July Business Change Digest

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In this edition:

SPOTLIGHT

Integrating project and change management

AFINITI NEWS

Top 20 Best Performing Learning Provider

AFINITI INSIGHTS

The latest from the Afiniti Insights Blog.

 

 

Spotlight by Stephen Forbes

INTEGRATING PROJECT MANAGEMENT AND CHANGE MANAGEMENT

The Project & Change Management Office (PCMO) – the answer for business in the age of constant disruption?

Change as the new norm

The business landscape looks very different now compared to ten years ago. Continued advances in technology and changing consumer demands are bringing major disruption to the way most sectors and industries operate. In addition, there has been a shift in the workforce with an influx of tech-savvy millennials entering the job market with fresh expectations and often disruptive thinking around how things should work. More than ever, business leaders face a constant challenge to sustain and evolve their business to remain relevant, profitable and ahead of the competition.

Organisations are awash with projects – be it developing or adopting new technologies, upgrading systems and processes, creating new products and services to meet changing customer expectations or just planning for changes in regulations (GDPR and Brexit come to mind). Take a step back from it, you quickly realise that implementing a project and then letting things settle down for a sustained period just doesn’t happen anymore. In other words – change is the new norm.

Considering this, it is no surprise that clients often come to us asking for support in setting up a Project Management Office (PMO). They usually have many competing projects and requirements across their organisation, and recognise the need to have a consistent methodology in place and be in more control of these activities.

This is clearly a positive step for an organisation to take, establishing good project governance and practices is something I know they won’t regret (assuming it is followed through properly). However, there is something else that is often neglected and then regretted further down the line. It is the challenge of not just delivering projects, but the wider piece around ensuring they are effectively adopted, embedded and sustainable within the organisation. Or to put it simply – the integration of project management and change management within the PMO.

 Let’s look at what often happens

PMOs traditionally concentrate on providing governance in order to ensure that projects are  delivered to the triple constraints of time, scope and budget. The focus is predominantly on the condition of the project (scope, time, budget) and to a lesser extent on the people in the organisation, the affect it will have on them and the strategies that need to be in place to ensure effective adoption. In addition, the cumulative people impact of changes across the entire organisation are commonly not considered.

Particularly in larger organisations, and especially with IT projects, it is common for much of the project team to be external and commonly there is limited business representation and meaningful end user interaction. This means that processes (old and new) and the associated impacts aren’t fully understood leading to issues and delays in delivering the project. As a result communications are often late and training / training materials aren’t ready or of sufficient quality. Often businesses are too scared to communicate as key stakeholders don’t have all the answers, but the result is radio silence which leads people to feel in the dark and disengaged from the project.

 The panacea – the integrated Project & Change Management Office (PCMO)

More recently, we are seeing increased success in organisations that choose to implement change management resources and practices within their PMO. The project methodology and governance model are adapted to integrate change management best practices and deliverables that ensure a focus on preparing for and managing successful change.

The change part of the PCMO understands the holistic impact in more detail and is more connected to business users. They can provide appropriate representation at key project stage gates and ensure there is adequate attention on business readiness, not just solution readiness. Decisions and conversations across the business are underpinned by key change management activities and deliverables including: change strategy, business impact assessment, end user engagement plans, sponsor roadmaps, communications, and change measurement surveys and associated corrections.

PCMOs typically have a project management lead and change management lead working closely together with project managers, project teams, change managers and business stakeholders. The conflict point between project and change usually comes when delivery to the triple constraints meets the business being ready, able and willing to accept the change. It is a balancing act, leadership support is essential, and the PCMO works to ensure that the best approach is taken that maximises overall success for the organisation (not just the project).

I recently worked with a client within the PCMO for a large transformation programme and witnessed first-hand the value that it brings. Under pressure to deliver on time and to budget a solution was proposed by the project team that met the requirement, but involved a number of steps and was far from elegant. Within the PCMO meeting, and understanding the impact and existing perceptions about the project, the change manager was able to insist that the user experience was prioritised, despite it resulting in extra cost, pressure on the project timeline and additional work for the project team. The outcome was a far simpler process and this has resulted in happy, engaged users who are proactive in using the new solution.  I am certain, judging by previous experience, that if there had not been an integrated PCMO the original solution would have been selected and adoption and overall perception of the project would have been severely hampered.

