Top 5 Challenges with Current Ways of Managing Multiple Change Initiatives

by The Change Compass | Change Measurement, Portfolio management

Managing multiple change initiatives is not a new concept nor is it new to organizations. What is perhaps ‘newer’ is how change practitioners are using data to manage multiple changes. Change practitioners that manage a portfolio of initiatives used to focus on building capability in various arenas from employee capability, leadership capability, through to the effectiveness of engagement and learning channels. However, using business and change management data to help companies is just as critical.

In this article, we will explore the top five challenges associated with the current approaches to managing multiple change initiatives. We explore these common approaches and critique key challenges, along with alternatives.

1) Using Change Heatmap to Classify Departments Impacted

Change heatmaps have become a popular tool for classifying departments based on the impact of a change initiative. However, two key issues often arise with this approach: the oversimplification of the traffic light classification system and the lack of granularity at the department level.

One of the most common ways to visually depict the impact of multiple changes is to use the heatmap. This is normally using a 3-point rating system (high, medium, low) to determine the level of impact across the various departments across the organisation. Whilst the rating process is an easy exercise, there are some very serious challenges:

Even for the 3 level rating system the change practitioner may be challenged with how this rating is determined and what it is based on. Not every team within the same department may be equally impacted
There may be different impacts for different roles within the same team and department
The impact may be different depending on whether the focus is on employees, customers, process, system or partner
Typically most use a monthly rating scale. However, for busy organisations with lots of changes, the change volume may go up and down within the same month. With one rating it oversimplifies what actually happens throughout the month
With only 3 levels of ratings, a lot of departments end up having the same rating level for months, meaning there is not much they can do with this data.
In Summary, the summarised monthly rating for one department indicates medium-level change. But at what time of the month, for what role, for what team, and for what type of impact?

The below is an example of a change heatmap from the University of California, Berkeley.

a. Traffic Light Classification Too Simplistic:

The traditional red, yellow, and green traffic light system used in change heatmaps is a simple way to communicate the status of a department’s readiness for change. However, this simplicity can be misleading. Red may indicate a problem, but it does not provide insights into the nature or severity of the issue. Likewise, green may suggest readiness, but it might hide underlying complexities or dependencies.

Even for the 3 level rating system the change practitioner may be challenged with how this rating is determined and what fact it is based on. Also, the impact may be different depending on whether the focus is on employees, customers, process, system or partner. Typically most use a monthly rating scale. However, for busy organisations with lots of changes, the change volume may go up and down within the same month. With one rating it oversimplifies what actually happens throughout the month. Even if the singular departmental rating is split into rating by initiative, this does not provide an aggregate department-level rating that is aggregated based on logic.

To overcome this challenge, organizations need a more nuanced classification system that takes into account the specific issues within each category. This could involve incorporating additional colours or using a numerical scale to better represent the diversity and complexity of challenges within each department.

b. Department Level Not Granular Enough:

While change heatmaps provide a high-level overview, they often lack the granularity required to understand the specific challenges within each department. Different teams within a department may be impacted differently, and a broad classification may not capture these variations.

To address this issue, organizations should consider adopting a more detailed classification system that breaks down each department into its constituent parts. This granular approach allows for a more targeted and effective change management strategy, addressing specific issues at the team and role levels.

In Summary, the singular monthly rating for one department indicates medium-level change. But at what time of the month, for what role, for what team, and for what type of impact?

2) Using Project Milestone Roadmap to Sequence Impacts

Project milestone roadmaps are commonly used to sequence the impacts of change initiatives. However, this approach faces challenges in terms of the sufficiency of milestones and the difficulty of overlaying multiple capacity considerations.

Below is an example from Praxis Framework.

a. Milestones Are Not Sufficient vs Overall Aggregate Impact Levels:

While project milestones provide a structured timeline for change initiatives, they may not capture the full scope of the impact on the organization. Milestones often focus on project-specific tasks and may overlook broader organizational changes that occur concurrently. For example, adoption may require months and is not a single point-in-time milestone per se.

