief Training: It is extremely important for an organization to provide details about the changes employees are going to face. Each and everyone working in the team should be aware of the IT security risks, do’s & don’ts of the action, what restrictions should be taken while accessing privileged accounts, what IT administrators should minitor. Today, organizations can’t depend only on Anti-Virus or Firewalls to prevent data theft; instead robust risk preventive and risk predictive solutions like Privileged Access Management (PAM) is required for advanced security. Most of the times it is seen that organizations ignore this training part and directly announce the functional changes which creates ambiguities among the employees.
Assurance for betterment: At any cost, organizations should provide complete assurance about the benefits of the changes to the employees. Which role would be excluded/ included; what would be the advantage; which new system they will have to adapt to – all these factors should be made clear so that the employees should be assured about their work and career. Once new IT security solution is implemented by the security team, organizations should ensure a session on the advantages of the solution and how it can ensure betterment of the entire IT operations. Not only that, the administrative efficiency which can be enhanced by the deployment of new IT security solution (like PAM), should be explained to the employees in details so that they know the importance of a change.
Resolve Confusion & Conflicts quickly: It is highly imperative to inculcate a good team spirit among the employees which can erase conflicts and confusions in a better way. During the transition period, the personal anxieties that arise among the employees can be resolved in an effective way if the other members (who have understood the benefits of transition) in the team take initiative to make things clear. Frequent team meetings and team bonding sessions help to understand and appreciate each other in a better way, especially if the transparency of the transition is conveyed systematically.
Remain Positive, Supportive & Trustworthy: It is highly essential for organizations to support and edify a positive leader who inspires free thoughts, galores creativity and encourages honest communication for the development of the team. Employees normally expect team leaders or managers to handle the functional changes. Inspirational positive leaders create a habit where changes are accepted as challenges and the zeal to perform germinates. It even increases the confidence among the employees that the changes would offer better security to the enterprise assets.
Inculcate a Learning Attitude: Everything in the world changes. It is inevitable and unavoidable. Thus, resisting changes is indirectly resisting the reality. Organizations can take initiative to inculcate the learning attitude among the employees which can eventually help them to accept anything new. Thus it is said, “When a surfer gets tense riding a wave, he falls; when a leader gets tense adapting to change, he fails.” Hence, a learning mindset is the key.
Counselling: This would require during extreme situations where employees resist changes in a nasty way and it influences the rest of the operations badly. In a way, organizations should take the initiative of changes in a logical pattern so that this situation does not arise at all. The suggestions mentioned above once implemented can refrain the organization from falling into such situations when counselling would require.
Bottom Line: Resistance to changes is prevalent in human blood. Changing this notion is almost a herculean task. Hence, instead of allowing the employees to reach that state of mind, organizations should concentrate on the above mentioned steps to smoothen the business processes and ensure the security of enterprise assets.
ARCON is a leading enterprise risk control solutions provider, specializing in risk-predictive technologies. ARCON | User Behaviour Analytics enables to monitor end-user activities in real time. ARCON | Privileged Access Management reinforces access control and mitigates data breach threats. ARCON | Secure Compliance Management is a vulnerability assessment tool.