 So why aren’t more organisations adopting this PCMO approach?

For some organisations even a PMO is seen as a luxury, so integrating a change management office is perceived as one cost/overhead too many.

In my experience, though, the investment in PCMO does pay its own way by reducing cost and schedule overruns, improving speed of adoption (ROI), embedding the right behaviours, and ensuring that you manage resistance to change early so you can adapt and intervene.

As mentioned earlier, change and adaption is the new norm, so whilst a focus on project management will help manage the portfolio and support efficiency delivery, without change being integral to the process there is a real risk that businesses are not going to capitalise on opportunities or deal with challenges if they are not considering their main asset – the workforce. This is not to say that project management as a discipline hasn’t come a long way in improving its focus on benefits and managing change, however more needs to be done to ensure that change management and people are at the heart of the conversation. Ultimately, it will help ensure that organisations are able to deal with regular change and ensure that they always make change stick.

At Afiniti, we regularly advise our clients on setting up PMOs / PCMOs, so if you are thinking about taking this next step for your organisation get in touch and we would be happy to discuss this further. Likewise, if you have any examples you would like to share around integrating change management within a PMO it would be great to hear from you too.

Afiniti News

The Learning and Performance Institute recently launched their Top 20 Best Performing Learning Providers eBook and we’re very proud to announce that Afiniti have been ranked within the Top 20!

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October Business Change Digest

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In this edition:

SPOTLIGHT

Starting a business change programme? Avoid the common pitfall.

AFINITI NEWS

Jay Dixon joins the team as Business Change Director.

INSIGHTS ROUNDUP

The latest from the Afiniti insights blog.

 

Spotlight by Anthony Edwards

You’re about to start your business change programme, but where’s your burning platform, and can you fight the fire?

Someone recently asked me ‘what’s the one key thing you would advise leaders embarking on a business change programme?’

This is a really big ask, There are so many elements to discuss and debate – each ‘change’ has different drivers, each industry its own nuances, and each company its own culture and all these elements play vital roles in shaping any programme.

Thinking about the past 15 years’ or so, and my experience helping clients in oil and gas, transport, logistics, pharmaceutical, and finance; There is one stand-out piece of universal wisdom I’d pass on to any client, which is to start at the beginning.  It sounds obvious, but let me explain.

Start at the beginning, and take it step by step

In my experience many organisations find themselves starting their change programme by creating the vision and strategy, before they’ve sufficiently ‘set the stage’.

Planning a business change programme can feel incredibly daunting. Time and again leaders are under pressure and already behind the curve – budget approval came through later than anticipated and the programme is running behind schedule and not completely formed, but there’s pressure to plough-on regardless.  It’s at this point that you need to take a step back and say ‘stop, let’s start from the beginning – together.  Let’s set ourselves up for success.’

So what should you be doing before you start strategising?

Preparation really is the key when it comes to change, so it’s no surprise that there are a number of models and methods for building and leading change programmes – and we can use elements from many of them. One I return to time and again is Kotter’s 8-Step Process which breaks the job down into logical, and most importantly, sequential steps.

 

Kotter’s 8-Step Change Model for Successful Transformational Change

Source: Kotter and Cohen, The Heart of Change.

 

Step 1. Create a sense of urgency – Nail the ‘Why?’ and ‘Why now?’

For change to stick it really helps if the whole organisation accepts it and understands the drivers – especially if change has been attempted in the past and already had a number of false starts.

For this reason Kotter encourages us to start the change programme by creating a sense of urgency, so that we are not only focussing on the ‘why’ change, but also the ‘why change now?’

You need to develop a clear and compelling story – a way to articulate the common goal behind which everyone needs to align. The story needs to not only be socialised, but shouted from the rooftops, so everyone can understand why this change is taking place and get behind it. This sense of urgency, communicated by the leadership team, builds, spreads and fuels itself, and there you have what Kotter refers to as your burning platform.

It’s also worth noting that, at this stage it is crucial to sense check that your reason for change will be obviously compelling to everyone involved, not just the leadership team.  It may seem crystal clear to senior leaders, but once you start communicating about the change, and you go two or three steps out into the business, the people may not have a clue what you’re talking about!  A good question to ask is, if the story is not clear, does the responsibility for clarification lie with the reader or story teller?!