To overcome this limitation, organizations should supplement milestone roadmaps with an overall aggregate impact assessment. This holistic view ensures that the sequence of milestones aligns with the broader organizational objectives and minimizes conflicts between concurrent initiatives.

b. Difficulty of Overlaying Multiple Capacity Considerations:

Managing multiple change initiatives requires a delicate balance of resources, and overlaying capacity considerations can be challenging. Project milestone roadmaps may not adequately address the interdependencies and resource constraints that arise when multiple initiatives are in progress simultaneously.

To enhance capacity planning, organizations should invest in advanced project management tools that allow for the dynamic adjustment of timelines based on resource availability. This ensures a realistic and achievable sequencing of impacts, taking into account the organization’s overall capacity.

3) Relying Purely on Excel and PowerPoint to Manage Multiple Change Initiatives

While Excel and PowerPoint are ubiquitous tools in the business world, relying solely on them to manage multiple change initiatives presents challenges related to the agile nature of changes and the difficulty of having interactive data-based conversations. This is especially the case that most change initiatives are digital changes, and yet they are been managed using non-digital means? How can change practitioners ‘be the change’ when they are using dated ways of driving digital change?

a. Agile Nature of Changes Means Ongoing Updates Are Required:

Change initiatives are inherently dynamic, and their requirements can evolve rapidly. Excel and PowerPoint, while useful for static reporting, lack the real-time collaborative capabilities needed to accommodate the agile nature of changes.

To address this challenge, organizations should consider adopting change management and collaboration tools that enable real-time updates and collaboration. Cloud-based platforms provide the flexibility to make ongoing adjustments, ensuring that stakeholders are always working with the latest information.

b. Difficulty of Having Interactive Data-Based Conversations and Federated Model of Change Data:

Excel and PowerPoint may struggle to facilitate interactive discussions around change data. As organizations increasingly operate in a federated model, with dispersed teams working on different aspects of change initiatives, a more collaborative and integrated approach is essential.

Implementing dedicated change management platforms that support interactive data-based discussions can enhance collaboration and provide a centralized repository for change-related information. This ensures that all stakeholders have access to the latest data, fostering a more transparent and collaborative change management process.

4) Preparing Business Operations Readiness for the Amount of Change

Preparing business operations for a significant amount of change requires a strategic approach that incorporates capacity and time considerations while maintaining granularity in data.

a. Using Business Operations Speak: Capacity, resources, time.

Business operations readiness is often discussed in terms of capacity and time. However, the challenge lies in translating these concepts into actionable plans. Capacity planning involves understanding the organization’s ability to absorb change without compromising existing operations, while time considerations are crucial for ensuring a smooth transition without disruptions.

Change practitioners need to distill the ‘ask of the business’ in business speak. Business stakeholders may not be interested in the various classifications of change or the varying degrees of cultural changes involved. What they are interested in is what you want from my team, how much time you need them to dedicate, and for what team members, so that they can plan accordingly.

b. Granularity of Data:

The granularity of data is essential for effective business operations readiness. Generic metrics may not capture the specific needs and challenges of individual departments or teams, leading to oversights that can impact the success of change initiatives.

Implementing a comprehensive data collection and analysis strategy that considers the unique requirements of each business unit ensures a more accurate understanding of operational readiness. This granularity allows organizations to tailor change management strategies to specific needs, enhancing the likelihood of successful implementation.

5) Getting Executive Engagement and Decision Making

Ensuring executive engagement and decision-making is critical for the success of change initiatives. However, achieving this engagement poses its own set of challenges.

To overcome this challenge, organizations should:

Establish Clear Governance and Engagement Channels:

Ensure that there is in place clear governance bodies making decisions on the overall control of initiatives across the organisation. Communication channels between change management teams and executives should also be well-defined and effective. Regular updates and transparent reporting on the progress and challenges of change initiatives build trust and encourage executive engagement.

Align Change Initiatives with Strategic Objectives:

Demonstrate the alignment of change initiatives with the organization’s strategic objectives. Executives are more likely to engage when they see how a particular change contributes to the overall success and growth of the company.

