4 Keys to Managing Change

Sten Swenson, Director of Information Technology, North Carolina State University

As a College IT Director at a large University, I sit in the middle of a complicated web of user needs, technological systems and support models. My users consume services from central IT, third party vendors and College IT. This all happens against the backdrop of sweeping changes across the technical, financial, political, social and regulatory landscapes.

Technological change can be highly disruptive and stem from a variety of sources. Updated regulations often reduce functionality. Users who are used to consumer technologies can be frustrated by the limitations of commercial environments. On the financial side, the ballooning cost of technology, coupled with financial constraints, often leads to cost-cutting measures such as switching or reducing access to systems. Technology itself is also evolving, leading to vast and fluctuating new markets in AI and Cloud computing. Users may want to take advantage of new solutions but don’t know how to start and end up frustrated when these changes take an undue amount of time away from their core responsibilities.

One result of not managing change is that it can create cultural misalignment, mistrust, and blame between IT teams and users. This is a phenomenon I’ve noticed since the early days of my 10+ year career managing a wide variety of IT teams across 3 major Universities. Coming from industry, where the customer is always right, I’ve often been taken aback by the US vs them rhetoric on both sides of the aisle. From the user side, you often hear things like “no one considered how this would affect my job,” or “I have to figure this out on my own, because no one will help me”. From the IT side, you hear, “They’ve known this was coming for 6 months” and “they just don’t understand how to use the technology”.

Here are 4 ways to get this broken model back on track.

1. Build Relationships

You can’t manage change unless you understand your users. To understand your users, you have to get to know them and their needs. Schedule regular meetings with leadership and pay attention to topics that don’t directly concern you to better understand how the organization works. Once you take a genuine interest in the people and organization you support, you start to shift your perspective to how change will impact the business. Building strong, trusted relationships with your users also allows you to have open and honest conversations with them about technological change.

“You often can’t support change through the same processes you use to support operations”

This rule goes for IT partners as well. Relationship building with other IT teams provides you with greater influence on how the change will be implemented and more opportunities to advocate for your users.

2. Focus on Impact

When you become aware of a change, the most important question to ask from a user perspective is: how will this impact my organization day in and day out? This is where your relationships and knowledge of the business become critical. Equipped with an understanding of how the change will impact your users, you can solicit their perspective on how to manage it. Your users will appreciate having some control over the outcome and your IT partners will appreciate a smoother roll out.

3. Communicate, Communicate and Communicate

Communication channels are saturated and you have to cut through a lot of noise to be heard. Your communications have to be well crafted and take many forms. I prefer minimalistic writing while also trying to keep things casual, so the message feels like it's coming from a colleague rather than boiler plate IT speak. Of course, you still have to provide the critical answers to who, what, when, where and why. I use a variety of channels to connect with people in different circumstances. I send regular communications to the general population, provide talking points to leadership and send targeted communications to impacted groups and individuals.

4. Build Targeted Processes and Support Models

You often can’t support change through the same processes you use to support operations. From a project perspective, you may refer to this as “hypercare”—the period after go-live where there are increased support needs before people settle into a new system. You often have to build temporary processes, bypass standard rules, train your team on new technologies and increase levels of support. Regardless of the details, you have to have a plan or you will end up scrambling.

Change is hard and often unpopular. Ultimately though, technology decisions are business decisions that support the overall goals of the organization. That means we’re all on the same team and striving for the same outcomes. It's our job as technology professionals to minimize the negative impacts and maximize the benefit to the organization. That starts with building relationships and understanding the organization, focusing on impact, communicating effectively and building the processes needed to support the transition.

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