It’s equally important that all members of the leadership team can articulate this sense of urgency.  People need to receive the same message whether they ask the project team or their own management hierarchy, It is your senior sponsors’ responsibility to ensure that they’re all aligned.

 

Step 2. Create a guiding coalition from across the organisation

You’ve created the sense of urgency and now you need to shape a team who can continue building the momentum and lead the change programme.

Consider who will be strong and effective at leading the change on a daily basis – you’ll need influential people around the table, from a variety of different backgrounds.  These people will become key to embed the change later on.

Once you’ve formed your guiding coalition you need to check that the common goal is anchored in the benefit outcome  – and that you’ll be able to measure your success against this. Then you’re in a position to start creating the vision and strategy for the change programme.

 

One last thing

So you’ve nailed the ‘why’ and you have your guiding coalition ready to get started on your business change programme.  One final thing to consider:

Is the organisation currently ready and capable of change?

To be in the optimum position to be ready and receptive to change – your key business capabilities such as leadership, culture and competency should be functioning at a certain level.  If any one of these is out of kilter, you’re not giving yourself the best chance for the programme to succeed.

Afiniti’s 6LeverTM change readiness assessment tool measures where you are now against six key capabilities and outlines any gaps which need to be addressed, and what needs to be done to accelerate change and make it sustainable.

 

 

Take the Change Readiness Assessment now and find out if your organisation is ready for change.

 

I’d love to hear any experiences you’ve had with ‘setting the stage’ for business change.  Do you think there are any other pitfalls senior leaders should be mindful of when embarking on a business change programme?

Afiniti news: Jay Dixon joins the team as Business Change Director

Previously a Managing Partner at James and Carmichael Consulting (JCC), Jay has over twelve years’ consulting experience under his belt, as well as a background in operations and supply chain management where he started his career after graduating from Leeds University .

Jay is settling in to working life at Afiniti, so it seemed a good time to sit down with him and have a chat about his career to date, his areas of specialism and what he’s enjoying working on so far at Afiniti.

Read the full article.

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Four ways to create communications tools that last

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Those of us who work in communications frequently support our organisation through major change. And for change managers, often the most challenging part of delivering change is what happens after the project has finished.  We need to find ways of embedding the new processes or behaviours and making them stick.

This calls for communications tools that last, are repeatable and sustainable, and have a life beyond the project.

During business change, you’re asking colleagues to change the way they work. They’ll need reliable information, clear motivation and moreover, a shared story that connects any current disruptions to how things will be in the future.

It’s a time to invest in ‘sustainable communication tools’ – these are tools that come to life the more they’re used. For example, an online portal sustained by its own user community, or a visual identity that brings impact and character wherever it’s used. A colleague of mine calls them ‘Future-proof tools’.

Done right, these brilliant concepts can pay for themselves quickly. They’ll inspire people to share content and contribute their own; they can create a stronger sense of a collective journey to a common goal.

Based on our extensive client experience, here are four things to focus on to create effective, long-term communications tools:

1. Culture fit. Devise a tool that suits how people interact now

It’s a common mistake to introduce a platform, like an enterprise social network, that’s at odds with an existing culture. Change teams may hope that people will somehow change their ways when they see it. However culture is, by nature, hard to adjust and successful programmes will work within their audience’s current preferences. There’s room to adjust engagement methods later if people start to become more adventurous.  Also, tools cannot be just left to manage themselves.  You will need to maintain them regularly by prompting people for content, asking questions and making suggestions.  While this can be time consuming to begin with – it will become easier over time, if successful.

2. Usability. Strip back and simplify

It can make sense to offer just a little information, if it means the bigger picture is easier to understand.  We’ve been working with a pharma company who found that complex new role descriptions were getting in the way of business change. People were distracted by the terminology and said they switched off when they received emails about it. The client took a fresh stakeholder management approach using an online campaign to simplify who does what. A team member said: “These people are scientists, inquisitiveness is part of workplace culture. Start with something simple and they’ll ask the right questions as and when they need to”.  So if you’ve developed a campaign that needs to run, keep things simple.  People like ‘simple’.  They are faced with complicated jargon every day so would welcome any effort made to make things easier for them to understand and act on.