Provide Decision-Making Frameworks:

Equip executives with decision-making frameworks that guide them through the complexities of change initiatives. Clearly defined criteria for evaluating the success of a change, along with potential risks and mitigation strategies, empower executives to make informed decisions.

Highlight the Business Impact:

Clearly articulate the business impact of change initiatives. Executives are more likely to engage when they understand the tangible benefits and potential risks associated with a particular change. Use data and analytics to support the business case for change.

Offer Ongoing Support and Education:

Ensure that executives have the necessary support and training to navigate the complexities of change management. This includes providing relevant information, resources, and expertise to help them make informed decisions and actively participate in the change process. Creating ‘bite-sized’ and summarised insights is key for executives.

Effectively managing multiple change initiatives is a complex task that requires a holistic and adaptive approach. By addressing the challenges associated with classification, sequencing, tool reliance, business operations readiness, and executive engagement, organizations can enhance their change management strategies and increase the likelihood of successful outcomes. Embracing innovative tools, fostering collaboration, and maintaining a strategic focus on organizational goals are key elements in overcoming these challenges and navigating the ever-evolving landscape of change.

In this article, we’ve stressed the importance of data. You may wonder about the amount of time and effort required to establish all the various points mentioned in the article and if this is even doable. Well, using Excel and other static non-digital ways of managing change data will mean a significant volume of work, and even then it may not provide a clear picture that gives you the various cuts of data required to drive meaningful conversations. Resort to automation provided by change management software such as The Change Compass to assist in data capture, data analysis, and dashboard generation.

To read more about managing a portfolio of changes check out articles here.

How to measure change adoption

by The Change Compass | Change approach, Change Measurement, Uncategorized

Measuring the change adoption of stakeholders is one of the most important parts of the work of change practitioners. It is the ultimate ‘proof’ of whether the change interventions have been successful or not in achieving the initiative objectives. It is also an important way in which the progress of change management can clearly be shown to the project team as well as to various stakeholder groups.

Measurement takes time, focus and effort. It may not be something that is a quick exercise. There needs to be precise data measurement design, a reliable way of collecting data, and data visualisation that is easily understood by stakeholders.

With the right measurements of change adoption, you can influence the direction of the initiative, create impetus amongst senior stakeholders, and steer the organisation toward a common goal to realise the change objectives. Such is the power of measuring change adoption.

The myth of the change management curve

One of the most popular graphs in change management and often referred as the ‘change curve’ is the Kubler-Ross model. The model was specifically designed by psychiatrist Elisabeth Kubler-Ross to refer to terminally ill patients as a part of the book ‘On Death and Dying’. For whatever reason, it has somehow gained popularity and application in change management.

There is little research evidence to back this up even in psychological research. When applied in change management there is no known research that supports this at all. On the other hand, there is ample research by McKinsey that for effectively managed initiatives and transformations, stakeholders do not go through this ‘valley of death’ journey at all.

The ‘S’ curve of change adoption

If the ‘change curve’ is not the correct chart to follow with regard to change adoption, then what is the right one to refer to?

The ‘S’ curve of change adoption is one that can be referenced. It is well backed in terms of technology and new product adoption research. It follows a typically slow start followed by a significant climb in adoption followed by a flattened level at the end. Here is an example of key technologies and the speed of adoption in U.S. households since the 1900s.

With the different types of change contexts, the shape of the S curve will be expected to differ as a result. For example, you are working on a fairly minor process change where there is not a big leap in going from the current process to the new process. In this case, the curve would be expected to be a lot more gentle since the complexity of the change is significantly less than adopting a complex, new technology.

Going beyond what is typically measured

Most change practitioners are focused on measuring the easier and more obvious measures such as stakeholder perceptions, change readiness, and training completion. Whilst these are of value, they in themselves are measuring aspects of the change. They can be viewed as forward-looking indications of the progress that supports moving toward eventual change adoption, versus the eventual change adoption.

To really address head-on the topic of measuring adoption, it is critical to go beyond these initial measures toward those elements that indicate the actual change in the organisation. Depending on the type of change this could be system usage, behaviour change, following a new process or achieving cost savings targets.

