One of the best strategies for gaining buy-in and support for your business initiative is through stakeholder engagement. By “engagement” we mean not only communications, but active involvement of the people who have a vested interest in the outcome of the initiative. Bear in mind, it is human nature for us to resist change when […]
In our previous article, How to Prioritize Stakeholders to Ensure a Successful Change Program, we introduced the Stakeholder Prioritization Map. Now we will explain how to translate that stakeholder prioritization analysis into stakeholder engagement strategies. As a reminder, stakeholders are individuals or groups who either will be impacted by changes resulting from the business initiative, […]
Stakeholder prioritization is one of the fundamental building blocks to a successful organizational change strategy. Too often, though, project teams get the stakeholder prioritization step wrong. Two of the most common stakeholder prioritization pitfalls are Prioritizing stakeholders based on the wrong assessment criteria Prioritizing stakeholders based upon input from too few people To clarify, in […]
Stakeholder resistance, if it gains a foothold on a large scale, can threaten to derail even the most positive change effort. There are four primary reasons1 that people resist change. Once you know what types to look for, you will be better equipped to spot change resistance in your organization. After you have identified the […]
Our previous post highlighted how companies under-invest in organizational change management when it comes to system implementations. Many excellent IT system implementations never realize the long-term benefits they set out to achieve because companies focus disproportionately on the structure and technical aspects of the IT program itself, and not on engaging employees in the process […]
For many project teams, conducting a change assessment is an eye-opening exercise which helps them chart a new course for the project they are working on. At a minimum, the assessment provides the team with an opportunity to confront and deal with current habits, beliefs and practices around the cultural aspects of change. Tool description […]
As you look ahead to the priority projects in your company’s pipeline, it is a good time for a brief refresher on organizational change success factors. Implement the recommendations below as you start-up (or continuing) your strategic business initiatives and you will be well on your way to success. Remember, the “soft stuff” (i.e., people […]
Just Because You’ve Communicated Doesn’t Mean They’ve Heard You It’s not uncommon for project teams and executive sponsors to suffer from what’s known as the “curse of knowledge,” a term coined in the book Made to Stick. In a nutshell, the curse of knowledge is the psychological phenomenon where once you know something well, it’s […]
Jesse Jacoby
