Elements of Change Management

Change management is an operational process that helps organizations deal with change and have an efficient and seamless transition.

All organizations experience change. Change occurs when a company expands into new territory or manufactures a new brand or product. Change happens when new clients jump on board and the old way of doing things doesn’t deliver exactly what they need. Change is the order of the day when two companies merge or when a new CEO is appointed.

Change is inevitable when a company continues to grow and needs new and better ways to exploit opportunity. Outstanding companies embrace change and put a premium on change management.

In a nutshell, the role of change management is to successfully manage change. Change management is primarily concerned with three basic elements:

1. The Nature of Change
Naturally, it all begins and ends with change. The key to successful change management is to understand clearly what change involves and to implement the correct plan on how to deal with it.

To deal with change, an organization must ask the right questions. What is the nature of the change that it requires to be managed? What are the goals of this change and what is necessary to achieve them? What are the key departments involved and how many of their people will be affected? Who is the sponsor of change and who will be in charge of change management?

The organization must mobilize a team to address change. The team may include project leaders within the company or external specialists who are more familiar with the technical side of the change. This team can either be under Human Resources or assigned under the department where most of the change takes place. The sponsor of the change must create a team structure that best addresses change management.

2. The Repercussions of Change
Change management has two perspectives: the organization and the people. The repercussions of change are usually strongest in the rank and file. They manifest themselves in two areas: technical and behavioral.

In the technical area, change management is concerned with whether the skills of employees are sufficient to deal with changes in their deliverables and whether the company’s systems and processes adequately support the attainment of these deliverables. Is additional training necessary? Will the company have to hire specialists and new project leaders? Does the company have to tweak or drastically alter its systems and processes? These are the questions that change management must address.

In the behavioral area, change management is concerned with how people deal with change and whether this affects their behavior and performance on the job. Is there resistance to the new way of doing things? Are employees stressed or depressed and does this affect their productivity? Is there resentment, disloyalty, mistrust, envy? The behavioral area of change management can sometimes be the most difficult to manage.

3. Addressing the Imperatives of Change
Based on the first two elements, the organization must now determine strategy and draw up a plan of action to address the imperatives of change.

This plan should include a roadmap that gives a step-by-step account of what the organization must do to manage change properly. The plan should have provisions for training employees to develop new skills, coaching them as they use these new skills and motivating them to fully adapt to the new way of doing things. The plan should also anticipate resistance and how to deal with it.

The change management team should also plan how to communicate change to employees in a manner that emphasizes its benefits, addresses resistance and prompts them to embrace change.

In closing, the plan should ensure that employees have successfully adapted to change and that the desired levels of efficiency and productivity are achieved on a consistent basis.

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