3. Identity. Give the programme some character

A great identifier can increase the sense of a shared journey for everyone going through change. It could be a name, image or any visual that works with the organisation’s brand. We’d call it a communications tool because it does an important job in connecting activities together. For example, an oil and gas client won awards for its use of a three day change event to support major change. A strong programme identity ran through diverse activities, highlighting the fact that everything’s connected.

4. Involvement. People will only carry ‘their’ communications tool

Regardless of format, a communications tool will grow because people want it to. The more relevant it feels to individuals, the more they’ll invest. For example, companies often appoint ‘change champions’ but unless these individuals feel in control they’ll struggle to truly ‘champion’ change. Recognising this, a client created a guidance document for its new change champions. It provided key facts and pointers. Champions could talk about change in their own words, but with confidence supported by the right facts.

Read our blog for ideas on how to ensure people are onboard for your change journey

 

Overall, the true test of a sustainable communications tool is whether it connects people to the same purpose, and has a life after the project closes.  We like to pop back to clients to see how they are getting on with the sustainable tools left behind.  Given the right support and guidance, we are often surprised at how well they are working.

What tools do IT managers need to successfully manage change?

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As well as routine project management and IT programmes, IT managers are often tasked with the people elements of change – an implementation can’t be seen as successful if there is no user adoption.

So what do they need in order to make sure this goes smoothly?  IT managers need practical tools that will be sustainable for future use. As all change is unique and needs people to truly own it, all guidelines and templates must be flexible and adaptable to help engage people and enable them to put their own stamp on a project.

Here are my top ten products and tools to support IT managers:

1.       Change readiness assessment

There are questions to ask around how ready the business is for a particular change. How likely are the current culture and patterns of working to lend themselves to adoption of the new process or technology? What barriers may appear in the organisation?  Readiness assessments allow us to baseline our change capability within an organisation, or a part of an organisation. Readiness assessments can be repeated at various points up until go-live to measure the effectiveness of the change management we have implemented.

Take our sample organisational change readiness assessment

2.       A change readiness dashboard

The change readiness dashboard will collate the various readiness assessments and report them as a whole.  Through a readiness dashboard we can assess if our change management approach is being successful

3.       Change impact analysis

This is a template that allows us to overlay what the change is, with which user groups it is going to affect.  We can build on this to determine how we best support for those groups.

4.       Stakeholder mapping templates

A means of identifying and classifying key stakeholders according to their influence and relevance to the project. This can feed into a stakeholder management plan.

5.       A process for co-creating a key message framework

As well as the key message framework, you’ll also want to co-create the core story with key stakeholders.

Read our blog on the impact of storytelling on your change programme

6.       An adaptable communications strategy

Your communications strategy will need to be adaptable and flexible enough that it can be applied to different functions/areas to ensure it reaches all corners of your stakeholder matrix.

7.       A guide for line managers to support their teams throughout a project and beyond

You will need a guide for line managers to help them support their teams, and you will also need guides for sponsors and change champions to help them fulfil their roles. This includes ideas for sharing success, communicating at different levels, setting example behaviours, gathering and monitoring feedback, and answering questions. The guides should support the change network to reach the heart of the business, to prepare people and embed a number of changes in behaviour. And, thinking back to sustainability – these guides are inherently reusable.

8.       A sponsor roadmap

The roadmap needs to provide a  framework for the change project, and set out how the sponsor can support the various project teams and stakeholders, as well as how the project manager can use the sponsor to effectively deal with resistance and challenges.

Here’s the Prosci take on the sponsorship roadmap

9.       The creation of sustainable and highly relevant communications materials

Sustainability for any team faced with implementing change, really means three things here: 1 Boosting long term skills. Once a team goes through the process once and has coaching, the process becomes repeatable. 2 Tools should always have a long life-span for example a video should be reusable. This means every item has to be produced with sustainability in mind: ‘where can we use this elsewhere?’ ‘What would need to come out to enable multiple use?’ And 3. Adaptable templates for items such as emails and newsletters can all be used again and again by an IT manager or change team, to create materials for new projects.

10.   The development of a one-stop portal

often developed in SharePoint, the portal will house everything people need to know about the new technology, with individual learning pathways that can be tailored and updated for new projects.

 

We’d love to hear your thoughts on the ten points above. Are there any more elements you think could be added? Let us know in the comments below.