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2021/1/28 Change Management: Definition, Best Practices & Examples
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- B LO G -
Change Management: Definition, Best Practices &
Examples
Apr 16, 2020 ▪ Approx. 17 min. read
Change management has become one of the most critical success factors for any
business in today's ever-changing world.
Change management has become one of the most critical success factors for any business in
today's ever-changing world.
The business world is changing at a fast pace: technology keeps evolving, customer trends
are changing, new market regulations are being launched on a regular basis, and businesses
have to cope with unprecedented global crises.
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💡Download our eBook "10 Principles of Modern Employee Communications" and learn how to communicate with the modern employee in today's digital age.
Companies that can't adapt and grab growth opportunities are most likely to be outcompeted
by agile competitors and even disappear. That's why preparing for change should be one of
your top priorities.
💡In this blog post, you're going to learn more about the following topics:
De�nition of Change Management
3 Types of Organizational Change
Common Examples of When Change Management Is Needed
Managing Organizational Change During Crisis
Most Common Change Management Challenges
12 Change Management Best Practices
Change Management Models You Can't Ignore
The Role of Internal Comms in Change Management
How to Communicate Organizational Change During Crisis
Definition of Change Management
Change management is a systematic approach that includes dealing with the transition or
transformation of organizational goals, core values, processes or technologies.
The purpose of every organizational change management initiative is to successfully
implement strategies and methods for e�ecting change and helping people to accept and
adapt to change.
As organizational changes in the agile workplaces happen daily, change management and
change communication teams have become crucial performance drivers for many companies.
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People are Resistant to Change
A research shows that only 38% of people like to leave their comfort zone. When these people
are presented with a change, they think, "Hey, this is so exciting." Those positive interpretations
of change result in positive emotional reactions, such as happiness and satisfaction, which
result in greater employee productivity.
The other 62%, however, look at that same exact statement and immediately feel fear and
discomfort. They may think, "Oh great, this change will have an e�ect on my career growth." or "I
will not do what I like doing any more." or “Will they keep me in?”.
3 Types of Organizational Change
The 3 most common types of organizational change include:
1. Developmental change - Any organizational change that improves and optimizes on
previously established processes, strategies and procedures.
2. Transitional change - Change that moves an organization away from its current state to
a new state in order to solve a problem, such as mergers and acquisitions and
automation.
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3. Transformational change - Change that radically and fundamentally alters the culture,
core values and operations.
Common Examples When Change Management Is
Needed
With all the changes happening in the business world, change management has become one of
the most important business functions.
Some of the most common examples when change management is necessary to successfully
implement changes within organizations include:
Implementation of a new technology
Mergers & acquisitions
Change in leadership
Change in organizational culture
Times of a crisis
Managing Organizational Change During Crisis
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Under normal circumstances, driving change in the workplace is already quite challenging.
Today, workplace transformation needs to be more agile.
In a survey with nearly 3,000 executives about the success of their enterprise transformation
e�orts, McKinsey found the failure rate to be higher than 60%. But COVID-19 makes
organizational change even more complex and challenging.
As the pandemic continues to spread, businesses have no choice but to review their short-term
as well as long-term strategies.
Some companies have temporarily closed their plants and shops while others have also made
remote work mandatory. More and more businesses are laying o� a part of their sta� because of
business deterioration. As a result, unemployment rates are exploding. For example, more than
16 million people have �led for initial unemployment bene�ts since mid-March in the US.
Businesses are now operating under pressure.
They have to adapt on the �y and they have no visibility on what's going to happen in the
upcoming weeks. Check out the graph below where WTO shows di�erent scenarios (optimistic
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and pessimistic ones) for the evolution of the world merchandise trade volume in the upcoming
years due to COVID-19. 👇
World merchandise trade volume, 2000‐2022
Source: WTO
In these uncertain times, businesses have to review their plans in no time. They are changing
the way their employees are working as remote work has become the new norm and they also
are rethinking the way their teams are functioning and collaborating. Most companies have
already changed their organizational structure and their work arrangements.