Project Benefit realization

It goes without saying that to really measure change adoption the change practitioner must work closely with the project manager to understand in detail the benefits targeted, and how the prescribed benefits will be measured. The project manager could utilise a range of ways to articulate the benefits of the project. Common benefit categories include:

Business success factors such as financial targets on revenue or cost
Product integration measures such as usage rate
Market objectives such as revenue target, user base, etc.

These categories above are objectives that are easier to measure and tangible to quantify. However, there could also be less tangible targets such as:

Competitive position
Employee relations
Employee experience
Product or solution leadership
Employee capability

There could be various economic methods of determining the targeted benefit objectives. These include payback time or the length of time from project initiation until the cumulative cash flow becomes positive, or net present value, or internal rate of return.

The critical part for change practitioners is to understand what the benefit objectives are, how benefit tracking will be measured and the interpret what steps are required to get there. These steps include any change management steps required to get from the current state to the future state.

Here is an example of a mapping of change management steps required in different benefit targets:

Project benefits targeted	Likely change management steps required	Change management measures
Increased customer satisfaction and improved productivity through implementing a new system.	Users able to operate the new system. Users able to improve customer conversations leveraging new system features. Users proactively use the new system features to drive improved customer conversations. Managers coaching and provide feedback to usersBenefit tracking and communications. Customer communication about improved system and processes Decreased customer call waiting time .	% of users passed training test. System feature usage rate. Customer issue resolution time. User feedback on manager coaching. Monthly benefit tracking shared and discussed in team meetings. Customer satisfaction rate. Customer call volume handling capacity.

Measuring behavioural change

For most change initiatives, there is an element of behaviour change, especially for more complex changes. Whether the change involves a system implementation, changing a process or launching a new product, behaviour change is involved. In a system implementation context, the behaviour may be different ways of operating the system in performing their roles. For a process change, there may be different operating steps which need to take place that defers from the previous steps. The focus on behaviour change aims to zoom in on core behaviours that need to change to lead to the initiative outcome being achieved.

How do we identify these behaviours in a meaningful way so that they can be identified, described, modelled, and measured?

The following are tips for identifying the right behaviours to measure:

Behaviours should be observable. They are not thoughts or attitudes, so behaviours need to be observable by others
Aim to target the right level of behaviour. Behaviours should not be so minute that they are too tedious to measure, e.g. click a button in a system. They also should not be so broad that it is hard to measure them overall, e.g. proactively understand customer concerns
Behaviours are usually exhibited after some kind of ‘trigger’, for example, when the customer agent hear certain words such as ‘not happy’ or ‘would like to report’ from the customer that they may need to treat this as a customer complaint by following the new customer complaint process. Identifying these triggers will help you measure those behaviours.
Achieve a balance by not measuring too many behaviours since this will create additional work for the project team. However, ensure a sufficient number of behaviours are measured to assess benefit realisation

Measuring micro-behaviours

Behaviour change can seem over-encompassing and elusive. However, it may not need to be this. Rather than focusing on a wide set of behaviours that may take a significant period of time to sift, focusing on ‘micro-behaviours’ can be more practical and measurable. Micro-behaviours are simply small observable behaviours that are small step-stone behaviours vs a cluster of behaviours.

For example, a typical behaviour change for customer service reps may be to improve customer experience or to establish customer rapport. However, breaking these broad behaviours down into small specific behaviours may be much easier to target and achieve results.

For example, micro-behaviours to improve customer rapport may include:

User the customer’s name, “Is it OK if I call you Michelle?”
Build initial rapport, “How has your day been?”
Reflect on the customer’s feeling, “I’m hearing that it must have been frustrating”
Agree on next steps, “would it help if I escalate this issue for you?”

Each of these micro-behaviours may be measured using call-listening ratings and may either be a yes/no or a rating based assessment.

