The dangers of doing stuff….

Change is good, right? Without change, we stagnate and don’t grow. Uncontrolled change, however, is a bad thing. What happens when you start making changes to the organisation (new procedures/new technologies) without considering the impact those changes will make? Maybe nothing….or perhaps chaos. This is the danger of change.

When making any changes to your organisation, it is always good to analyse what effect those changes will have overall. A change may seem like the best thing since sliced bread to upper management, but cause those lower in the corporate ladder to consider it the worst thing since Beta max (It’s a boomer thing- ask your parents).

Involving your staff is half the battle, and letting them know how any changes will impact them will make them feel included, hand in hand with knowing precisely what the impact of the changes will be, and the battle is nearly won.

So how do you bring employees along with you?

#1 – The big one is to leave no employees behind. Your employees need to feel part of the process. They need to feel like they are a significant stakeholder in the new implementation, and their ideas are included in this process.

#2 – Every person in the change management process needs visibility of whether they are succeeding or failing. Employees who are positively working with the change should see rewards and recognition and vice versa for those lagging and hindering the process.

#3 – Managers and critical decision-makers need to demonstrate what the big picture is to employees. The more everyone understands how the change will make their lives easier, the more they will feel connected in achieving the end goal.

#4 – Deal with the naysayers quickly. With most implementations, we generally see a few hesitant individuals who liked the way things operated before. This apprehension is understandable, but continued resistance without any interjections from management can de-rail and damage the progress of the change.

Organisations need to know when to say enough is enough. If you wait too long, employees can gain a powerful opportunity to create damage to your goals. This damage comes in not following new process management protocols and persuading others to do the same.

A new system that spits out at a touch any information request from senior management requires someone to enter all that new data that was previously unavailable. Is that the project manager running the job or one of the admin staff back in the office? Any of these changes may require you to make other changes to potentially support this, maybe reassigning tasks or hiring new staff to perform these activities.

The key is understanding the impact of any change – and any potential danger this change could create.

If you are considering a change in your business software, get in touch with Thrive. We can help navigate you through the confusion.