Roles in change management
| Change management cannot be done by one person sitting
alone in his or her office. Driving successful change
requires a system of actors all moving in unison to
help employees to understand why the change is
happening, get them board with the change and ultimately
ensure that they adopt
the changes required in their day-to-day work. It is not necessarily
easy to get all of the change management pieces moving; but by better understanding the roles that support
effective change management, you and your projects will be
more successful.
This tutorial examines five roles related to change
management:
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Change management
resource/team
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Executives and senior
managers
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Middle managers and
supervisors
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Project team
-
Project support functions
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Prosci has developed tools to support each of
the change management roles. Find out more in the
bookstore or call 970-203-9332 to speak with an analyst. |
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Learn why each role is important and what is required of
the role in times of change. The tutorial concludes with
some observations on the "employee-facing" roles in change management and the "enabling"
roles in change management.
Change management roles:
| Change management resource/team |
Why the role is important:
- Having dedicated resources for change management was #4
on the list of overall greatest contributors to success in
the 2007 benchmarking study.
- There is a growing body of data that shows a correlation
between the success of a change initiative and how well the
people side was managed.
- Without dedicated resources, change management
activities will not be completed. Unfortunately, when
budgets and schedules are squeezed, change management is
pushed to the bottom of the priority list if there are not
dedicated resources.
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What the role
requires:
- Apply a structured change management methodology
- instead of operating in an ad hoc manner, approach change
management with purpose and intent (read
more about Prosci's methodology)
- Formulate strategy - evaluate how big the change is
and who will be impacted to develop a customized strategy
- Develop plans - based on the strategy work,
create a customized set of plans for moving people forward -
including a communication plan, a sponsor roadmap, a
coaching plan, a training plan and a resistance management
plan (read
more about the five plans in Prosci's methodology)
- Support other ‘doers’ - the change management
resource is the coach and the go-to person for the other roles
described below
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| Executives and senior managers |
Why the role is important:
- In the 2007 benchmarking study, the active and visible
participation of the senior leader was cited as the #1 contributor to
success. And in the 2005 study it was also #1. And in the
2003, 2000 and 1998 studies it was #1 on the list. Bottom
line - their role is crucial to success.
- Employees want to see and hear the executive's
commitment to the change. The authority they provide carries
over to other change management actors.
- Effective sponsorship is a predictor of success or
failure on the project.
|
What the role
requires:
- Participate actively and visibly throughout the
project - there are three key words here: active,
visible and throughout - sponsors must be present and seen
by employees
- Build a coalition of sponsorship and manage
resistance - the sponsorship coalition describes the
group of managers and leaders who will take the change back
to their department, division, workgroup, etc - the primary
sponsor must build and maintain a healthy coalition
- Communicate directly with employees - employees
want to hear the business reasons for the change from
someone at the top
* From the 2007 benchmarking study. |
| Middle managers and supervisors |
Why the role is important:
- Managers and supervisors are close to the action - it is
their teams who must change how they do their jobs for the change
to be successful.
- In any organization there are two types of change
constantly happening: 1) top-down initiatives launched by
senior leaders (macro-changes) and 2) responses to daily
demands from customers and suppliers (micro-changes).
Managers and supervisors support their employees through
both types of changes.
- The attitude and actions of a manager will show up in
his or her people - whether the attitude is one of support
or one of opposition.
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What the role
requires:
Based on the 2007 benchmarking study, the five roles of
managers and supervisors during change are:
- Communicator - employees prefer to hear messages
about how the change directly impacts them and their team
from the person they report to
- Advocate - if the manager opposes the change,
chances are that his or her people will as well - in many
cases, the opposite is also true
- Coach - helping employees through their own
personal transitions is the essence of change coaching by
middle managers and supervisors
- Liaison - the role of liaison involves
interacting with the project team, taking direction and
providing feedback
- Resistance manager - research shows that the best
intervention to mitigate resistance comes from the
employee's immediate supervisor
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Why the role is important:
- The project team is tasked with managing the technical
side of the change. In the end, they are the people who
design how things will be done differently than they are
today.
- Without direction and management, the technical side of
the project will not move forward.
- The project team also plays a role in ensuring that
change management is part of the project - by providing the
appropriate resources (budget and personnel) and time.
- Change management will be most effective when it is
pulled in at the launch of the project.
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What the role
requires:
- Design the actual change - create the solution
that ultimately impacts how people do their jobs
- Manage the ‘technical side’ - with tools like the
charter, business case, schedule, resources, work breakdown
structure, budget, etc.