Establishing reporting process and routines

After having designed the right measurement to measure your change adoption, the next step would be to design the right reporting process. Key considerations in planning and executing on the reporting process includes:

Ease of reporting is critical, and you should aim to automate where possible to reduce the overhead burden and manual work involved. Whenever feasible leverage automation tools to move fast and not be bogged down by tedious work
Build expectations on contribution to measurement. Rally your stakeholder support so that it is clear the data contribution required to measure and track change adoption
Design eye-catching and easy to understand dashboard of change adoption metrics.
Design reinforcing mechanisms. If your measurement requires people’s input, ensure you design the right reinforcing mechanisms to ensure you get the data you are seeking for. Human nature is so that whenever possible, people would err on the side of not contributing to a survey unless there are explicit consequences of not filling out the survey.
Recipients of change adoption measurement. Think about the distribution list of those who should receive the measurement tracking. This includes not just those who are in charge of realising the benefits (i.e. business leaders), but also those who contribute to the adoption process, e.g. middle or first-line managers.

Example of change adoption dashboard from Change Automator

Change saturation measurement recipe

by The Change Compass | Change Measurement

Change saturation is one of the popular search items when it comes to measuring change management. How do we effectively measure change saturation without resorting to personal opinions? And how might we formulate effective recommendations that are logical and that stakeholders can action immediately?

Use this recipe to measure change saturation using The Change Compass.

To download the pdf click here.

The ultimate guide to measuring change

by The Change Compass | Change Initiatives, Change Measurement, Guides

A lot of change practitioners are extremely comfortable with saying that change management is about attitudes, behaviours, and feelings and therefore we cannot measure them. After all, a lot of change practitioners are more interested in people than numbers. This metaphor that change management is ‘soft’ extends into areas such as leadership and employee engagement whereby it may not be easy to measure and track things. However, is it really that because something is harder to measure and less black and white that there is less merit in measuring these?

“If you can’t measure it you can’t improve it” Peter Drucker”

The ‘why’ behind a lot of industry change in our day and age comes from the fact that data is now dominating our world. Data is a central part of everything that is changing in our world. Since we are now more reliant on the internet for information, the data that can be collected through our digital interactions around our lives are now driving change.

Home assistant Alexa from Amazon can recognize our voices and tell us what we want to know. We can be identified through street cameras. Our Google usage leads to better-targeted advertisements and product promotions. Our Facebook usage leads to a deep understanding of our preferences and lifestyles, and therefore we become targetted by advertisements for what we may find value in (according to Facebook data and algorithms).

At work, we are surrounded by work functions and departments that rely on data to run and manage the business. HR, Finance, Operations, Manufacturing, Risk, Procurement, etc. The list goes on. In each of these departments data is an essential part of the day to day running of the function, without which the function cannot be run effectively.

So if our world is surrounded by data, why are we not measuring it in managing change? To answer this question let’s look at what we are or are not measuring.

These are some of the common ways in which change is often measured in projects:

1. Change readiness surveys

Change readiness surveys are usually online surveys sent by a project owner to understand how stakeholder groups are feeling about the change at different points in time throughout the project. It can be in the form on a Likert scale or free text. Most results are summarized into a quantitative scale of the degree in which the group is ready for change. A simple SurveyMonkey could be set up to measure stakeholder readiness for change. ChangeTracking (now part of Accenture) is a comprehensive online tool that measures the change journey and readiness of stakeholder groups throughout the initiative.

2. Training evaluation surveys

These evaluations are normally based on participant satisfaction across various categories such as content, instructor effectiveness, usefulness, etc. In a face-to-face training format, these surveys are normally paper-based so as to increase the completion rate. For online or virtual training, ratings may be completed by the user at the conclusion or after the session.

3. Communications metrics

One way in which communications may be measured is the ‘hit rate’ or the number of users/audience that views the article/material/page. This may be easily tracked using Google Analytics that not only tracks number of views per page but also viewership by the time of day/week as well as audience demographic information as such gender and geographical locations.

4. Employee sentiments/culture surveys

There are some organizations that measure employee sentiments or culture over the year and often there are questions that are linked to change. These surveys tend to be short and based on a Likert scale with less open-ended questions for qualitative feedback. Since these surveys are often sent across the entire organization they are a ‘catch-all’ yardstick and may not be specific to particular initiatives.

