Essential Consultancy Services

Change Management Process

Change management process needs to extend beyond a traditional project management approach to recognise:

• A variety of pre-project activities needed to enable a change

• The likelihood that a considerable amount of activity at each stage will overlap, making traditional planning a complex process

• The need for post-implementation activities to underpin the change

This nature of change was first proposed by Lewin over 50 years ago. Here we prefer the terms mobilisation to Lewin's un-freezing phase, and consolidation to Lewin's re-freezing phase to recognise the on-going and progressive nature of change.

The cyclic or iterative nature of change is regularly recognised in change models, depicted through rolling ball or wheel metaphors (e.g. the PDCA or Deming Wheel, Kanter's change wheel).  The metaphor is convenient in permitting segmentation of tasks which need to be covered, but is simplistic where it suggests these will follow in a convenient linear fashion.  It is likely that some tasks will extend over a lengthy period and overlap several others, some tasks will need to be undertaken several times, and others will need to be undertaken in parallel for expediency, or in reaction to events. 

The link on emergent change contains a discussion on adapting change process to deal with semi-chaotic reality.

All pages are copyright: © 2004, 2005 Essential Consultancy Services Limited

The content of these pages represents the personal views of the author and is provided for information only.  The content does not constitute advice.  The reader shall accept responsibility for all uses to which the information is put.