Read on: Remote Work: 20 Ways to Engage and Connect with Your Remote Employees
Companies have to act fast and as a consequence, change is implemented with no smooth
transition, which is highly challenging for both businesses and employees.
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Think about it: employees — including team leaders — have to instantly adapt to new ways of
working and communicating while change management programs usually take years to be
implemented — whether it's the launch of a new technology or the implementation of a new
internal organization.
Indeed, driving change doesn't mean equipping employees with a new software or new ways of
communicating. Implementing change requires a preparation phase, a proper internal
communication plan, training programs, and evaluating the success of the program.
"Digital transformation does not happen quickly. Some companies seem to expect it to happen
over the course of a year. In my experience, particularly for larger organizations, closer to �ve
years is more realistic. Even then, the task is never over",
says Ashley Friedlein, founder of Econsultancy.
Experts have already announced that the future of work is happening now and there's no doubt
that the way companies are managing organizational change now will have a direct impact on
their ability to ensure business continuity.
Most Common Change Management Challenges
Change is not always perceived as positive, and many employees may be resistant to changes
within their organizations. Therefore, successful business transformation is all about getting
employees' buy-in and embedding new behaviors in the workplace.
Here are some of the most common challenges that change management professionals
face 👇
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1. Defining goals in a timely manner
Most changes get implemented with a goal to improve current processes, products, services or
organizational cultures. However, it is critical to identify clear goals and milestones.
Some of the common change management goals and objectives include:
Build a culture of innovation
Change or update company’s best practices
Implement new technology
Establish milestones and incentives programs
Implement knowledge sharing initiatives
Shift in targeted customer base
2. Poor leadership and lack of alignment
Leadership has a big impact on employee engagement. If your leaders are not convinced about
the bene�ts of change, it will be hard to implement it.
Poor leadership and lack of alignment among the leaders are some of the main reasons for
organizational change fails. On the other hand, great leaders know how to inspire their
workforce and embrace the change.
Read on: Top 5 Communication Skills and How to Improve Them
3. Identifying the resources needed to make change a success
Before starting the change process, identifying the resources and individuals that will facilitate
the process and lead the change is crucial for success. However, it can be hard to identify those
resources and budgets before the process even starts.
4. A Lack of agility and slow approval process
Organizations that are not agile struggle to implement changes. Slow approval processes can
cause delays in change implementation.
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Therefore, it is important to have everyone on the same page in order for the process to get
implemented smoothly and on time.
5. Planning the next steps
Every change management process should have a well set plan. The plan should consist of a
timelines, and change milestones should be identi�ed. Without planning, it may be hard to
understand the overall success of the change process.
6. Fear and conflicts
Changes within organizations can develop emotions of uncertainty and fear. This may cause
employees take their frustrations out on each other. Here, it is leaders' responsibility to overcome
the di�culties and resolve con�icts.
An active leader should always be ready to dive deeper into the problem while working in
accordance with their organizational change management.
7. Resistance to change and lack of commitment
Some employees are resistant to change, do not want to collaborate or commit to new practices.
Leaders should be able to address resistance on a psychological level and proactively remove
behavioral barriers that restrict change.
8. Poor communication in the workplace
Communication is crucial for successful change management, and the cost of poor
communication can be signi�cant. Every employer that has a successful change management
team expresses the need for constant communication during the change experience.
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9. Aligning all the teams with the new strategy
Having everyone on board and informed before and during the implementation process may be a
challenge. This is especially true for large organizations with various o�ces and departments
across the world. Therefore, global and interdepartmental communication has to become a
priority.
10. Updating everyone on the new materials, policies and procedures in a timely
manner
Changes should be documented and those documents should be easily accessible and
shared with the employees.
Every highly-e�ective change management strategy keeps all changes well-documented and
transparent.
Read on: The Ultimate Crisis Management Checklist for Employers
12 Change Management Best Practices
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Change management processes can be very complex. Additionally, change in the workplace can
cause high levels of stress among employees.
However, there are some rules and best practices every organization should follow.
Here they are.
1. Define clear goals
Every change management initiative should be clearly de�ned. Even though SMART goals are
not easy to de�ne for change management, companies should strive towards setting up as
clear goals as possible.
