Last updated on October 13th, 2022 at 11:29 am
The ancient Greek philosopher Heraclitus once proclaimed – “Embrace Change: It is the only constant in life”, and he was not the only great who thought that. After spending years studying nature, the universe, the natural law, all the ancients known for their wisdom and invention had similar things to say. “You cannot step twice into the same river", said Plato. "Everything flows.", said, Aristotle.
While few of the above quotes come from a people perspective, other come from a scientific perspective. Change is the natural order of the world. And to embrace change is essential for survival. This is especially true in the modern context of the IT industry. People and processes but continually evolve and change to suit the market and consumer expectations. Only this would enable a company to survive and thrive.
All About Change Management
While change management is a critical factor for any organization, few get it right. The main concepts to learn about change management are Assessing, preparing, planning, implementing and sustaining the change.
However, for change to be effective below are also factors to consider:
How to Effectively Manage Communication of Change?
While starting to learn about change management, it is evident that communication is key. With the advent of technology, Change is often communicated via email or voice recordings. While this reaches a broader audience, it might not be as effective as a face to face discussion as the employee get an opportunity to react to the change and to register his comments on it. Communication must be personal and must convey to the employee what is at stake if he does not embrace the change and what are the advantages if he does.
How to Manage Resistance to Change?
The key factor to resistance to change must be understood. Employees who are heavily invested in the current way of doing it find it hard to accept. The employees who are resisting change must be heard out, and if required, the change proposal must be reworked to suit the needs of the company, product and employees. If there is a lesson to be learnt about change management, it is that Alignment to the new policy is mandatory.
How to Manage disruptive technology in the marketplace?
Technology evolves rapidly. You can become obsolete at the blink of the eye unless you evolve with the market. While it is ok to respond to the changing market conditions, the important thing we must learn about change management is that companies and processes must be discovery and technology driven rather than knowledge driven.
How to manage alternate ways for the company to generate revenue?
While licensing seems good for business, business models these days offer free developer version and license only the enterprise versions. The latter is a better option as more people have the competence to embrace this software. The important thing about change management is to assess the expectation of the consumer community and to gauge the competitor's strategy to redefine yours; else you will no longer be earning as much revenue as you did last year.
How to manage changing customer expectation?
The good thing about change management is that it requires constant input from the industry about changing needs and demands of the customer. Instead of reactively looking for solutions to problems, it is better to anticipate change and prepare for it proactively.
Constant evaluation of change
After the implementation, are the results in line with expectations of the market? Complacency cannot set in as continuous tweaks are constantly necessary to keep ahead.
How to bring about the change?
Constant R&D can bring about change management in the entire society. Often technology has brought change to the society and not vice-versa. Vision is a must for all companies.
Believe and Invest in Change
To bring everyone on board is a top-down approach which involves the entire leadership team. For it to succeed would mean working together as a team.
How to drive change?
Create a sense of urgency. An essential factor to learn about change management is the timeline. Execution on time is vital for all strategies to succeed.
