Managing Change

Experience teaches me that the formula for a successful software system implementation has three critical elements:  technology, process and people.  Successful projects factor all three of equally important aspects of the technology-induced change.

As an IT consultant who manages the implementation of business systems I’m often exposed to communities of system users who experience change anxiety in their work environments. Even when warned of the impending changes, and with many of them actually contributing to the process, the change is often overwhelming to impacted users. If the situation is left unmanaged the cries for things to go back to the way they were can start long before the implementation.  The impacts on the software project can be devastating.  The impact on staff and morale can be worse. 

So why does this happen ? The reasons are as diverse and the changes themselves and too dependent on local context to be captured in one model but some of the recurring themes are:

• Loss of control, lack of flexibility, loss of power.
• Fear of the unknown, forced learning, change in routine.
• Fear of looking “foolish”
•  Loss of relevance of formerly valued knowledge
• Bad past experiences

As an IT project manager I have learnt that system adoption is a risk factor that must be accounted for and managed. Even if the there is no question that a change is required, it could (and often is) resisted.  You know you have not managed change when the level of resistance far exceeds the magnitude of the change.  

So how do we manage this change?   In a word communicate.  The trick is to know what to communicate, to whom, how and when.