5. Change heatmaps

Some organizations devise change heatmaps on excel spreadsheets to try and map out the extent to which different business units are impacted by change. This artifact speaks to the amount of change and often leads to discussions concerning the capacity that the business has to ‘handle/digest’ change. The problem with most heatmaps is that they are usually categorized and rated by the creator of the artifact (or a limited number of people making judgments), and therefore subject to bias. Data that is based on 1 person’s opinions also tend not to have as much weight in a decision-making forum.

Change benefit tracking

In addition to typical change management measures, there are various initiatives-specific measures that focus on the actual outcome and benefit of the change with the goal of determining to what extent the change has taken place. Some example of this includes:

System usage rates
Cost reduction
Revenue increase
Transaction speed
Process efficiency
Speed of decision making
Customer satisfaction rate
Employee productivity rate
Incidents of process violation

Non-initiative based change management measures

There are two other measures that are used within an organizational vs. initiative-specific context, change leadership assessment and change maturity assessment. In the next section, we will discuss these two areas.

Change leadership assessment

David Miller from Changefirst wrote about 3 types of change leaders.:

1. The sponsor whose role is to drive the initiative to success from the beginning to the end. This involves possessing competencies in rallying and motivating people, building a strong network of sponsors and communicating clearly to various stakeholder groups.

2. The influencer whose role is to leverage their network and influence to market and garner the traction required to make the initiative successful. Four types of influencers as identified by Changefirst includes:

a) Advocates who are great at promoting and advocating the benefits of the change

b) Connectors who are able to link and leverage people across a part of the organization to support the change

c) Controllers who have control over access to information and people and these could include administrators and operations staff

d) Experts who are viewed by others in the organization as being technically credible

3. The change agent is someone who is tasked with supporting the overall change in various ways, including any promotional activities, gaging different parts of the organization on the change and be able to influence, up, down and sideways across the organization to drive a successful change outcome.

Whilst there isn’t one industry standard tool for assessing change leadership competencies and capabilities. There are various change leadership assessment tools offered by Changefirst as well as other various smaller consulting firms. One of the most comprehensive change leadership assessment tools is by ChangeTracking is the Change Capacity Assessment which is a self-assessment with the broad categories being Goal Attainment, Flexibility, Decision Making, and Relationship Building.

Some of the key competencies critical in change leadership have been called out by Pagon & Banutal (2008), and include:

Goal attainment
Assessing organizational culture and climate
Change implementation
Motivating and influencing others
Adaptability
Stakeholder management
Collaboration
Build organizational capacity and capability for change
Maneuvering around organizational politics

Change maturity assessment

Organisations are increasingly realising that managing change initiative by initiative is no longer going to cut it as it does not enable organizational learning and growth. Initiatives come and go and those who rely on contractor change managers often find that their ability to manage change as an organization does not mature much across initiatives.

Change maturity assessment is focused on building change capability across the organization across different dimensions, whether it be project change management, operational change or change leadership. The goal of conducting a change maturity assessment is to identify areas in which there may be a capability gap and therefore enable structured planning to close this gap.

Change maturity assessment results may prompt focus and action to improve change management capabilities if used in the right channels to influence the leadership and the business.

There are 2 major change maturity assessment models available in the market. The first is by Prosci and the second is by the Change Management Institute. To read more about change maturity assessment read out article A New Guide for Improving Change Management Maturity, where we outline how to improve change maturity throughout different business units across the organization.

A comprehensive model of Change Management Measures

In this diagram various change management measures are represented along two axes, one being the different phases of the initiative lifecycle, and the other being different organizational levels of project, business and enterprise in which change management measures fall into.

Project level measures

1. ‘Plan’ phase

In this phase of the project, the team is discovering and scoping what the project involves and what the change is. As a result, the details are not known clearly at the commencement of the phase. Later in the phase the scope becomes much clearer and the team starts to plan what activities are required to implement the change.

