Insights and Advice for Enabling More Efficient and Sustainable Construction

What To Include In Your Change Management Plan For Seamless Digital Transformation

April 12, 2021
6 mins read

Only 30% of organisational change initiatives are successful. Having a proper plan in place can mean the difference between successful digital transformation and failure.

Change is inevitable, and it is something that all project managers must prepare for. Your change management plan can make a major impact on your project. If the plan is not effective, your project can easily run over time and budget. But, with a good plan in place, you will be able to easily adapt and evolve.

Digital transformation is one of the main areas of change in construction. As technology progresses, construction companies need to start utilising the right construction software and tools to keep up with the competition. Digital transformation should be a seamless process as companies adopt new technology and processes as their new norm. So, how do implement this change without causing disruption?

Understanding Change Management

A change management plan is a process a company takes to embrace big changes in its systems. In construction, this could include things like using a new type of software to control estimationplanning, or project management.

The plan needs to be implemented properly in order to provide a clear roadmap for how the company will follow through with these changes. They are also necessary for any fundamental business process that affects a large portion of people.

The plan needs to contain elements such as:

  • the goals of the plan
  • how communication around the plan will take place
  • how to manage any resistance brought up around the change
  • and what training processes need to be implemented and how this will be done.

Good change management plans should cover every detail of how the implementation will take place. This includes how the company can ensure that it is a smooth process. This is a big part of any project management strategy.

What to Include in your Change Management Plan

Digital transformation can be a complex scenario. To avoid any issues or roadblocks along the way, you need to map out a detailed plan.

Here are six (6) critical steps to take when putting together a change management plan.

  1. Understand the Reasons for the Change Before implementing change, the organisation needs to have a clear understanding of why the change is being implemented. You need to clearly define the reasons for the change to help everyone involved appreciate why it’s important. This will allow people to understand how the change will help them. Thus, it will be met with more support and less resistance.
  2. Understand the Scope of the Change Change management plans need to cover who the change will affect, and how much of an overall impact the change will have on your processes. Project managers need to understand how roles will shift, and processes and structure might change when they put the plan in place. This is also necessary for determining a timeline for the change management process.
  3. Set Goals Before implementing the change management plan, you need to introduce a clear set of goals. These act as milestones that you can use to measure the success of the change. These milestones help everyone to understand the direction of the change management plan and to see its progress.
  4. Project Management Tools Change management plans can be a complicated process. This is why proper construction management software and tools should be adopted to make things run smoother. This is essential for keeping up to date with task lists, timelines, communication and project tracking.
  5. Communication Effective digital transformation requires a strong system of communication. Everyone involved in the project and change should know how to communicate with each other over any concerns or queries. Everyone needs to be kept up to date with all processes. Clarity and visibility are essential here. This requires a well-structured communication plan and a central management system for easy access to information.
  6. Resistance Management The aim of the change management plan is to get everyone working efficiently with a new digital system. Chances are there will be some resistance to the new change in the process. This is something that you need to factor into the change management plan. Project managers need to understand how the change might be met with resistance and what they can do to avoid this.

Conclusion

Digital transformation is becoming an increasingly important area in construction. It requires proper planning to be successful.

Managing transformation is never easy. But, with the right tools and plan in place, your business should be able to adopt the new change effortlessly.