Organizational change management (OCM) is a framework for managing the effect of new business processes, changes in organizational structure or cultural changes within an enterprise. Simply put, OCM addresses the people side of change management (business transformation).
Effective Organizational Change Management (OCM) within a Digital Transformation is often underwhelming in its execution for simple matters that have far reaching consequences that are not seen or felt until just before or after Go-Live. When it is too late and costs more to fix.
There are several reasons why organizational change initiatives are so difficult to implement. Planning is one of the first things that comes to mind. Without step-by-step planning, change in an organization is likely to fall apart or cause more problems than benefits. You need to understand exactly what changes will take place and how those changes will occur.
Another big one is organizational leadership ownership and speaking with “one voice.” The decision to implement changes necessary for a successful digital transformation need to come from the top level of the organization. All management level staff need to be on board and able to deal with the changes or you may face dissension within your end user community. You will find that the organization itself is giving pushback to the OCM aspect of the program. Meaning the employees are not adopting the coming change in lieu of maintaining the status quo. This thinking not only endangers the programs overall success, but create (and festers) a toxic environment that leads to unneeded challenges in the removing of silos, and eventually leading to fear, speculation and inevitable reductions in workforce. By leadership providing that “one voice” for change, reaffirming and clarifying the goals of the mission and that everyone needs to get on board, you will have a higher probability of resolving this conflict.
Communication is another key challenge. Failing to communicate with your end users invites additional disengagement, rumors and/or fear into the workplace, particularly if you’re facing major changes that often come with a major digital transformation initiative. Your end users want to know what’s going on, whether it is positive or negative news. The feeling of uncertainty when management doesn’t communicate disrupts work and makes your end users feel as if they aren’t a part of the decision. Build a comprehensive communications plan in order to keep your end users updated regularly about the plans and progress toward the change implementation.
Some features that Platinum PMO has integrated into their Digital Transformation Implementation Platform will assist your organization in properly executing the Organizational Change Management aspect of your initiative. For example, our integrated methodology functionality allows you to build your organizational transformation roadmap right within the platform. This functionality coupled with our integrated planning engine, allows your organizational transformation leadership team to build step-by-step plans using the latest and greatest organizational transformation methods in the industry. Another set of features involve our multiple integrated communication channels. Within the platform we have created a state-of-the-art communications register to identify and execute all of the critical communications to your internal and external stakeholders. We also provide what we call “surgical communications” by applying the PPMO Integrated RACI aspect of our platform. With these types of communications an organization is engaging ALL affected players within each step along the way. Giving clearly defined ownership, accountability, and awareness of outlying or possibly unknown effects of changes within the program. This will solidify the OCM aspects as they are made know the IMPACT OF THEIR WORK within the bigger picture or the organization.
Clarity within the Organization Change Management aspect of a Digital (Business) Transformation will be a key factor in the end success of a program as employee retention is kept, are bought-in to the new ways of adding value, and with new efficiencies in place that add to the projected and desired ROI that a program should bring.
