STORIES & SOLUTIONS FOR THE MODERN BUSINESS USER

One change management trend that is getting a lot of attention, and we are seeing in our own experience, is organizations working to establish change as part of their company culture.

Successful change initiatives are not a matter of chance, but the result of strategic planning and strong communication. Strong leaders put change management at the forefront of digital transformation, modernization, and organizational culture efforts.

Innovation is defined as “a new idea, method, or device,” according to merriam-webster.com. It sounds so simple, yet the complexity behind it can be mind-boggling.

Change analytics is an evolving space and having the chance to talk about the subject at ACMP Global Connect led to great discussions with change practitioners around the globe. One key theme during many of our conversations focused on change fatigue, the resistance or passive resignation to organizational changes on the part of an employee. Change fatigue continues to be one of the more challenging concepts to measure, as everyone has a different threshold for where they reach the point of being fatigued. However, much like an athlete, there are ways to train for change, including increasing organizational and personal change resilience. Change resilience is easier to measure, as we can use an individual's historical performance and reactions to change to understand where an organization needs to continue to build change muscles.  

Last weekend, I was sorting through old notes from my college business classes and I came across a picture of cheese. Obviously, this caught my attention. The notes covered highlights from the book Who Moved My Cheese? An Amazing Way to Deal with Change in Your Work and in Your Life by Dr. Spencer Johnson.

You may be wondering, “what do dolphins and whales have to do with data and analytics?” Academic David Feeny first made the comparison between dolphins and whales with business by explaining that dolphins surface frequently to take short breaths and maintain contact with the rest of the pod. Whales on the other hand stay submerged for longer, meaning when they need to take a breath it takes more effort and is longer. Dolphins, not whales, set the example for sustaining change.

The last two years have been filled with disruption and change, requiring organizations in all industries to quickly pivot and adapt to changing employee and consumer needs. When uncertainty is the only certainty, organizations must rethink how they build community, strengthen relationships, coach and mentor, and reinforce shared purpose and culture.

For many higher education institutions, a cloud implementation is the largest initiative undertaken in 20 years or longer. However, a successful transformation project is more than modernizing technology. Success is measured on the level of adoption and use of the new system and takes careful planning. Bringing human resources, financial, and student systems together impacts the entire institution, and as with any widespread change, developing a robust communication strategy is vital to project success.

The American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) was signed into law a year ago on March 11, 2021. The plan, which includes $350 billion dollars in emergency funding, is dedicated to mitigating pandemic impacts for state, local, territorial, and Tribal governments. While now a year old, there is still funding available and recipients still have until December 31, 2024, to assign funds and until December 31, 2026, to spend them.

We’ve all heard the stereotypes. Project Managers: IT geeks that are excited by spreadsheets and their only interaction with people is through a computer screen. Their only job is to check off boxes when things are completed and then deliver a perfect outcome for a project.