Success Story

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About the company
With annual sales of more than $9 billion, Thermo Fisher Scientific employs 30,000 people and serves over 350,000 customers within pharmaceutical and biotech companies, hospitals and clinical diagnostic labs, universities, research institutions and government agencies, as well as environmental and industrial process control settings. 

What was changing?
Thermo Fisher’s Madison, Wisconsin facility makes high-tech instruments and electronic equipment to aid in scientific analyses. Themeasurement capability of this equipment is so precise that in many cases it is admissible as court evidence. Because of the need for such precision, the consistency, quality and uniformity of the products are very important.

Over the past several years, the Madison facility has undergone some significant structural changes. Spectra Tech, Spectronic, and Noran, three business units acquired by the company, relocated to the Madison facility in 2002, 2003, and 2004, respectively. Nine total product lines are now produced in Madison, adding significant complexity to the production process.

As a part of this integration, management had begun to consider how to better preserve and document the “native knowledge” of many experienced employees so that the significant skill required to build and test these products could be preserved and passed on.

At that same time, a culture shift was also underway. The company had begun focusing on key business metrics and putting related measurements in place, holding monthly meetings to report on progress. As a result of these changes, the organization was expecting more and more of its people. In the words of Cory Erickson, Human Resources Director at the Madison facility, all these changes converging at the same time were described by some employees as “the perfect storm.” 

What did they do?
The leadership of Thermo Fisher’s Madison site wanted to give their employees the tools they needed to navigate these current changes successfully, as well as to better anticipate changes further down the road.

After looking at several options, they chose to work with Spencer Johnson Partners (SJP). Cory had become a certified trainer when the SJP program had been offered at another site in the company, and word of the program’s effectiveness had gotten around. Members of the Madison leadership group read Who Moved My Cheese? and did some research on the process, determining that SJP offered the best option for Gaining Change Skills training. Says Cory, “People liked the fact that it was relatively simple. And, as a well-recognized name with 23 million copies of the book sold, Who Moved My Cheese? was a brand and a concept everyone could relate to.”

 

Cory adds, “One of the four values of the Thermo Fisher Scientific culture is intensity. Because of our relentless focus on the job, anything else we do must be viewed as extremely valuable. It’s not a matter of making the time; it’s a matter of priority. It was very helpful that the SJP training was presented in chunks that easily integrated into our work lives. The Gaining Change Skills Training was only half a day.”

The Madison site began the training at a measured pace, conducting a pilot with a carefully selected group in May 2006. Cory recalls: “Tom [SPJ’s Tom James] was an awesome trainer. One big surprise for me was that when I went through the self-assessment for change readiness, I actually came out more change-averse than I thought I was. When I shared that with Tom, he observed that there is a little bit of “Hem” and “Haw” [characters from the book] in all of us. And, as Tom said, if we were all already there, we wouldn’t need to go through training.” 

The training also encouraged site management to share their own personal change experiences. People appreciated this personal touch—and as managers shared their stories, others would open up and share their own. 

The initial pilot received rave reviews, so more sessions were scheduled and in early 2007 a commitment was made to train the entire site. Employees are continuously encouraged to use the change tools and have personal responsibility and accountability for implementing what they’ve learned.

Says Cory, “Towards the end of the initial training, I saw folks who’d had significant reservations really come around with a very positive attitude about the change process. We used the “Winning Today” feature on the SJP web site and shared those principles with the class. People especially embraced the idea of being an advocate, rather than being a victim, of change.” 

What results have they seen?
According to Cory, going through the training has led to less stress and less hand-wringing about change. He’s also noticed that people are approaching change with a more positive attitude. “You can really tell that people are embracing change when they talk about change differently,” he says. “Now, instead of worrying or complaining, people will smile and say, “Well, my cheese is getting moved again!”

The Madison facility will continue offering the training on an as-needed basis and plans to move all new employees through it to keep the momentum going. “It really works,” says Cory. “It’s very simple, but like the training says, “Simple is powerful.”