Management of Change

 Change is an inevitable part of our life. Our being, in all of its aspects, is affected by permanent change. Our personal life can change every day, and so can our professional life. An organization’s direction can change at any time in an attempt to adapt to new environments. Very often, change is a necessity, not an option!

Change is inevitable, but resistance to change is also inevitable. We cannot implement or even think about a change without thinking about resistance to change. Managing any resistance to change is as important as the change itself, if not more important. Therefore, any change should be perfectly planned and managed.

A Change Management Plan should include:

• The reason and fundament of the change, and the risk of not changing,
• The outcome of the change,
• What needs to be changed and how to implement the change,
• Who and what will be affected by the change,
• How to manage residence to the change,

Change is always the result of a need. We change things because we need to change them. Change has always a fundament and a goal. The goal cannot be anything else other than improvement with a better result. Any change require resources and efforts. Resources include, human resources, financial resources, and sometimes some potential losses for a better result after the change. Remodeling a shop can result in a few days or few months of closing the shop with a loss of revenue, but these losses will be compensated accordingly once the changes are implemented.

 

Resistance to Change

We understand that resistance is a very normal reaction of anybody who is not involved in the process of making decisions for change. This is not limited to employees only, but very often middle management, and sometime even executives can feel the pressure that change causes. Resistance is a result of fearing the future. Resistance is also the result of an individual’s perception.

Let’s stay on “perception”. How an individual sees change. How he or she predicts the future. How he or she perceives the change. Those are our main concerns when dealing with individuals and trying to overcome their resistance.

 

What Matters is NOT What We Want to Do but How Others Perceive It.

Can we change this perception? Of course we can, and of course we MUST. How? This is the key to success. How can we change the perception of an individual to accept change, to be a part of it, and to help us implement it?

 

Information is Good, Participation is Better.

If employees, middle management, managers, and executive are involved in the process of making the decision and are perfectly informed of its evolution, they can embrace the change rather than embracing their old habits and the status quo.

The first step is building awareness of the need for change, the risk of not changing, creating a desire to change and being a part of the change. This is how individuals feel respected and get involved.

Then, get people involved and establish the right communication. The right communication is the right information at the right time.

 

Change is inevitable. It needs to be planned, managed, and reviewed!

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