One of the hard­est things about man­ag­ing change — out­side of actu­al­ly man­ag­ing the change — is ensur­ing spon­sors and lead­ers appre­ci­ate the true impor­tance and neces­si­ty of incor­po­rat­ing change man­age­ment into the over­all busi­ness and entire life cycle of ini­tia­tives impact­ing end users. The def­i­n­i­tion of change man­age­ment is man­age­ment of change and devel­op­ment with­in a busi­ness or sim­i­lar orga­ni­za­tion. That is ​“what” change man­age­ment is, but what about the ​“why”? Why do we need change management?

As change man­agers, agents, con­sul­tants, prac­ti­tion­ers, etc., we must ensure there is also a clear under­stand­ing of the ​“why” behind change man­age­ment, not just what change man­age­ment is or what change man­age­ment does.

Under­stand­ing the ​“why” behind man­ag­ing change has more impact, bet­ter defin­ing the pur­pose of change man­age­ment to our stake­hold­ers, spon­sors, and leadership.

Key take­aways:

• Increase prob­a­bil­i­ty of project suc­cess and ROI.

• Man­age employ­ee resis­tance to change.

• Build change competency.