Published on: 12/Jan/2020
Change management has become essential for every company that wishes to succeed in today’s ever-changing environment. The corporate environment is dynamic: technological advancements, customer preferences shift, new market laws occur on a regular basis, and organizations must deal with significant global challenges.
Companies that are unable to react and seize growth opportunities are likely to be passed by more dynamic competitors and may even go out of business. As a result, one of the primary concerns for business leaders and consultants like Bill Smith is preparing for change and properly implementing the necessary changes.
What is Change Management
Change Management is a systematic strategy to manage the metamorphosis of corporate goals, core values, procedures, or technologies. Every organizational change management endeavor aims to successfully implement strategies and methods for bringing about change and assisting people in accepting and adapting to it. Change management and communication teams are now critical success drivers for many firms. Hiring consulting firms like Double Iron Consulting led by the former Royal Cup Coffee CEO Bill Smith can help organizations manage the change process effectively.
Types of Organizational Change
There are three types of change that organizations undergo.
Developmental change
Developmental change entails an organization improving what it is currently doing, such as improving employees’ skill sets, enhancing work processes, or setting new performance standards. Examples of developmental change can include training employees on communication, conflict resolution, or team-building activities to enhance synergy.
Transitional change
These are changes that transition an organization to a new state to enable it to solve particular problems. Transitional change results in the replacement of what is already in existence. For transitional change to happen, people involved need to let go of the old ways of doing things and embrace the new approach. Examples of transitional changes include automation of processes, mergers, acquisitions.
Transformational change
These changes transform how a company operates, including its core values, corporate culture, and vision. In transformational change, the future is not clearly known in detail, and the final state results from a trial and error process. Business leaders and managers require inventing rather than inhabiting the future state, and this requires a great deal of effort in changing mindsets and behavior.
Why is Good Change Management Important?
Change within an organization is a critical part of a business’s overall success. Every organization that seeks to last long requires anticipating different dynamics in the operating environment. These dynamics require that the business change with the times to survive. When an organization is inadequately prepared to change, it may lose its competitive advantage or succumb to total business collapse.
Change management helps every level of an organization succeed when faced with events requiring minor or major adjustments. As change is implemented, well-grounded change management ensures everyone understands their roles and operates in the new scheme of things. In essence, change management enables a business to be viable and adapt to shifting market trends and dynamics.
Challenges Organizations Face in Managing Change
Whether small or large, all changes can benefit from a well-laid plan. Typically, change doesn’t happen naturally to organizations, and without good change management, change leaders are likely to face obstacles and waste resources. Here are the common challenges organizations face when managing change.
Lack of clear definition of change goals
Most directed organizational changes improve current processes, product offerings, or corporate culture. Other goals include deploying new technology, ramping up innovation culture, or shifting to a new customer base. When the goal of the change management isn’t clearly defined, the process is likely to fall short of expectations.
Lack of change leadership
Everything rises or falls on leadership. Leadership has a significant effect on employee engagement, and if the leaders are hardly convinced of the need to change, others may not fall in line. Leaders motivate their followers to embrace transitions and make it easy to implement change plans. Bill Smith helps an organization with leadership development that is critical for good change management.
Lack of resources
Change costs resources, and it’s crucial for organizational leaders to identify the resources required to push through changes from start to end. These resources may be monetary or non-monetary.
A properly-resourced change process is likely to be successful. While it may be difficult to identify all the required resources, using historical data and information from other organizations can help estimate. Hiring experienced consultants like Bill Smith can also help in this endeavor.
Lack of communication and documentation strategy
Communication is a critical lever in every successful change process. Every stakeholder requires getting the correct information in a timely manner. They also require a platform to give feedback to inform the change management process.
Changes also need to be documented, and the documents made easily accessible and shareable with relevant stakeholders. Poor communication and documentation can be detrimental to change management.
About Bill Smith and Double Iron Consulting
Prior to founding the consultancy firm Double Iron Consulting, Bill Smith former CEO of Royal Cup Coffee, a family-owned business specializing in coffee roasting and distribution. Founded in 1896 by Henry T. Batterton, the company has made a name in serving fresh and flavorful coffee. In 1950, the company changed hands from the Batterton estate to William E. Smith and became known as Royal Cup Coffee.
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The Smith family stills own the company, with Bill Smith being the last CEO from the Smith household. Today, the company is run by a non-family executive team and is a major importer, roaster, and distributor of premium coffee. Bill Smith now runs Double Iron Consulting to help businesses implement change and strategy. With Royal Cup Coffee’s success story, Bill Smith is undoubtedly a safe pair of hands.