This way, employees and leaders will have something to reference to when evaluating their
change management e�orts.
2. Be honest and transparent
Over 30% of employees say that their employer is not always honest and truthful.
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In order to implement transitions successfully, employers should be honest and transparent.
As most employees don’t feel comfortable with changes, being transparent at every step of the
change management process helps build trust and connection with employees.
3. Train and reassure your teams
Support your employees with reassurance, o�er new training sessions and give employees
time they need to adapt to new practices. Empathy and reassurance help fasten the process and
eases future organizational changes.
Yet, many line managers don't even understand why the change is happening.
4. Encourage conversations and communicate regularly
Employee relations have a big impact on encouraging conversations before, during and after the
changes are implemented.
Start a conversation among your employees in order to �nd out how they feel about the new
initiatives.
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Understand that true communication is a two-way conversation.
Read on: Interpersonal Communication: De�nition, Importance and Must-Have Skills
5. Listen to your employees
When driving engagement and communication, you should not be the only one talking. Listen to
what your employees have to say. Allow them to lead the conversation where employees can
ask questions, comment and suggest their ideas for improvement.
6. Bring your leaders on board
The evidence is clear- excellent change management increases business outcomes of change
initiatives. So why is it so di�cult to communicate these bene�ts to business leaders?
Companies should work on proving the real ROI of change management and communicate
that to the business leaders to bring them on board and support the change.
7. Choose the right communication tool
Millennials in the workplace expect an easier way of communication than through emails. In
fact, many emails are never read which causes important information to get lost.
Choose the right employee communication and engagement solution that your employees
will actually want to use.
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Make sure that your solution is mobile friendly. Younger generations are used to being able to
do everything on their mobile phones. Company tools should, for that reason, be mobile-friendly.
8. Empower your employees
Empower your change management leaders as well as employees to engage in the change
process by giving them freedom to make their own decisions and implement new ideas.
If your employees don’t feel empowered, the engagement level will drop and result in
resistance to change.
9. Encourage knowledge sharing
Some employees will learn and adapt to change faster than the others. However, knowledge
sharing among employees can fasten this learning process signi�cantly.
Employee collaboration tools such as Smarp enable organizational knowledge sharing in a way
that is easy and fun for employees.
10. Document and make information easily accessible
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Documenting everything does not help if this information is not easily accessible to
employees. Having a central place where all the important documents and information are kept,
makes change management much more e�cient.
Did you know that employees, on average, spend 2.5 hours every day searching for
information? In the process of change management, this can be very frustrating and
discouraging to employees. Drive the #NoSearching Revolution in your company!
11. Recognize and reward
77% of employees say that they would work harder if they were recognized for their work.
Therefore, this approach can be a great motivation to comply with and implement the changes
faster.
Recognize and reward employees for accomplishments and for adopting new behaviors
during the transformation process. Celebrate the wins and milestones.
12. Make it social
If you are implementing a new technology solution you are proud of, share it publicly! Modern
employee communication tools allow you and your employees to easily share information both
within and outside your organization.
Having employee advocates can also be a huge help for your recruitment and talent acquisition
e�orts.
Change Management Models You Can't Ignore
There are many change management models out there. However, we have chosen the top 3
models used by successful companies across the world.
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1. Kotter’s change management theory
This change management theory is one of the most popular and adopted ones in the world. It is
divided into eight stages where each one of them focuses on a key principle that is associated
with the response of people to change.
Increase urgency – Create a sense of urgency among the people so as to motivate them
to move forward towards objectives.
Build the team – Get the right people on the team by selecting a mix of skills, knowledge
and commitment.
Get the vision correct – Take into account not just the strategy but also creativity,
emotional connect and objectives.
Communicate – Openly and frequently communicate with people regarding the change.
Get things moving – Get support, remove the roadblocks and implement feedback in a
constructive way.
Focus on short term goals – Set small goals and achievable parts is a good way to
achieve success without too much pressure.
Don’t give up – Be persistent while the process of change management is going on, no
matter how tough things may seem.
