Changes to products, processes, or even corporate culture can be challenging to implement in any organization—but they can be especially difficult in large organizations with hundreds or thousands of employees and multiple levels of management.
Change can be scary, but it’s also necessary to grow your business and improve employee satisfaction. If you want to make sure that change goes as smoothly as possible, it’s important to lay out a change management plan with clear steps and strategies in place. This way, everyone on your team can get on board with the process of change and have realistic expectations about what comes next.
Transitioning from one thing to another can be difficult, and the time it takes for a change management plan by Performance by Design varies based on the size of the change and the people involved. If you’re leading an effort to create change among your team or company, then it’s important to follow phases in order to ensure that you don’t lose people along the way and that you keep them as motivated as possible throughout the process. We’ve outlined 5 phases of effective change management below to get you started!
Table of Contents
1) Identify the need
The first step in creating a successful change management plan is to identify the need for change within your company. This can be done through a variety of means, such as conducting interviews, surveys, or focus groups. Once the need for change has been identified, you can begin to develop a plan to address it.
2) Develop clear goals and objectives
The first step is to develop clear goals and objectives for your change management plan. What are you trying to achieve? Be as specific as possible. Once you have your goals and objectives set, you can move on to the next phase.
Evaluate performance: Evaluate the current performance in order to determine where there are gaps or improvements that need to be made. You may need to benchmark or analyze metrics in order to see where you need improvement.
Analyze resistance: Analyze what’s being done right now that works, but also analyze what isn’t working. You will want to be sure not only do people know about what changes are coming, but they will want them too! There is no point in putting in so much work if people resist it!
Design the change: Design how things will be different from today’s norm once implemented. How will life look after these changes happen?
3) Set up realistic expectations
A successful change management plan must be designed to slowly ease employees into the new way of things. Set up a timeline for the change and make sure to include plenty of buffer time in case there are any unforeseen delays. Be sure to communicate the plan to everyone who will be affected by the change and answer any questions they may have. Finally, test the plan before implementing it to make sure everything runs smoothly.
4) Facilitate communication throughout the organization
Performance by Design’schange management plan has five phases: pre-change, change initiation, implementation, reinforcement, and post-change. Good communication is essential in each phase to ensure that the right people are informed about the changes taking place and understand how it will impact them.
5) Celebrate success!
Acknowledge the successful completion of each phase and take time to celebrate as a team. This will help keep morale high and motivate employees to keep going through the remaining phases. Here are the five phases of a successful change management plan
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