Change at Hand Consulting – Approach
Step 1. Identify the Change
Description: This foundational step is about defining the change and setting the strategic direction. We work with executive leaders to gain alignment, prioritize the initiative, and clearly articulate the current and future state. By identifying key resources and the decision-making structure, this phase ensures the change is well-defined and fully sponsored.
Risk of Missing: Absence of a clear business case and executive support. The project will suffer from misalignment, continuous scope creep, and a lack of funding when competing priorities arise, leading to an inevitable stop/start cycle.
Leaders’ Align on Priorities
Detailed Change Impacts
Step 2. Plan for Change
Description: This phase transforms the strategic vision into an actionable blueprint. It involves developing a detailed Change Impact Assessment to understand the effects on specific roles and processes. We create integrated Communication, Stakeholder Engagement, and Training strategies, ensuring they are synchronized with the technical project plan. A robust plan minimizes surprise and maximizes user readiness for the transition.
Risk of Missing: Massive employee resistance and low adoption rates. Without a plan, stakeholders will be caught off guard, training will be inadequate, and critical user groups will actively reject the change, forcing costly reworks or abandonment.
Step 3. Executing for Change
Description: Execution is where plans become reality, focusing on driving adoption. This includes aligning change management activities with deployment timelines and using Transition Monitoring to track progress and handle resistance. By managing risks and ensuring all items on the Exit Strategy Checklist are complete, we facilitate a smooth transition.
Risk of Missing: The project will fail at the last mile (Go-Live). Gaps in communication and training during deployment, unmanaged risks, and high-volume support issues will overwhelm the organization, leading to a chaotic go-live, frustrated users, and a swift dip in productivity.
Transition & Tracking Progress
Reward New Behaviors
Step 4. Sustain the Change
Description: This final, critical step ensures the change locks in the benefits and becomes the new standard operating procedure. We shift focus to measuring adoption and realization of business benefits using ongoing KPIs, not just project completion metrics. By reinforcing new behaviors and formally transitioning all ongoing change activities to business ownership, we prevent a relapse to old habits and guarantee the longevity of the results.
Risk of Missing: Loss of realized benefits and a relapse to old habits. The organization will drift back to previous ways of working because new behaviors aren’t reinforced, negating the entire investment and ensuring the project fails to deliver its planned ROI.
Change at Hand 