David FrazierIS&T Management Consultant| Karistem ConsultingParis, France
One of the big challenges as an IT management consultant today is to find a message that resonates when advocating change. As an example, I currently provide ITIL expertise, including change management support, to a large multi-national firm in Europe, which I will refer to as Firm A.
One of the ITIL process areas that I am currently working to improve is the Change Management process, which is a very specific type of "change" but still relevant to the larger thread in this forum. Many IT and business professionals in Firm A actively seek ways around implementing the ITIL CM process, due to a fear (both real and imagined) that it will reduce project efficiency and increase the delivery time to properly implement ITIL CM.
Without going into the arguments for how and why such resistance to CM actually increases costs and reduces project efficiency/effectiveness, the key point here is to highlight one way that resistance to change is being broken down in Firm A. Invariably, firms that manage IT operations without adequate process emphasis experience incidents as a result of this lack of control over certain aspects of IT operations.
Firm A experienced a major incident involving a key internal communications tool. The tool failure impacted every employee that used the tool, which was nearly every employee. Furthermore, the root cause of the incident/problem was the lack of sufficient controls over ITIL CM, including internal communications.
The best thing to come out of the incident (lesson learned) was that it sometimes takes an incident such as this to highlight the importance of internal process and controls in IT operations. Perhaps, the moral of this story is that crises often drive change for the better. Saving Changes...
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arlene trimbleAssistant IT Director| Local GovernmentAlamo, Ca, United States
Yes, I agree. Unfortunately in some organizations, a crisis or failure needs to happen before they recognize that something needs to change to fix the situation that has failed already.
Some organizations may think that establishing a change management process is just another red tape or bureacratic process that delays existing operations. In some organizations, this is true as the change management process that was established was very cumbersome and process focused rather than outcome focus. This is primarily one of the reasons why organizations hesitate to have an established management process.
In today's fast changing world, we need to be lean and mean when we establish a change management process so that the sponsors and stakeholders are aware of the value that the change process brings to the organization and the importance of using it. Saving Changes...
Your analyisis apply for all industries and business, "Resistance to Change" is a great problem for continuos improvement, for productivity, and finally impact in the "competitiveness" of the business. Saving Changes...
Rehan AzeemProject Manager| University of LahorePakistan
In most of the firms, CM process is not being acceptable as some of the employees disagrees as they think CM will slow the working process and they in need to learn more things, but actually, CM could be a difficult thing to adopt, but end result is a positive one. Saving Changes...
The irony about change is that almost everybody agrees to its need but very few have actually deviced change management procedures in their organizations. Saving Changes...
Michel WagnerProject and Program Manager| FujitsuSydney, Nsw, Australia
The article focuses on breaking down resistance to change and I understand that you are illustrating with an example of needing to change the CM process.
The technique you are using consists of highlighting major incidents as a result of the status quo / current situation.
This is the valuable point and a key way to engage stakeholders at the start of an initiative is to ask them what difficulties they have recently experienced. For example, they may say that it takes too long for an order to be fulfilled and the customers have been disgruntled. They may have lost some sales as a result of poor back-office performance.
Ask the stakeholders and they will tell you. Later, you will be able to sell the change more easily by quoting their issues and confirming how the change you are introducing improves the current situation. Saving Changes...
Pashori LalTransformation Director, Author, International Speaker| Balmoral Change ConsultingCoventry, West Midlands, United Kingdom
Carrying out a stakeholder analysis is really the major starting point and absolutely essential if you are going to be able to identify the pockets of resistance wherever they may be.
It is all too easy to focus on the resistance you can see because it is in your face. Just as crucial is the resistance you don't see because it is covert, beneath the surface, where the real resistant party gives the bullets to others who then fire those bullets in arguments posed to you.
Once you understand the who, then you can focus on their why. Why do they feel that way? What do they know about the change? What relationship do you already have with them? How can you use that relationship to break down the barriers and move them along the scale of engagement.
It sounds like great theory and fine words but you will see their value when, like me, you put them into practice and reap the real rewards. You may even have the situation (which you actively create) where you can use one stakeholder to persuade another stakeholder about the change and its benefits.
Breaking down the barriers of resistance is key to successful introduction of change at all levels. If anyone wants to know more about carrying out a stakeholder analysis, send me an email or a request, I will be happy to help. Saving Changes...
