2.3.4 Change Management

Explain basic change-management best practices.

Change management is the method that companies use to ensure that change are implemented as smoothly and effectively as possible.

Change Requests

Organizations have an official approval procedure for making changes regarding to how the company functions. They use change order forms to document those requests. They usually ask for the change's:

• Purpose
• Scope
• Risk Analysis
• Rollback Plan (in case things don't go as expected, have a plan to retract all changes made)

Once a change form is submitted, it goes to the change board for approval. A change board might consist of one person or a group of people. It might include the CEO of the company, managers, project supervisors, and even the customer if the product or service being developed is for customer use.

Purpose

The first thing the change board will want to know about the change is the reasoning behind the change - why it needs to occur. The person presenting the change (in most cases you) will need to describe why the change is needed, whether it'll increase efficiency, save money, or add additional and useful functionality. You'll also need to explain how it fits with the company's current strategic focus.

• Why do you want to make this change?
• Why is the change needed?
• Will it improve a current process, save money, or add additional functionality?
• Does the change align with the organization’s current mission and strategy?

Scope

The company will also want to know exactly how long the proposed change will take to implement and how long it's going to last (if it's temporary). The scope should also include possible outcomes, estimated cost, personnel required, and systems involved in the change.

• What exactly do you want to change?
• What are the desired outcomes or deliverables?
• Will you need to request funding to cover new hardware or software?
• What about man-hours?
• Will you need programmers or technicians or administrative staff to work on the change?
• Who is the primary contact?
• Which existing systems will be impacted?
• Will there be down time?
• How will you know that the change is complete, and what quality control measures will you have in place to ensure that the project is complete?

Risk Analysis

All changes have a certain measure of risk involved, so be sure to carefully analyze your change to minimize the chance of something unexpected and catastrophic happening. It would be wise to ask yourself the following questions:

• What could go wrong if we implement these changes?
• How are we going to avoid these problems?
• How difficult will it be to backtrack if things turn out worse than expected?
• Is the outcome worth the risk?

Always get written approval for changes. It protects not only you, but the change board, and the customer. It also ensures that everyone involved with the change had a complete understanding of the change and its possible consequences. You'd always want to avoid misunderstandings that could bring harm to both your reputation and the company's, which might cause expensive problems.

Remember to properly document all the changes and implementations you make all the way. Include all approvals required for the project to move forward, and follow the organization's end user acceptance process. This ensures that someone who's going to be using the system verifies that it's working well and as expected. Document this as well. #II

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