Peculiarities of the Change Process
End of the Change Process
At the end of the change process, the alteration is put into action. It can be observed through the behavior of the employees, the improvement of the activities managed by the organization and workflows.
Steps for Moving Forward
If the organization wants to move forward, it should follow several steps:
- Bring out a detailed description of the expected outcomes;
- Understand what needs to be improved and focus on this issue;
- Decide what is already achieved;
- Find out when the organization has reached similar success;
- Make a new step forward;
- Examine the results;
- Identify the further change.
Documentation/tracking of the Change Process
The alterations are to be tracked with the help of a change management system.
The change process is conducted to improve the current situation. That is why as soon as it reaches the end, the effect is to be seen. Then the employees are to keep to new stands and continue working according to the new plan as this is the only way not to lose what was gained (Elearn, 2007).
According to the FORWARD-model, the change process consists of 7 steps. During the first one, the organization should evaluate current condition and decide what is to be enhanced. They may need to solve some problem or want to improve something good even more. Then they should discuss what they want to get eventually, what will be different and what advantages the change will bring. During the third stage, the organization is to assess the current state. Thus, nothing will be overlooked, and the employees will get involved. They may also find out what should be done to make progress. The next step is meant to identify when they achieved some success in the past (what went right, what was done, etc.). Then they are to see whether the actions that helped earlier can improve the situation today and to monitor these results. They will understand what can be used during the change process and in what way. Finally, the organization will realize what change is to be made further and when they will not need to alter something more (Visser & Bodien n.d.).
To review the change process one can refer to the change tracking system, where it is documented. The change is documented “when the change initiator has completed the required level of technical verification and completes a change request” (Cisco Systems, 2008). As a rule, there is a particular template for the change plan document.
Facilitating Change in an Organization
The Most Important Thing Learned
I believe that the most important thing I have learned is the fact that the outcomes are to be clearly identified before the implementation of the change.
The Reason for Importance
This aspect is important because if the organization wants improvement but does not imagine the exact result of the change process, all efforts are likely to be wasted (Scheer, Abolhassan, Jost, & Kirchmer, 2012). The company will not be able to realize that the moment to stop alternations has come and may get exhausted soon. Moreover, without a decent plan, the changes fail to bring success. It means that if the organization does not see its future after the changes, it will have a wrong plan of actions, which may lead to serious issues. Thus, the change process can ruin the organization instead of providing benefit.
References
Cisco Systems. (2008). Change management: Best practices. Web.
Elearn. (2007). Change management. London, United Kingdom: Routledge.
Scheer, A., Abolhassan, F., Jost, W., & Kirchmer, M. (2012). Business process change management. New York, NY: Springer Science & Business Media.
Visser, C., & Bodien, G. (n.d.). Moving FORWARD with solution-focused change. Web.