- Engage with CM team/resource - work with the
change management resource or team to ensure that the
technical-side and the people-side of the change progress in
unison, provide timely project information
- Integrate CM plans into project plan - begin
change management at the start of the project and weave the
change management strategy and plans into the
technical-side plans to create one seamless project plan
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| Project support functions |
Why the role is important:
- Project support functions bring expertise in a
particular area - these groups include: Human Resources staff, Organization Development staff, Training specialists, Communication specialists,
solution specific Subject Matter Experts, etc.
- In some cases, one of these project support functions
might operate as the change management team or resource.
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What the role
requires:
- Experience and expertise - project support
functions bring experience on past changes that can be
applied to the current change
- Knowledge - each of these groups have specialized
knowledge that can help the project team and the change
management resource or team
- Tools - each of the areas bring specific tools
that support change management activities - just be sure the tools align with change management
best practices
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A final observation on two different roles
In the sections above, we outlined the key roles of the different
actors involved in making changes successful in any organization. It is
interesting to note that in all of the roles presented in the right hand
column, two of the roles have direct contact with front-line employees
impacted by the change while three of the roles do more of their work
behind the scenes.
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Employee-facing roles:
- One-to-one interactions
- One-to-many interactions
- Why are these the employee-facing roles?
Because
these are the people that employees want to hear from!
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Enabling roles:
- Create and implement the plans that are executed
by the employee-facing roles within the business
- Why are these not
employee-facing roles?
Because employees don't know
who they are and don't really care what they have to say!
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Implications of employee-facing and enabling roles: This is
one of the most important takeaways from the discussion about roles.
Change managers in organizations - whether they are the project manager,
an HR consultant, an OD consultant or from a specialist change
management group - must ultimately work through others. They play the
role of enablers in most cases, creating easy-to-implement plans and
supporting the executives, senior leaders, middle managers and
supervisors throughout the organization.
Action steps for change managers:
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Adopt a
structured methodology you will use on the projects you support.
Prosci has
certification, online
and hardcopy
methodology tools so you can apply the research-based approach using
all of the templates, assessments and tools that are part of the
3-phase approach. Read more about
Prosci's
methodology.
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Begin making
a case for why it is important to manage the people-side of change.
The case will need to be made to project teams, senior
leaders, middle managers and supervisors - all of the other gears in
the roles discussion. Be sure to answer "What's In It For Me?" and
connect change management to what they care about - such as meeting
financial objectives (for senior leaders) or delivering a project on
time, on budget and on target to meet objectives (for project
teams).
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Explain the
role that you need each of these groups to fill. Draw on
best practices and research to demonstrate the specific actions you
need and the biggest mistakes that are typically made by these
groups.
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Provide
knowledge, training and tools. For many of the different
actors, applying change management is a new job requirement. You
will need to help each of them build their own personal competency
for leading change. Prosci offers a 1-day program for managers and
supervisors and a 4-6 hour session for executives and senior
leaders. Call 970-203-9332 to learn more about these research-based,
hands-on programs.
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Coach them.
Whether it is a project team you are working with to
integrate change management into the project plan, the division
president you are asking to fulfill the role of "great sponsor" or a
front-line supervisor you are asking to coach his or her direct
reports - you need to be there to provide support and answer
questions. You are now the coach for the agents of change throughout
your organization.
Tools for applying change management:
- Change
management certification ($2100) - 3-day program where you bring
a project you are working on and apply all of the assessments and
tools as you learn them - taught by former Fortune 500 executives at
locations across the U.S.
- 2007 Best Practices in Change Management
benchmarking report ($249) - journal-style report with lessons learned and best practices
from 426 participants, presented in an easy-to-use format - reads as
a checklist of what to do and what not to do
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Change Management Toolkit ($349) - hardcopy 3-ring binder presenting
Prosci's change management methodology; includes templates, checklists
and assessments for managing the people side of change (includes CD-ROM)
- Change
Management Guide for Managers ($189) -
tools to help supervisors engage and coach their direct reports
through change (includes ADKAR book, Employee's Survival Guide and
10 ADKAR worksheets)
- Change
Management Pilot 2008 ($449) - online tool including Prosci's change
management methodology, eLearning modules and downloadable templates,
assessments, presentations and checklists
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Change Management Pilot Professional 200808 ($559) - the content of the
Change Management Pilot plus additional benchmarking data and an
online version of the Change Management Guide for Managers and
Supervisors
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Change Management: the people side of change ($18.95) - a primer that addresses why manage change,
individual change management and organizational change management for
anyone involved in organizational change
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Employee's Survival Guide to Change ($14.95) - a handbook to help
employees survive and thrive during change; answers frequently asked
questions and empowers employees to take charge of change
*** Prosci also offers
leadership packages - groupings of products at discounts that
offer you some of the most helpful and common combinations of Prosci
change management resources
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Email a Prosci analyst or
call 970-203-9332 with questions about the methodology, its application, or finding the
right resources to support your change management activities.
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