Change Management (Part 2)

SYNOPSIS

Change can be difficult. But effective management of the change process can lead to long-lasting improvements for both your business and its people. From principles to implementation, use our Change Management (Part 2) deck to welcome a culture of positive evolution. Make adjustments inside your organization to meet your individual success criteria, whether that's higher profitability or elevated brand image.

PREVIEW

TOOL HIGHLIGHTS

OUTCOME

The success of any change management program is hugely dependent on the players involved. It's not just about the success of individual projects, activities, and tasks, but your team's level of understanding, collaboration, and morale. 

That's why excellent communication and guidance are paramount. Use the tools from this deck to assess, prepare, plan, implement, and sustain positive changes.

Communications 

Change of any kind creates resistance, which is why it is important to get everyone on board and motivated with a change. You could communicate a change face-to-face with an all-hands or one-on-one meeting, through an announcement from the executive team, or simply a published FAQ or company-wide email. Sometimes a change is also signaled from external sources, like regulations or legislations that compel the business to rethink how it operates.(Slide 4)

Gap analysis 

Tools like Gap Analysis help you determine what your organization needs to accomplish to complete a change. In a table format, list the "what, where, who, and how" of your current state and desired future state. The change needed is the gap between the two. The action to close the gap entails steps that are needed. 

For instance, let's say your current state is high employee turnover. Your desired future state is keeping great talent on the team as long as possible with higher overall employee satisfaction. 

The gap is the distance between turnover and retention. One action you could take would be to provide more educational resources to develop employee capabilities and make them feel that their career isn't stagnating. 

As a result, employees will feel it's worth their time to stay at the company because they are getting paid to learn and be better prepared to advance their careers when the right opportunity strikes in the future.(Slide 7)

Forces, barriers, and resistance 

External forces of change can compel change management out of the blue. Everything from the nature of the workforce, to technology, to economic shocks, and changing social trends can lead to the need for change. For example, recent global events have normalized remote work as a viable option. As a result, systemic changes are needed to ensure that employees have the tools and software to do their work. And for some industries that handle sensitive data, more measures would need to be implemented to prevent security breaches. Even though internal personnel are the key players who carry out this change, the reason why it took place was due to external circumstances.(Slide 8) 

On the other hand, internal forces of change can come from changes in key leadership, recruiting impediments, or pressure from shareholders.(Slide 9) 

Human beings tend to seek comfort in the status quo. Barriers to change, such as mental resistance, lack of executive commitment, or unrealistic expectations, can be difficult to overcome until they are addressed. For instance, a leader might have unrealistic expectations on how fast the change can be implemented. This sentiment could lead to a lack of appreciation and acknowledgment for the work that employees put in, and negatively impact everyone's drive to continue.(Slide 10) 

Use a feedback form to determine where the areas of resistance are at your organization. Perhaps you have a feeling there is a lack of understanding of the purpose of change. Or maybe it's a lack of support from leadership. Perhaps the change has a high level of impact on daily work patterns. Survey your team and rate their responses from strongly agree to strongly disagree. You can report these findings in a table format.(Slide 11)

Force fleld analysis 

A force field analysis assesses factors that influence a situation. When used in the context of change management, it compares the driving forces that encourage change against the restraining forces that hold it back. For instance, your customers' demand for new products and an increased production speed could encourage change. However, the loss of staff over time (as a result of more efficient production) and the environmental impact to create a new product could hold you back. But when you tally up the scores at the top, you find the benefits still outweigh the barriers in this scenario. Ultimately, you decide it's worthwhile to upgrade the facility equipment and make new products.(Slide 16)

Cost 

It takes time to implement a change, and time is money. Determine your change management cost in a table format that takes the timeframe into account. Assess how long each task will take across a four-quarter period and the total costs associated with the change over the course of a fiscal year.(Slide 26)

Evaluation

As part of "aftercare" and continuous improvement, use a questionnaire to learn what went well, what went wrong, and what could be improved next time. If you're answering a question like, "What has enabled you to sustain the changes?" The answer could be "Every few weeks, we saw incremental improvements in productivity and performance. This provided positive reinforcement that we're on the right path and motivated us to keep going."(Slide 27) 

Share feedback from your questionnaire in a bar graph format, organized by those who strongly agree to strongly disagree with a series of questions. For instance, you might ask how your employees feel about the effectiveness of leadership, or if your company has a strong focus on customers. This feedback will help you analyze how the implemented changes are perceived by your team.(Slide 28)

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