Incorporate change – Reinforce and make it a part of the workplace culture.
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2. ADKAR Model
ADKAR model or theory of change is a goal-oriented. This makes it possible for change
management teams to focus on activities that are directly related to the goals the company is
trying to achieve.
The model can be used by change managers to �nd out the various challenges in the process of
change management so that e�ective training can be o�ered to the employees.
ADKAR Model stands for:
Awareness – of the need and requirement for change
Desire – to bring about change and be a participant in it
Knowledge – of how to bring about this change
Ability – to incorporate the change on a regular basis
Reinforcement – to keep it implemented and reinforced later on as well.
3. Lewin’s Change Management Model
Lewin’s Change Management Model is one of the most popular, most accepted and most
e�ective models that make it possible for companies to understand organizational and
structured change. This model consists of three main stages which are: unfreeze, change and
refreeze.
Unfreeze: The �rst stage of the change process is the preparation for change. Here,
employers must get prepared for the change and explain to people why the change is
necessary. As most people are resistant to change, this step helps to break this status
quo.
Change: In this stage, the change process takes place. Good leadership and e�ective
employee communications are crucial for this step.
Refreeze: In this stage, the change has been accepted. This is the time when the
employees start going back to their normal pace and routine. This last step requires
leaders to make sure that the changes are adopted and used even after the change
management objectives have been achieved.
The Role of Internal Communications in Change
Management
According to Michael O'Malley, “it isn't the technology itself that IT projects trip over”.
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In a research by PMI, of 256 companies that were surveyed, only 14 percent of all failures can be
chalked up to a company's inability to cope with technology.
The other 86 percent owe to some common management challenges:
improperly de�ned objectives (17 percent),
unfamiliar scope (17 percent),
lack of e�ective communication (20 percent) and,
poor project management skills (32 percent)
As a lack of, or ine�ective, communication often cause change management projects to fail,
companies now have to reconsider their internal communications e�orts.
How to Communicate Organizational Change During
Crisis?
When it comes to change management, internal communication plays an even more critical
role today. Indeed, businesses have to �nd e�ective ways to communicate the abrupt changes
they're implementing right now so that employees can understand where the new strategies and
adjust their work accordingly.
Read on: Crisis Communication — How to Communicate E�ectively with Your Employees
Broadly speaking, when driving change during the pandemic, you need to:
Explain to your employees the changes you're implementing as well as the
di�erent steps your organizational change plan includes.
Tell them the reasons why you're implementing these speci�c changes and the
impacts they may have on their work
There's no organizational change plan without objectives and goals. Clearly
explain to your employees the objectives you've set and help them identify the impacts
their work will have on the team's ability to reach these goals.
Encourage your employees to ask any questions they may have in mind and most
importantly, make sure you are able to answer all their questions. That point is
extremely important when it comes to driving change during the pandemic. That's one of
the best way to reconnect and build trust with your remote teams. If needed, appoint a
spokesperson that will be able to keep the dialogue with your employees open, the same
way as you would appoint a spokesperson as a part of a crisis communication plan.
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We've also asked our clients to share their best practices for communicating change with
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1. Share the new company policies and procedures with your teams in a timely manner
2. Share safety tips with your employees on a daily basis. Sharing wit them informative and
educational materials such as short videos is a great way to help them protect
themselves from the pandemic.
3. Monitor updates from Governments and other local authorities and instantly share
them with your employees
4. Make sure you are able to inform your employees about urgent matters
5. Know your employees and the content they are interested in
6. Make it easy for your teams to keep up with the latest news related to the pandemic
7. Track the e�ectiveness of your change plan
8. Use a mobile app so you can reach all your employees, no matter where they are
9. Align your communication e�orts so your messages are consistent, no matter with
whom you share them. It's all about building trust in these times of uncertainty.
What's next? Download the eBook “10 Principles of Modern Employee Communications” where
we share tips & best practices for successfully communicating with your employees in today's
digital age.
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- R E L AT E D ART I C L E S -
WRITTEN BY
Valène Jouany & Kristina Martic
How to Improve Cross-Functional Collaboration in the Workplace
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