Armani x Change

RIP Armani

Signor Armani died last week. He’s made a lasting impression on fashion, but he’s got something to teach us as transformational leaders, too:

Take out the shoulder pads of the suit. And wear more loafers.

I’m kidding.

Well, kind of. I love stretching a metaphor, and I’m sure I could somehow draw some dubious change lesson here if nip came to tuck.

But at a more principle-based level, Signor Armani did love to say this:

The essence of style is a simple way of saying something complex.

I’ve never really thought of a change process needing to be stylish, but there’s something powerful here. It seems that other leaders feel the same.

I interviewed Paolo Pisano, CHRO for the Booking.com Group recently (episode coming out in a few months), and when I asked him what his most singular piece of modern change mastery was, he answered:

Simplify!

Which in turn reminded me of an interview with Tobi Lütke, CEO of Shopify and an excellent first principle thinker, who said:

You can tame enormous complexity with good UX.

Be Stylish

Here are three things you could do to search for style in the way you’re leading change.

1. Make it visual

Sketch out your design. Drawing things makes them real. What’s going to happen, and what does that look like? What’s the final outcome, and what does that look like? What are the tiny details that will make all the difference, and what do they look like?

2. Give it a theme

Every haute couture show has its own angle. If your change program had to be staged in Paris to a lot of Very Beautiful People Wearing Oversized Sunglasses, what would grab their attention? What would have both gravitas and whimsy?

3. Remove one of the big things

Just cut it out. Subtraction is one of the great underutilized tools of change.

(“Remove the shoulder pads.”)

4. Explain it in a single breath

If it takes more than that, there’s more simplicity to be found on the other side of complexity.

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