The pace change occurs in the external environment is
constantly quickening, and the effect this produces upon the organizational
context is increasingly dramatic. Change typically requires individuals to adopt
a different approach to work and to modify their behaviour in the workplace,
but more often than not change also entails individuals to learn new skills and
enhance and hone their professional ability. Inasmuch as each individual, of
any given change target group within an organization, is prompted to exhibit a
different behaviour and gain new competencies to properly perform his/her job,
HR professionals should show to be in the front line as regards their
professional development in order to strengthen their credibility as change
agents and change facilitators.
Despite the numerous assumptions and allegations, at times
anecdotal, made now and then about the future of HR, just because this or that
company has come up with a new way to perceive the HR Function, HR is
definitely here to stay, at least as long as robots will not totally replace
human beings. Since change management is essentially concerned with managing
and controlling the likely impact change may make on individuals, the pivotal
role played by HR in change management can be definitely taken as axiomatic. As
contended by some of the prominent proponents of the socio-technical system
from the British Tavistock Institute (Trist and Bamforth, 1951; Rice, 1958;
Trist, 1960), organizational effectiveness and success rely on the adoption of their
model. Whether employers should focus on the technical system only, to the
detriment of the human social system, change may in fact prove to be extremely difficult
to introduce, never mind to sustain over time.
HR professionals, notwithstanding, cannot on no account rest
on their laurels, let alone can they assume to be those in charge of planning
and introducing change whether they are unable to set a good example to the
other employees. To effectually perform this daunting task HR should, first and
foremost, constantly strive to expand its professional expertise and competence
so as to prove employers, and the entire employee population, to be able to
autonomously introduce and execute change when required.
Whereas HR professionals should be well acquainted with
change management models and approaches, and with the relevant theories
enabling them to carefully analyse the impact that change may potentially make
on individuals so as to timely identify the countermeasures to oppose to the resistance
eventually offered by employees to it, not all of the HR professionals might be
fully acknowledged with some technical skills which would enable them to more properly
and successfully perform their change agent or change facilitator role.
Planning and introducing change can be regarded, and should be
hence managed, as a project so that a thorough and comprehensive knowledge of project
management methodologies would indeed prove to be beneficial to HR
professionals, clearly not only to hone their change management skills. Change
management, at the same time, exposes employers to a considerable number of
risks so that possessing a good understanding and knowledge of risk management
would definitely increase HR professionals’ chances to successfully perform
their change manager role.
Change management, project management and risk management
can be hence regarded as three different disciplines HR professionals should
become increasingly acquainted with, and able to autonomously master and adopt
with complete confidence. The question is whether these methodologies can be
actually considered mutually exclusive or complementary.
Change Management
Change is in general required within an organization when a
gap between the current state and the desired state is identified; change
management can be thus defined as the process activated by the employer to
bridge this gap, taking heed of the possible resistance offered by employees
(Boddy, 2008). Change management focuses on individual reaction to change and
aims at controlling the restraining forces eventually opposing it. The
relevance of people in change management is properly stressed by Rumble (2011),
who defines change management as “an approach to address people-oriented
implementation risks arising from change.”
Project Management
Fanning (2005) contends that “projects bring together
resources, skills, technology and ideas to achieve business objectives and deliver
business benefits.” Project management is thus intended as a structured method
aiming at enabling employers attaining their intended objectives, within the
preset deadline and budget constraints. Project management is also defined as
“the application of knowledge, skills, tools, and techniques to project
activities to meet the project requirements” (2013, Project Management Institute).
Drawing a comparison between change management and project management
From the definitions of project management and change
management it clearly transpires that project management is concerned with
processes, tasks, resources, deadlines and deliverables; whereas change
management aims at giving individuals to understand the importance of
introducing, accepting and ultimately genuinely embracing change.
