If you enjoy the blog, you'll love the book!

Dear readers,

I'm extremely excited to announce that my book, Practical Change Management for IT Projects, will be published next week and is now available for pre-order.  Just click here to order your copy now!

Like the blog, the book is focused on providing practical advice on implementing Change Management.  It's full of templates and exercises that will help you create a Change Management plan.  Based on the Five Pillars of Change, with chapters dedicated to Sponsorship, Stakeholder Management, Communication, Training, and a section on Organization Design, this book provides a comprehensive beginner's guide to Change.

And don't be fooled by the name.  Practical Change Management for IT Projects will be relevant for anyone implementing Change Management on organization, culture, or process projects, as well.

Thank you to all of my loyal readers for making this book possible, and I hope you enjoy the book as much as you do the blog!

Happy reading,
Emily

Change Management Checklists: Sponsorship

My apologies, Readers.  I have slacked the last two months with updating this blog.  Keep your reading glasses handy, though, because I plan to become much more prolific.

In my last post, I listed what I consider the Five Pillars of Change.  Here, I'll provide a list of activities to keep in mind as you create the Sponsorship portion of your Change Management program.

Note that not every Change program needs to include every item on the list.  Based on the size of your organization, the complexity of the change, and your company's culture, you can pick and choose the activities that will provide the greatest value in helping people adopt the change.

Although it is important to have a comprehensive Change program, and skimping on necessary activities can adversely impact the adoption of the change, including too many activities just for the sake of checking them off a list can be harmful, too.  Carrying out activities that don't add value:

1. Causes people to question the value of all Change Management activities - even those that are essential for success
2. Overwhelms your stakeholders and can lead to burn out
3. Pulls resources - both time and money - from activities that deserve the most focus

With that said, I hereby present a list of Sponsorship activities for your consideration.  This list is not 100% comprehensive, but it will give you a good start in developing a Sponsorship plan.

Sponsorship Activities

• Identify project Sponsors
• Establish project Governance
• Build a Steering Committee
• Develop a Change Agent plan
• Create a Change Agent/Super User Network
• Involve all sponsorship groups in relevant areas of the project early and often...gather and incorporate their feedback, as appropriate
• Develop consistent communications to keep Sponsors and Change Agents informed
• Provide early training for members of all sponsorship groups
• Say, "Thank you" - often and with sincerity
• Be available to help and support all sponsorship groups as they carry out their sponsorship activities

Let Me Know:  Do you agree with this list?  Is there anything else you would add?

The Five Pillars of Change

While I thoroughly enjoyed writing the last few posts as part of the Virtual Book Club, I'm now feeling the need to get super practical.  So, my next set of posts will focus on the actual activities that make up a Change Management program.  I won't be able to include every activity (it's a very long list), but I will provide a fairly comprehensive set of check lists that will get you started in creating your Change Management plan.

I'll be breaking the check lists down based on what I call the "Pillars of Change."  They are:

• Sponsorship (about which I have very strong feelings)
• Stakeholder Management
• Communication
• Training
• Organization Design

As far as I'm concerned, all Change Management activities fall into one of these five pillars.  When you create your plan, you pick and choose a set of activities from each pillar based on the needs of your project and organization.  You then create a timeline based on when each activity is due (based on the larger  project plan) and how long it will take to complete, and voila!  You have the beginning of a Change Management plan.

Coming up first: Sponsorship activities

Let Me Know: Do you think these five pillars cover all Change Management activities?