The Key to Change Management
Written by Guest Blogger, Kelly Sewczwicz, Process Manager at Cox Communications.
Everywhere I see articles talking about how constant change is going to be the new normal and that companies need to figure out how to embrace it. Last year, I heard similar sentiments, but I do think it’s getting harder for companies to compete without figuring out how to overcome change. Customers are expecting companies to adapt and to do so quickly. Most of the time change management is treated like a monumental effort and is very structured.
Maybe companies are looking at how to approach this wrong. Accepting change really means embracing failures. Not everything a company tries is going to work and they don’t have the luxury of time to get it 100% right. Customers are not expecting perfection, but they are expecting to see that companies are moving in directions to support them. Companies need to be willing to take risk to try new things and think creatively. They need to test ideas in the market that can be changed or turned off easily.
Equally important to accepting failures, companies need to be able to recognize failures quickly. In order to do that, companies must:
- Have a good understanding of the business processes and how they are performing
- Have a good understanding of the voice of the customer and what customers expect
- Have a way to connect information together to create action plans, not large, complex processes
The company culture needs to be accepting of groups that are willing to try new things that fail. As Henry Ford said, “Failure is simply the opportunity to begin again, this time more intelligently.”
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