It may be argued that project managers at large perform the
“administrative” activities associated with the management of a project,
whereas change managers take care of the adverse, serious consequences change may
have for individuals (Rumble, 2011). Change management is thus sorely important
not only to ensure that the results expected from a project are obtained, but
also to avert serious consequences in terms of employee motivation,
contribution and morale, which all considerably impact organizational
performance.
Not all of the projects planned and initiated within a
business have a dramatic impact on individuals and require hence change
management procedures to be planned and implemented so that project managers do
not necessarily need to take care of this facet. Change management approaches,
on the other hand, are adopted only whether a project entails individuals to
change the way they perform their activities or behave, and may be hence pushed
beyond their comfort zone.
Despite essentially different, project management can be
easily integrated with change management. Since in order to effectually manage
change a broad knowledge of HR theories is necessarily required, nonetheless, the
two approaches can be properly managed in combination only by HR practitioners
who have gained a solid understanding of project management, in addition to a
thorough acquaintance with change management.
Project management is habitually performed executing five
process groups (Prince2 identifies eight management processes), to wit:
initiating, planning, executing, monitoring and controlling, and closing (2013,
Project Management Institute). Change management, taking as a reference the
model outlined by Boddy (2008), unfolds through four stages, namely initiating,
planning, designing and implementing. The outcome produced by the process does
not actually represent one of its specific phases, but rather the result it yields.
Table 1
The two processes glaringly appear to be similar in
structure. The analogies between project management and change management
appear to be even more evident whether we consider the “life cycle”, also known
as “rational-linear”, change management model. In this instance, the activities
typical of project management can be in fact even more clearly identified.
Table 2
Irrespective of the specific methodology used to perform
project management and change management, it can be contended that both
processes essentially aim at enabling organizations and people respectively to
move from an initial state to a desired state, after a transition period, in a
structured and controlled fashion.
Table 3
This circumstance, nonetheless, may prove to be misleading
about the real objectives which project management and change management aim at
obtaining. As properly summarized by Prosci (2009), project management is
concerned with the identification of the prescriptive activities necessary to
smoothly move from the current state to the desired state. To attain this
objective project management focuses on the identification of the necessary
resources and on their most appropriate and convenient deployment; it hence
analyses the systems, processes, organizational structure and job roles so as
to come up with optimal solutions fitting the new employer needs and
circumstances.
Change management, by contrast, is concerned with the
identification of all the activities enabling the employer to successfully
introduce change and oppose the restraining forces eventually arising against
it. Change management essentially defines the activities and initiatives
required to support the impacted target groups, in order for the individuals within
these to accept and embrace change, avert disruptions during the change
implementation process and ensure a smooth transition (Prosci, 2009).
Change management and project management essentially serve
the same objective, but in a different fashion; the former is concerned with
individuals, whereas the latter with processes. It can be contended that change
management and project management represent the two sides of the same
organizational performance coin.
The two activities can be indeed rather easily integrated. As
discussed earlier, nonetheless, whether it is highly likely that a change
manager may be able to properly manage change in autonomy, it is sorely
unlikely that a project manager may be able to effectually manage change of
his/her own. Project managers are typically very structured individuals with a
process and procedures mindset enabling them to plan and execute their task
with great precision and methodology. To deal with individual fears, expectations
and at times anxiety, nevertheless, the knowledge of HR management and motivation
theories assumes a paramount importance.
Change management is not about structure, processes and
timelines; a structured approach, planning, deliverables and milestones are
indeed crucially important to manage change, but whereas these activities
represent the end in itself in project management, these can be regarded as the
means to an end in change management. This does on no account imply that
managing change is easy for HR; only individuals with a broad knowledge of organizational
culture, motivation theories, employ relations and HR management theories and
practices can in fact effectually perform this daunting task within the HR
function.
Risk management
As stressed by Rumble (2011), change management can be considered
as “an approach to address people-oriented implementation risks arising from
change” and “focuses on people-oriented risk areas.” Change management entails,
it can be argued by definition, risk so that change managers should invariably
be ready to expect the unexpected.