The change complexity assessment evaluates how complex the project is. It looks at how many people could be impacted, what the size of the impact could be, how many business units are impacted, whether multiple systems and processes are impacted, etc.
Change resourcing costing. At the planning phase of the project cost required for the change management stream of the work is required. This includes such as any contractors, communication campaigns, learning cost, travel, and administration cost, just to name a few.
Change readiness assessment is usually conducted prior to the change and during the change. Usually, the same set of questions is asked of various stakeholder groups to assess their readiness for change.

2. ‘Execute’ phase

The execute phase is one of the most critical parts of the project. Activities are in full flight and the project is busy iterating and re-iterating changes to ensure successful execution to achieve project goals.

Communication and engagement tracking. Effective engagement of stakeholders in the change is absolutely critical. Stakeholder interviews, surveys, communication readership rates are all ways in which engagement may be tracked.
Learning tracking. Measuring learning is critical since it tracks to what extent the new competencies and skills have been acquired through learning interventions. Typical measurements include course tests or quizzes in addition to course evaluations. On the job performance may also be used to track learning outcomes and to what extent learning has been applied in the work setting.
Change readiness assessment continues to be critical to track during the execution phase of the project

3. ‘Realise’ phase

In this phase of the project the change has ‘gone live’ and most project activities have been completed. It is anticipated in this phase that the ‘change’ occurs and that the benefits can then be tracked and measured.

Change benefit tracking measures and tracks the extent to which the targeted benefits and outcomes have been achieved. Some of these measures may be ‘hard’ quantitative measures whilst others may be ‘soft’ measures that are more behavioural.

Business level measures

Business level measures are those that measure to what extent the business has the right ability, capacity, and readiness for the change.

Change heatmaps can help to visualize which part of the business is most impacted by 1 project or multiple projects. The power of the change heatmap is in visualizing which part of the business is the most impacted, and to compare the relative impacts across businesses. As the number of change initiatives increase so would the complexity of the change. When facing this situation organisations need to graduate from relying on excel spreadsheets to using more sophisticated data visualization tools to aid data-based decision making. To read more about change heatmaps and why this is not the only way to understand business change impact, go to The Death of the Change Heatmap.
Sponsor readiness/capability assessment can be a critical tool to help identify any capability gaps in the sponsor so that effort may be taken to support the sponsor. A strong and effective sponsor can make or break a change initiative. Early engagement and support of the sponsor are critical. Both Prosci, as well as Changefirst, have sponsor competency assessment offerings.
Change champion capability assessment. Change champion or change agent are critical ‘nodes’ in which to drive and support change within the organizational network. A lot of change champions are appointed only for one particular initiative. Having a business-focus change champion network means that their capability can be developed over time, and they can support multiple initiatives and not just one. Assessing and supporting change champion capability would also directly translate to better change outcomes.
Change leadership and change maturity assessment – refer to the previous section
Change capacity assessment.

In an environment where there is significant change happening concurrently, careful planning and sequencing of change in balance with existing capacity are critical. There are several aspects of change capacity that should be called out in the measurement process:

Different parts of the business can have different capacity for change. Those parts of the business with better change capability, and perhaps with better change leadership, are often able to receive and digest more changes than other businesses that do not possess the same level of capability.
Some businesses are much more time-sensitive and therefore their change capacity needs to be measured with more granularity. For example, call centre staff capacity is often measured in terms of minutes. Therefore, to effectively plan for their change capacity, the impacts of change needs to be quantified and articulated in a precise, time-bound context so that effective resourcing can be planned in advance.
The change tolerance or change saturation level for business needs careful measurement in combination with operational feedback to determine. For example, it could be that last month a part of the business experienced significant change impact across several initiatives happening at the same time. The operational indicators were that there was some impact on customer satisfaction, productivity, and there were negative sentiments reported by staff that there was too much change to handle. This could mean that the change tolerance level may have been exceeded. With the right measurement of change impact levels for that part of the business, next time this level of change is seen, previous lessons may be utilized to plan for this volume of change. Utilise measurement and data visualization tools such as the Change Compass to track change capacity.

