SUSTAINABLE CHANGE MANAGEMENT: EMPOWER CHANGE- CONTROL AND EXECUTION:

Typically, a few months after a change implementation, after all the initial excitement has died down, there is a risk that many of the changes will not take hold, erode or even disappear as employees revert back to old work habits.

Why does the change not take hold in the long run, will explore the real reasons?

Unfortunately, all too often, the change implementation team is too caught up with rushing to demonstrate initial project results. They either postpone or fail to address how routine work procedures are impacted in the long run. They assume that department or line managers will address them post-project, after the change. No, that's too late. Changes to how routine work is to be performed must be addressed as an integral part of the change implementation. So where do we begin?

• Start with a blueprint for ensuring actual work performance takes place as designed. This blueprint is called a control plan. The control plan ensures the right controls and procedures are implemented to achieve performance targets on a sustainable basis. Several things should be defined in the control plan. What should be monitored? With what metric? To what target? How actual performance is to be measured? And how frequently?
• Measurements should be frequent enough so that employees can adjust in time and regulate promptly. In addition, employees need to know when to intervene and when to leave the process alone, and if action needs to be taken, what action to take and who does it? All this needs to be clearly defined.
• For more information on control plans and how to develop them, I refer you to videos in other courses on this platform, listed in exercise files. Next, use the control plan as a blueprint to develop or revise SOPs or standard operating procedures and step-by-step work instructions.
• Specify in detail who does what, when and how. Tasks and steps should be defined, documented, made available and training should be provided to employees.
• Let me example. As part of a transformation initiative, a grocery store chain offers delivery pickup within a scheduled time slot. They use an app to track the customer's journey to the store. So controls and processes must be established so that groceries are packed and ready for pickup exactly when the customer arrives.
• The control point is no longer at the point in time when the traditional install customer checks out. With this new service, the control point should move upstream to when customers activate the app to track their journey to the store's pickup point.
• So SOPs must be developed or revised to ensure that work processes support this change. They become the standard protocol for everyone who's involved regardless of time of day, shift or day of week.

• As your team develops or updates SOPs and work instructions, ensure that the following are addressed clearly. Who is responsible and accountable for doing what tasks, at what point in time, how to do it, and they have the authority.
• In our grocery store example, we ensure groceries are picked and packed in advance and are ready for pickup just in time when a customer arrives. We just need to make sure that the right people have the authority to fulfill these basic tasks. It does not need to be more complicated than that.
• So in your change implementation, don't forget to use control plans and SOPs to operationalized employee empowerment.