The Chartered Institute of Internal Auditors’ International
Standards define risk as “the possibility of an event to occurring that will
have an impact on the achievement of objectives” and measures it “in terms of
impact and likelihood.” Every project is indeed exposed to events and
consequences which can offer benefits or pose threats to its successful
implementation. Both project managers and change managers need therefore to be
prepared to manage sudden undesirable and desirable occurrences.
Risk management is essentially concerned with identifying
the impact and consequences, both negative (downside risk) and positive (upside
risk), which the events occurring in the external context might produce in the
organizational environment, and properly treat and capitalize on these. As
maintained by Flood (2013), "Risk management is analysing, and then acting
appropriately, on risk." This clearly entails risk management being
regarded as a process concerned with “planning, organizing, directing, and
controlling resources to achieve given objectives when surprisingly good or bad
events are possible” (Head, 2009). Since Risk management is habitually
concerned with addressing negative, rather than with exploiting positive
events, it can be in many respects regarded as a modern variation of problem
solving (Head, 2009).
Rumble (2011) identifies five main areas of risk in change
management, to wit: poor sponsorship and leadership of change, a not accurately
and sufficiently articulated storyline, poor consideration of the stakeholders,
insufficient and poor communication of change, and lack of change empowerment.
The introduction and implementation of change within an
organization arguably represents one of the most difficult task employers are
prompted to perform in modern times; risks can literally arise at any time.
Notwithstanding, it all depends on the accuracy and care paid by employers and
change managers during the planning and preparation phases of change. The more
accurate the preparation, the less likely that major risks may occur. To this
extent change managers and change agents should strive to consider all the
possible occurrences which may affect their plans. Gaining a good insight into risk
management techniques will unquestionably prove to be extremely helpful and
beneficial to change managers, it can in fact enable them to:
- Detect and classify risks;
- Measure and evaluate the impact of each risk before it
actually occurs;
- Identify the measures which can be taken to mitigate
downside risks and take advantage of upside risks.
The synergic use of
the three methodologies
Despite representing and being considered as stand-alone approaches,
risk management, project management and change management can be definitely effectively
used in combination. The combined use of the three disciplines can indeed
results in a synergy, which by enabling change managers to enhance the
effectiveness of their activity, can show to be very productive. The role of
change managers is clearly particularly hard so that the HR professionals
called to play it should do their utmost to gain an in-depth knowledge of the
three methodologies to build on their complementariness.
To effectively play the role of change managers, notwithstanding,
HR professionals should also be capable to properly analyse the internal
context, that is to say the organizational components which shape individual
behaviour and strongly influence the way individuals may react to a proposed
change. Context and culture may in fact make or break any employer’s bid to
introduce change within an organization. As suggested by Pettigrew et al
(1992), organizational context can prove to be either receptive or
non-receptive of change and hence badly affect the employer capability to introduce
and implement change. The organizational context should be consequently definitely
regarded as an additional area of risk by change managers.
Managing change does not entail the sheer knowledge of a
structured model to be used in a prescriptive fashion. Change management aims
at gaining change target groups, that is to say individual, acceptance, support,
participation and ultimately engagement. It entails change managers to be able
to understand organizational culture and individual fears, and being able to
help employees to ease these.
The knowledge of the different change management models and
approaches developed over time, of the different causes which may account for
individuals to oppose and resist change, and of the assessment methods used to
evaluate driving and restraining forces to change are all unquestionably
significant.
Managing change is not about glory and visibility, but
rather about performing one of the most sensitive activities within a business.
The knowledge, skills and competencies necessary to effectually perform this
daunting task might prove to never be enough; that is basically why this
activity can be on no account left in the hands of those who are not properly
prepared to perform it, also within the HR function.
Longo, R., (2016), Change
Management, Project Management and Risk Management (for HR): Complementary or Mutually
Exclusive?; Milan: HR Professionals, [online].