Enterprise level change measures

At an enterprise level, many of the business unit level measures are still applicable. However, the focus is comparing across different business units to sense-make what each part of the business is going through and if the overall picture is aligned with the intentions and the strategic direction of the organization. For example, typical questions include:

Is it surprising that one part of the business is undergoing significant change whilst another is not?
Is there a reason that one business unit is focused on a few very large changes whilst for other business units there is a larger set of changes each with smaller impacts?
Is the overall pace of change optimum according to strategic intent? Does it need to speed up or slow down?
What is the process to govern, report and make decisions on enterprise level change, prioritization, sequencing and benefit realization?
Is there one business unit that is able to manage change more effectively, faster with greater outcomes? How can other business units leverage any internal best practices?

As mentioned in the Change Management Measures diagram, some enterprise level change measures include:

Change capacity assessment – Does one business unit’s change capacity limits mean that we are not able to execute on a critical strategy within the allocated time? How do we create more capacity? Ways in which to create more capacity could include more resources such as staff, or initiative funding, more time is given, or more talent to lead initiatives
Change maturity assessment – At an enterprise level, the concern is with the overall change maturity of the organization. How do we implement enterprise level interventions to build change maturity through programs, networks, and exchanges, such as:
- Enterprise change capability programs
- Enterprise change analytics and measurement tools
- Enterprise change methodology
- Enterprise network of change champions
Strategy impact map – Change management need not be focused only on project execution or business unit capability. It can also demonstrate value at an enterprise level by focusing on strategy execution (which by definition is change). The way in which different strategies exert impact on various business units may be visualized to help stakeholder understand which initiatives within which strategic intent impact which business units. To illustrate this please refer to the below diagram which is an example of a strategy impact map. In this diagram, each of the organisation’s strategy is displayed with different initiatives branching out of each strategy. The width of each initiative correlates with the level of impact that the initiative has on the business over a pre-determined period of time. Therefore, the width of each strategy also indicates the overall relative impact on the business.

This data visualization artifact can be valuable for business leaders and strategic planning functions as it depicts visually how the implementation of various strategies is impacting business units. This helps planners to better understand strategy implementation impacts, potential risks and opportunities, and balancing change pace with strategy goals at various points in time.

Predictive indicators on business performance – We started this article talking about how data is all around us and we also need to better manage change using data. With quantitative data on change impact, it is possible to ascertain any correlations with operational business indicators such as customer satisfaction, service availability, etc. For those business indicators where there is a significant correlation, it is possible to hence use predictive reporting to forecast performance indicator trends, given planned change impacts.

In the below graph you can see an example of this whereby using historical data it is possible to establish correlations and therefore forecast future impact on business indicators. This example is focused on the customer contact centre (CCC) and key business indicator of average handling time (AHT) is utilized as an illustration.

This type of predictive performance forecasting is extremely valuable for organisations undergoing significant change and would like to understand how change may impact their business performance. By demonstrating the impact on business indicators, this puts the importance of managing change at the front and centre of the decision-making table. At The Change Compass, we are developing this type of measurement and reporting function. This is the frontier for change management – to be established as a key business-driving function (versus a standard back-office function).

Change can be measured and this article has outlined various operational and strategic ways in which change measurement can demonstrate significant value. Most corporate functions cannot exist without data and analytics. For example, Human Resources relies on people and pay data. Marketing cannot function without measurement of channel and campaign effectiveness. For Information Technology, pretty much everything is measured from system usage, to cost, to efficiency. It is time we start utilizing data to better visualize change to better plan and make business decisions.

Have a chat with us if you are looking for ways to streamline how you capture, visualise data for decisions, and leverage AI to easily gain insights. This includes the ability to easily do forecasting, ask data questions using natural language and get instant answers.

And If you’re ready to start implementing your change metrics check out the Part 2 of The Ultimate Guide to Measuring Change.

References:

Miller, David (2011) Successful Change. How to implement change through people. Changefirst Ltd.

Pagon & Banutal (2008) Leadership Competencies for Successful Change Management. Study Report. University of Maribor.

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