Change is intended to strengthen companies, making them more competitive, and working more efficiently

Hardly a business day goes by without hearing the word 'change'.  Change, apparently, is the only constant in our organisational lives; whether it is a major change linked to new strategic directions, or smaller ones coming from changing departmental work process.  All of this change is intended to strengthen companies, making them more competitive and working more efficiently.  Yet, research has shown that time and again, many change efforts fail to deliver the benefit that they promised. 

There are many reasons cited, but they can all be boiled down to one thing.  Usually the only focus is on the business solution - merging two organisations, implementing a major computer system, or adding new products to the portfolio.  This can cost the company not only thousands, but millions of pounds.  However, when it comes to thinking about effectively implementing this solution, many companies will not invest the same amount of effort or resources; and it is this which brings about the failure to deliver on benefits promised.

The answer is to invest in some effective change management, but for too many people in organisations this doesn't sound very tangible.  What is it?  Why should we do it?  Isn't it expensive?  Couldn't we just do some training?  What returns will we get on our investment?

To read the article in full, please click on the pdf link below:

Taking the Risk out of change.pdf