“We would not have turned this important project around without the outstanding support of Paths To Change.”
— Dan Weisiger, Director of BioSciences Operations at CH2M HILL
Outcomes of the work:
- Led the successful resolution of significant change-management breakdowns that threatened the project, allowing continued progress on a renewable technology with the potential to generate hundreds of millions of dollars of profit annually, and to preserve threatened ecosystems;
- Guided the successful conclusion of an important study vital to a top-priority planning effort for a multi-million dollar capital-budget plan;
- Received highest client-satisfaction praise at the conclusion of the project.
Situation Summary
CH2M HILL is one of the leading Engineering & Construction firm in the US in the scale-up, design, and construction of unique or first-of-a-kind process plants.
The company had engaged in a joint venture with a confidential high-tech partner on the preliminary design of a major commercial plant for manufacturing “clean-tech” renewable biochemicals. When brought to market, this renewable technology has the potential to generate hundreds of millions of dollars of profit annually. Additionally, it would replace a conventional manufacturing process that currently significantly harms the environment.
At a key point in the early phases of the joint venture, there was a series of serious change-management breakdowns between the joint-venture partners concerning strategy, metrics, expectations, alignment, culture, communications, etc.
At one point, the high-tech partner was considering terminating the project.
From Dan Weisiger, Director, BioSciences Operations, CH2M HILL
Dan Weisiger shares his perspective on his experience of working with Paths to Change:
“I am crystal clear that we would not have turned this important project around without the outstanding support of Paths To Change.
We’d reached a major impasse with our joint-venture partner at a critical time in the project. We were facing major project deadlines driven by demands of the business and external market factors.
My colleagues and I would have loved the luxury of sitting down with our partner for as long as necessary to understand the issues and work out required course-corrections, but time was one luxury we did not have.
This was a train wreck on the verge of happening – the termination of a major strategic initiative worth millions of dollars; delaying the rollout of a product expected to have enormous profitability and designed to replace a conventional manufacturing process that was damaging ecosystems significantly; not to mention the foreseeable derailing of careers.
We knew we had to get things turned around, and do it quickly, so we brought in (the lead consultant from Paths to Change).
Frankly, I didn’t know how much we could expect in an initial set of meetings, nor was I sure that the project was even salvageable by that point. As two organizations, we seemed to be at an irresolvable impasse.
To start, (the lead consultant from Paths to Change) led an exceptionally thorough assessment with key stakeholders of both companies – and at that, in less than two weeks, which was the only window of time we had available.
Then he convened a daylong meeting of six senior business leaders and project team members.
To my complete surprise, he was able to bring us to deep breakthroughs in understanding and alignment in just one meeting.
It was clear that, from his assessment, he had pieced together the major sources of breakdown, like putting together a puzzle.
However, he couldn’t just throw his assessment and recommendations out on the table like a completed puzzle and tell us what to do, because that wouldn’t have produced the breakthroughs that allowed us to move forward effectively.
Instead, he very adeptly guided us through the core issues, helping us dig into them to reach a common understanding of what had gone wrong.
He led us through a series of complex issues from metrics and safety protocols in a key chemical manufacturing process, to a serious misperception on our part of what had been intended with one critical inter-team communiqué.
After successfully working through three or four of these, we experienced a huge shift. The two teams began to interact collegially, and we even found ourselves laughing at some of the ways in which we’d been misaligned.
In that single, highly efficient daylong session, we achieved sufficient breakthroughs to produce solid operating principles and a detailed action plan that allowed us to move ahead collaboratively. Not only had we made it through the woods, but we were able to begin establishing a clear path to complete the major project phase we were in.
In addition to deftly leading us through that tangle, he also provided follow-up consulting to ensure a continuation of the successes we had achieved in the daylong session.
Even though his pre-session work was thorough and engaged, I still wouldn’t have believed it was possible to have such dramatic turnaround with so many busy, diverse people in such a short timeframe.
That we were able to do that and position a large-budget project to go to the next level indicates the consummate level of commitment and skill that (the lead consultant from Paths to Change) brought to his work with us.”