Its all about change (more than ever)

The first time I had the opportunity to lead a Change Management project was 8 years ago in México, in that time this was not a topic in the agendas of HR directors here in Spain, many clients though that the change management was about sending nice emails and develop a couple of training in soft skills, everyone could do the job. But not only the clients though this way, many colleagues reacted in the same way when I explained Change Management projects with questions like "But, the clients are not going to pay for that, they just need the new system to be up and running…"

This kind of mindsets, from many colleagues, evolved with the time, from an initial scenario like "ok, we are the implementation team and for sure we can do a communication plan etc." to a more mature scenario, something like "Well, we know about the systems and you guys know about the people, and how they will embrace this change".

 

The first challenge of a Change Management (CM) project leader is always to convince his or her own organization about the importance of the CM project, "Ok, let’s do CM, but...where is the project? well, sell it and call me back with the opportunity" use to be a common mindset a couple of years ago, the work between departments, and long term perspective in the development of the business has suppose a big help in increasing the CM projects. But the key element in changing this old fashion mindset about CM has been the impact that the CM leaders has done in their projects, let’s review why the CM projects has a deep impact not only in the projects team but also in the company and its culture:

 

• It's a personal thing: When explaining the important things about CM projects I use to start with the same idea: You cannot do a CM project just sitting in front of your laptop, the PPTs or XLS are not enough. The CM team must be in direct connection not just with the Project sponsor, but also with the main project leaders, stakeholders, key user, etc.. Listen in a continuous way their opinions it’s a key element in order to develop powerful and useful strategies.

• Understand where we are: It’s a common mistake in some CM leaders to deliver always in the same way, it doesn’t matter the company and the culture, they just arrive with its magical briefcase, open it and the magic begins. Well it really doesn’t work always this way. The strategies of CM must be aligned to the culture and the philosophy of the organization, and this doesn’t mean that we cannot develop innovate strategies; understanding where we are it’s the first step to develop a good impact.

• Internal and external change: During the planification of the CM strategies we use to consider the external audiences of the project, the final users of the tool, the clients, providers and all the people impacted by the change, but use to forget about the project team itself; in the IT implementations (SAP, Salesforce, etc.) it’s common to see how different groups of specialized people TRY to work together to get work done, but this try is not always enough. The CM workstream must have this internal look, providing spaces a channels to share ideas and concerns about the project.

• We all are Change Management Team: When in a project the things start going wrong its common to listen comments like “The CM guys will fix this” or “Things are not going well because of the CM”, this mindset of “us vs them” its and scenario where the “internal look” we talked before has not been developed, and its not a good scenario for CM. One of the slogans we use to repeat to our Business or IT colleagues its: “You are CM team too”. The power of the CM depends not only on the CM team actions but also in how we can help our colleagues in supporting others on getting over their fears and getting engaged with the change

 

The Change Management Office could be the difference between an authentic transformation in the organization and a mandatory change, the first one have impacts not only in the success of the project but also in the culture of the organization, developing strategies and resources for the changes and challenges to come