Difficult Decisions when Building a Team to Support Change Management

If your existing management team are fully occupied running the business then how can you second them into programme or project management positions?

I recently had a very interesting conversation with a senior Head of Business Transformation for a well known retailer. They are about to embark on a major change programme and his issue is that the existing management team are fully occupied with business as usual and consequently there is no possibility of them having the bandwidth to participate in the projects that will be required, even assuming that they have the requisite skills and experience.

His question: does he second people from the BAU team and back-fill them in the short term; or should he deliver the change programme using contractors or interim managers?

This is an incredibly difficult question to answer. It is also one that many organisations in the same circumstances will face and getting it right will be critical not only to the success of the change programme but also to benefits realisation and, I would suggest, retention of key employees.

There is no doubt that involving people from BAU will increase their commitment to the success of the change programme. It is also a unique opportunity to learn about new systems and processes before they become business critical. So involving the existing team is a priority.

On the other hand, they are the only people who understand how the current processes work and are therefore essential to business continuity. Bringing people in to temporarily replace them will involve a time consuming and ultimately throw away level of resource training people to use systems that now have a finite lifespan.

There is also the issue that BAU people are not used to project type work and gaining and being confident of those skills may add to the project critical path.

The answer may be to combine the two approaches. This would involve bringing external people into key programme and project roles to benefit from their expertise, but it would also necessitate being prepared to restructure some of the BAU roles and bringing in additional resource to allow BAU managers to be released to the programme, potentially on a part-time basis to act as subject matter experts for example.

There is no one right answer to this dilemma, but it is a fact that there is a natural resistance to change in most organisations. Involving your BAU team is a key way to break this down and ensure their motivation.

Written by Mike Gamble: JEM Retail Consultants

The Birth of JEM Retail Consultants

The trials & tribulations of setting up JEM and all the tasks involved and the case studies.

 

So setting up JEM Retail Consultants sounds straight forward enough. Three colleagues who have worked together over the past 10 years decide to unite and market themselves as a consultancy firm. The deal should be clinched over lunch and a glass, or 2, of Sauvignon Blanc and away we go……or is it ……….umm not so…… now we need a name, a website, a logo, business cards, pictures, case studies oh my, it’s an endless list of tasks and decisions.  Luckily for me no argument over the name – JEM - I love shiny things so a name close to my heart and made up of Jane, Erica, Mike – so I come first – great can’t complain about that. But then it gets harder, good job we have Mike managing and nagging us – apparently normally my job as the resident Programme Manager.

JEM Retail Consultants: www.jemconsultants.co.uk

And so we write our case studies, Erica and Mike working together on Buying and Merchandising structure and operations and a Warehouse implementation at Awear. All of us at Jacques-Vert working on a complete Supply Chain Programme – won a retail Week Award for that one so a great photo opportunity there for the website. Then there was LK Bennett and again all 3 of us, this one a little more complex as Erica and I held senior positions in the business, Merchandise Director and Head of IT & Logistics respectively, as well as carrying out project & programme roles.  Meantime, Mike concentrated on resolving the ever increasing issue of what to do with stock at the end of the season. Easy, I hear you say, and yes, from an outsiders point of view but not when at LK Bennett.  However, for the real story you would need to ply me with more than 2 glasses of Sauvignon Blanc.

So the work continued, all of the time conscious of our story and the essence of what JEM is all about and how best to get that across to potential customers.  Why us, why not a blue chip Consultancy Firm, apart from the obvious cost savings!  We had to make sure the case studies bought to life the 3 of us as individuals; exceptionally skilled and experienced in our own area of expertise, having held various operational jobs as well as the project & programme work.  All 3 of us skilled at presenting strategic goals and then delivering those goals and benefits.  Three individuals who work as individuals yet work even better as a team.  Ten years together means we know how the other one works, so we don’t save time by cutting corners, we save time and deliver excellence by hitting the ground running together as one unit.  Anyway, don’t let me go on and on, just take a look at the websites and peruse through the case studies, see if you believe we have achieved what we set out to do?