Editor's Note: Take a look at our featured best practice, A Comprehensive Guide to Change Management (586-slide PowerPoint presentation). This "new and improved" A Comprehensive Guide to Change Management,, which replaces my previous "best seller" of the same name, contains everything (well nearly everything) you would ever want to know about Change Management. This slide-deck now contains over 580 slides [read more]
Measuring Business Readiness & Adoption
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What is Business Readiness and Adoption?
- Would you talk to someone who isn’t paying attention?
- Would you make a movie if you didn’t know who would watch it?
- So why do projects often deliver to a Business that isn’t ready to receive or adopt!
Business Readiness and Adoption is a measure of preparation. A business that is ready will have made all the preparations necessary to accept the deliverables of a project and begin operating them. So, in effect, anything that involves a change to ways of working requires measurement to see if a business is ready for go-live.
Project deliverables will be a combination of the following (not an exhaustive list):
- New products.
- New services.
- New organisation structures.
- New processes.
- New systems.
- New infrastructure.
In projects to measure Business Readiness/Adoption I have previously used (but not restricted to) the following measurement areas:
- Leadership.
- Business Area Readiness.
- Implementation Planning.
- Stakeholder Management & Communication.
- Process & Procedures Readiness.
- Business Benefits.
- Data.
- Departmental Roles & Responsibilities (impact on individuals).
- Education & Training.
- Business Reporting.
- Testing.
These areas are all qualitative and were measured through a simple questionnaire containing previously agreed (with Key Stakeholders) questions and a numerical scoring scale e.g. 1 = Definitely no or Not At All or Low Priority to 5 = Definitely Yes or Completely or Extremely High Priority (dependent on the question). Some organisations have favoured a 1 to 3 scale and others a 1 to 4 scale.
The author has developed a PowerPoint presentation on this topic, Measuring Business Readiness & Adoption. Browse it on Flevy here.
Examples of questions used:
LEADERSHIP
- What level of importance is the project vs business as usual?
- What level of importance are you able to give the project vs business as usual?
IMPLEMENTATION PLANNING
- How aware is your area of control of the key project deadlines/milestones?
- Has consideration been given to business impact of cut over and go live?
STAKEHOLDER MANAGEMENT & COMMUNICATION
- Do you know enough about the project to be able to communicate what it will mean to your Business Area?
- Is it clear where to go or who to speak to if you have questions, concerns or comments about any aspect of the project?
DEPARTMENTAL ROLES & RESPONSIBILITIES
- How well planned is the transition of people to new roles?
- How clearly are the pending role changes understood?
Questionnaires were sent out on a cyclical basis (normally monthly) to the same group of stakeholders and the results were compiled and measured against previous results to track movement (static, up or down) in any of the key areas. Analysis was done on the results and commentary provided to the stakeholder group in the form of a presentation which was normally done f2f during stakeholder meetings and also sent out to the Steering Group and Sponsor for information. If there was a static or downward trend from previous scores then this indicated an area of concern although sometimes there was a valid reason for this. If it was deemed an area of concern then specific actions/change interventions were put in place to address them, the results of which would hopefully reverse the trend and show up in subsequent results. In addition to this before the initial questionnaire was sent out the stakeholder group would be asked to agree an overall target score which was what they considered should be achieved to indicate business readiness and subsequent go-live. All scores were tracked against this overall score.
I have to say that this is a very simple (if not somewhat crude) way of measuring the readiness of a business for the change and there are more sophisticated tools out there but for me and the organisations I have used it in… it worked.
20-slide PowerPoint presentation
This document contains 6 frame Change Management frameworks that deal with the "soft" side of managing effective organizational change:
1. Dimensions of Change
2. Emotional Cycle of Change
3. Ingredients of Change
4. Level of Commitment
5. Phases of Team Building
6. Trust [read more]
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"The only constant in life is change." – Heraclitus
Such is true for life, as it is for business. The entire ecosystem our organization operates in—our customers, competitors, suppliers, partners, the company itself, etc.—is constantly changing and evolving. Change can be driven by emerging technology, regulation, leadership change, crisis, changing consumer behavior, new business entrants, M&A activity, organizational restructuring, and so forth.
Thus, the understanding of, dealing with, and mastery of the Change Management process is one of the most critical capabilities for our organization to develop. Excellence in Change Management should be viewed as a source of Competitive Advantage.
Learn about our Change Management Best Practice Frameworks here.
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About Ron Leeman
Ron Leeman has been involved in “change and process” work for more years than he cares to remember. He has worked extensively across the UK, Europe, and globally--and has an enviable track-record of delivering organisational change and process initiatives across a wide cross section of industry sectors. In 2012, Ron was bestowed with a “Change Leader of Tomorrow” award by the World HRD Congress “in recognition of my remarkable progress in initiating changes enough for others in the same industry to follow my example”. Ron is firm believer in knowledge transfer and now wants to share his vast knowledge with those who are considering getting into or at various stages of “change” and/or “process” work or those working on specific Projects wanting to gain practical insights into “how to” type situations. You can connect with Ron Leeman on LinkedIn here, where you can view his 85+ Recommendations and in excess of 800 Endorsements from clients and co-workers alike to give you an indication of the quality of service that he has provided and can offer. Ron is also a document author on Flevy. Browse his frameworks on Change Management, Process Analysis, and Program Management here: http://flevy.com/seller/highwayofchange.
