Facilitating Change at UNICEF Vietnam

In June this year Vietnam became the first country in Asia to experience Free To Grow’s empowering processes.

Lotta Sylwander, the Country Representative of the UNICEF country office in Vietnam, explains: “The office is going through the very painful process of downscaling and restructuring and we were very aware that it would raise a lot of negative emotions and could potentially result in conflict. We hired a consultant to advise us regarding the technical aspects of the process, but I was concerned that our people were not adequately taken care of. It was not possible for us to deal with this in a constructive manner on our own without professional assistance.”

Sylwander explained that Free To Grow was selected for the assignment because their suggested approach related very well to the organisation’s needs. Having had previous experience of Free To Grow’s programmes, she also believed that they have the right kind of capacity and methodology to assist the office meaningfully. The fact that Free To Grow (FTG) have presented training to more than 12 Unicef offices over the past few years and therefore has a good understanding of the organisation, furthermore counted in FTG’s favour.

The process consisted of three phases spanning just over a month:

1.  The first phase focused on staff training: Three 2-day workshops helped staff to work through:
   • their emotions regarding either having to leave, or staying behind
   • working  with instead of against the change
   • expressing their feelings and concerns to management in a constructive manner.
2. The second phase comprised a staff retreat: Staff and managers attended a two day programme together where they were assisted to understand each other’s perspectives, motivations and intentions. Concrete action steps were taken to address problem areas that were identified as blocking the process. 
3. The final phase was management training: Managers attended Leading Change, a two day programme to equip them with the mindset and practical skills to lead the change and support people more effectively.

The overwhelming majority of staff experienced the process as healing and empowering, helping them to take several steps forward. A much more open climate was created in the office and a new level of trust and participation has developed.

Sylwander says, “For Asian people it is of utmost importance not to ‘lose face’. This results in a situation where everyone keeps quiet and doesn’t raise concerns. The methodology used by Free To Grow created a safe and secure space for people to open up and the level and ease of participation grew from workshop to workshop. I am quite amazed at how far we moved during this period. Healing took place, staff opened up in a non judgmental way which made it easier for management to acknowledge and understand their concerns and we were all led to take the steps in our control to take the process forward.”