systematicHR

Change management is a critical part of almost any project and it is a determinant in the successful implementation in both technology and process projects. I believe change management should be an organized function within the PMO. How it’s structured if there is a separate group of people working on change management, if change is embedded into the (program management) PMO structure, or if it’s even embedded into the project management structure is up to each individual organization.

What is critical about change management is the understanding of it’s different components, all of which are represented at some point in the project structure:

• Training Management
• Communications
• Behavioral Change

I recently spent 2 hours at the store of my local cell phone vendor. They were deploying a new sales system and the day I was there was the last day the “old” system would be available as a safety net. Through the prior week, all sales associates had been transitioning to the new system, but they were all attempting to use and learn it in the process. What should have been a 30 minute transaction was fraught with errors, multiple phones, and wasted time. In the process, several attempts at the new system finally resulted in giving up and making the sale on the old system. I also hear comments like “this is a stupid system… we didn’t need to change it,” and “the way this works doesn’t make sense,” and “hey, do any of you other guys know how I am supposed to do this?” The vendor (possibly the largest in the U.S.) trained and communicated poorly. They also instilled very little desire to change behaviors in their sales group by not having sufficient buy-in.

Training management is simply that – if you are rolling out new process or systems, practitioners affected will need to understand and be trained on the new operating procedures in order to minimize losses in productivity. It should be part of every project plan, thought through carefully so that the team identifies all impacted employees and organizations, and trains each component to the appropriate level at the appropriate time.

Communications are also simply that – as you implement anything, communications should impact recipient employees and organizations by creating excitement and giving information. If all you’re doing is implementing a new performance management process, the communication plan can sit at the project level. However, if you have a multi-functional implementation where performance, recruiting, and training processes are all being impacted, communications makes sense to be centralized and integrated into the program management structure.

Behavioral change is the most difficult component, and it’s what true change management practitioners spend their time thinking about – your vendor can train, corporate communications can communicate, but very few people know how to effectively create changes in behaviors over a large and diverse population. Over the next couple of days I’ll talk about behavioral changes in several different populations. Talk to you again…