5 signs of good health in change projects

 How do you know if your change project is in good health?

• What are the symptoms that tell you need help?
• What are the indicators of good change health?

It's a topic that entertained a group of change management folk a few weeks ago when the Change Management Professionals met to discuss the growing focus on change health checks.It was interesting but not perhaps surprising to see how the different lenses that we view change from influenced the discussion. There appeared to be a clear distinction between those who came from a Organisational Change Management background and those who were used to operating under dedicated project frameworks and protocols. When listening to those in the latter camp, I was wondering if a change health check is just another version of a project audit. I've seen very few organisations use project audits well (eg usually audits to see what went wrong) - so this had me a little nervous.But as Change Management Professionals co-founder Kym DeLany noted, the value in a change health check is the notion of taking action before it is overly problematic. See the doctor before you are sick and need remedial therapy.  So if I take that understanding, that a change health check is preventative, here in no particular order are my thoughts on how you assess the health of a change initiative.

1. Are the people designated with managing the change and preparing the organisation for change pacing themselves well (eg sufficient energy)
2. Are the change personnel sufficiently resourced?
3. Is the sponsor of the change initiative actively engaged?
4. Are the business stakeholders actively engaged
5. Is there a change strategy and communication plan

For me, these are the equivalent of nutrients, water, and sleep. Without these five health markers, then the change initiative is on shaky grounds, placing stress on other components of the team.  Other items are important, but these are critical (the heart, the brain, the central nervous system).Here are the notes from Kym's session - what would be your priorities? Keen to hear...and are you health checking in a preventative fashion?

What should we be health checking?

Exercise: In groups, select top 10 items. Prioritise

• Strategic alignment
• Organisational (structure) alignment
• Culture / behaviours
• Measures and metrics
• Resistance
• KPIs
• Processes
• Engagement
• Reinforcement
• Communications
• Leadership
• Sponsorship
• Data
• Readiness
• Risk
• Benefits
• People transition
• Systems and technology
• Strategy and planning
• Business integration
• Training / coaching
• Change strategy
• Delivery  / quick wins

Observations:

• “simple” language is not so simple! Different people have different understandings of these words/phrases. Agreement that it is important to work from a single understanding.
• Tendency to group up many of these items. E.g.:
  • Change strategy = training & coaching; comms, people transition
  • Strategic alignment = business integration
  • Sponsorship = stakeholder engagement; engagement
• There were items teams wanted to add:
  • Morale = change team (and business)
• There was language teams didn’t like at all!
  • No to “quick wins”. Yes to pacing and/or delivery.

Summary and close out:

• • 1. Challenging but worthwhile exercise
    2. Even change managers don’t agree on language – and we use it!
    3. 10 was hard to agree upon
    4. Next step would be to build the 3 or 4 key questions for each item.