Change Process Management

Change Process Management

Ashley Bax

Columbia College

MGMT 339

Dr. Jane

December 7, 2016

Introduction

In today’s society, one of the most essential characteristics in business is the change in the operations and activities. Due to the ever changing and fluctuating environment in the world of business, organization must be ready for change. Change is a process and should be executed in an organized and well communicated sequence of events.

        “Change has a bad reputation in our society. But it isn’t all bad – not by any means. In fact, change is necessary in life – to keep us moving … to keep us growing … to keep us interested … Imagine life without change. It would be static … boring … dull” – Dr. Dennis O’Grady

Change is also important to businesses; because with change comes competitive advantage and allows the organization to fulfill their strategic and core objectives. Change management in organizations is very important and a plan should be implemented to successfully complete the desired change. Change management is the process of preparing and supporting individuals in order to successfully adapt to change in order to meet organizational goals and their objectives.

Preparing for Change

        When an organization decides that a change in their normal process is need there are a few steps that should be taken in order to make the changes successful. The first step is readiness assessment. The organization and upper management need to lay out the details and see how the change is going to affect everyone as a whole and then break down the affects by smaller segments. By breaking down all the changes and the people it will affect will allow for a well-organized plan and will be easier to explain to the rest of the organization. The managers need to figure out how big the change is. The next step in readiness assessment is to know who all will be impacted by the change. Managers need to know and understand how groups and people will be affected by the changes being made. Managers also need to know how to communicate the need for change. This will involve knowing the whole problem and the solution or change that will take place to fix the problem. The final step in the readiness assessment is to know whether the change will be a gradual change or a drastic change. Once the people affected and the problem and solution have been developed, management must start communicating the changes that will take place. Management needs to start by building awareness. In order to build awareness management needs to make sure that everyone understands the need for change. Some will be resistant to change; however, with a good explanation of the need and awareness built on the change this should lower the number of individuals who feel resistant. By establishing a sense of urgency you help individuals see the issue and the impact it is having on the organization. In Kurt Lewin’s theory this stage would be considered the unfreezing stage of his three stage model. This stage is in preparation of the change, this involves getting everyone to the point of understanding that the change is needed to meet the objectives of the organization.

Managing Change

        At this point, there should be a change plan in place. Once the plan is communicated and an understanding of expectations is known, management can start to implement the plan. Knowing the goals and objectives will start to play a role in monitoring the change process. Managers and supervisors are responsible for and play a critical role in the process of managing change. The manager has the most influence over an individual and their expectations of the process. Although, some managers are the hardest to portray the need for change they are the ones that upper management must get involved and try to solve any issues they managers have with the changes. Once the supervisors and managers are on board then they must be given the tools needed to successfully train and manage their staff through the changes being implemented.  The change management team needs to make sure the proper training and guidance for their managers is available and that it includes how to use the individual change management tools such as using their own accomplishments as a tool and to build their supervisors and front-line employee’s awareness. Training is the cornerstone for building the knowledge about the changes being made and the skills required to be successful. The primary role is to make sure the people affected are being trained at the right time to ensure success. The management team should create the training requirements based on the knowledge, skills, and the behaviors to meet the needs of implementation. The requirements are a good starting point for the team to develop the project and training programs.  Unfortunately, with change there is sometimes resistance to the change. Resistance to change is very normal but can be addressed proactively to ensure the changed project is not adversely affected. The change management team needs to make sure they identify the resistance, listen and understand the actions throughout the organization. Resistance management is considered the tools and process used to help managers support the employees who show resistance.