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Odense Municipality

From strategy to embedding - strengthening the entire leadership chain

Background and need

Change is a basic condition in public-sector organisations - but the ability to translate change into lasting practice is far from given. In the Employment and Social Services Administration in Odense Municipality, the ambition was to strengthen the entire leadership chain's ability to do precisely that: to lead change so it actually becomes embedded in everyday practice.

The leadership chain spans four levels, and there was a clear need for a shared starting point - in language, understanding and approach to change management. At the same time it was clear that classic, rational models were not sufficient on their own. Leaders needed, to a greater extent, to be able to navigate the tension between structure and people - between what's planned and what emerges along the way.

The task was therefore not just to bring in knowledge, but to develop a more unified change capacity in the organisation.

Solution

We designed a programme focused on strengthening leaders' ability to work in an integrated way with both the rational and emotional dimensions of change.

Rather than treating change management as a set of tools, the programme took its starting point in the concrete challenges leaders were facing. The aim was to build a practice-near understanding of how change is planned, carried out and - not least - embedded.

The programme was built around two intensive full-day workshops with trialling in own practice in between. That way the learning was continuously linked to the leaders' everyday life and their current change tasks.

Workshop 1: Creating direction and understanding the dynamics of change

The focus was on establishing a shared foundation. The leaders worked on:

  • Basic principles of change management and what characterises successful implementation.
  • How to create clear direction, frame changes and prioritise efforts.
  • The interplay between behaviour, communication and involvement as drivers of progress.
  • Understanding resistance and engagement - not as barriers, but as reactions that need to be led.
  • Insight into the psychological mechanisms that affect people in change.

Workshop 2: From insight to embedding

Between the two workshops, the leaders worked with their own change cases. That gave a concrete starting point for the second workshop, which focused on:

  • Reflecting on own practice - what created progress, and where did challenges arise?
  • The organisation's overall change capacity and the ability to prioritise and coordinate changes.
  • The emotional dimension of change - and how leaders can work with it actively.
  • The leader's role as both direction-setter and support - and the balance between the two.

A central move in the programme was precisely the linking of shared reflection and concrete application. The leaders did not work with cases 'from outside', but with their own changes - and developed their approach as their experience grew.

Results

The programme has strengthened the leaders' ability to lead change as a unified discipline - not split into plan and implementation, but as a coherent process.

The leaders are left with:

  • A shared language and a shared understanding of what good change management is.
  • Greater security in navigating complex and often conflicting demands.
  • Increased attention to the interplay between structure, behaviour and emotions.
  • Concrete experience in translating insight into action in their own changes.

For Odense Municipality this means a strengthened change capacity across leadership levels. Changes are handled to a greater extent as shared tasks, where direction, involvement and embedding are thought through together from the start. The municipality's leadership chain is now better equipped to navigate the complex landscape of upcoming changes. Through a combination of rational planning and sensitivity to the human aspects of change, the leaders are able to handle more effectively both the structural and the emotional challenges that come with change management.

At the same time, a more realistic and usable picture of change management has been created: not as a linear process, but as a discipline that requires ongoing adjustment, leadership attention and an understanding of the people who have to make it succeed in practice.