When I was 10 years old, my parents sat my sister and I down and informed us that we would be moving from our beloved home in Silver Spring, Maryland to the uncharted, alligator-laden waters of Florida’s Gulf Coast. . I was resilient, to say the least. But over the next few weeks, promise and potential unfolded; I’m going to choose my room. It would allow me to adopt a cat. We would have a pool. Gradually, moving to Florida became less of something that was being done to me and more of something that I was a part of. Although they didn’t know it, my parents were doing an excellent job of instilling change management philosophies.
At a time when technology adoption is occurring at a rapid pace and organizations are simultaneously struggling to maintain a well-equipped and experienced workforce, successful change management can be a panacea for all that the infrastructure industry suffers from. And as the pace of change increases, the importance of instituting a positive change management culture grows along with it. When an organization pursues a technology or process change, change management helps ensure:
- Disruptions caused by transitions are minimized in favor of focusing on building together
- Both employees and leaders are committed to the same mission and vision
- Technology investments are adding value rather than creating disparate processes
What exactly is change management?
Before we get too far down the path of exploring change management philosophies, let’s take a minute to define it, although we recognize, of course, that it’s a fairly self-explanatory concept. But I was lucky enough to chat with several change management experts recently, and I’ll borrow their wisdom for this definition:
“We live in a time of constant change. Individuals go through change at a different pace. Change management addresses the specific changes that happen to people on a large scale, so we can predict who will adapt quickly to change and who will be more resistant to change, and we can adjust our change management to meet those individual needs in every way.” said John Oberdiek, Project Manager and Change Management Specialist at Infotech.
Essentially, it’s about thinking about the ramifications of change within an organization down to the person-to-person level. And as Mike Bousliman, the former CIO of the Montana Department of Transportation, pointed out during our conversation, it doesn’t necessarily apply just to new technology, but to any process or philosophy change that affects an organization. Indeed, most organizations around the world were given a crash course in change management during the pandemic as they dealt with changes in workforce requirements and increased use of technology remote like Zoom or Microsoft Teams.
The role of change management in transport agencies
With federal funding and construction technology increasing in availability and accessibility, transportation agencies have placed a strong emphasis on managing change. Many understand that much of their organizational knowledge is held by people who have been doing things a certain way for a long time, and if those people are not committed to change, there is a risk of losing that knowledge and have to do it replace it with inexperience.
Even for organizations that embrace change holistically, there is a risk that the change will not be sustainable if it is not implemented properly. Anyone who knows the phrase “it’s what I asked for, but it’s not what I wanted” can attest to that. Change management experts who provided input for this article emphasized the importance of communication as a crucial element of effective change management for the advancement of digital project delivery initiatives.
“Inclusivity and communication. Informing people of the impact of what’s happening and making them part of the process are important aspects of a good, disciplined change management strategy,” said Bousliman. Take my example of moving to Florida: the simple being informed that I would be allowed to choose my room gave me a sense of control and input into the process.
Pat Lane, Montana DOT’s digital delivery project manager, echoed this with a specific example of how communication between different departments must occur to effect change:
“The way we design and deliver the roundabouts – the 2D blueprint is delivered and there’s a lot of information in that design deliverable. As we went deeper into how we model that roundabout in 3D, capturing all the attributes and the intel ·intelligence, we started asking ourselves if we needed all this data. We reached out to a number of senior project managers and started asking them: What do you need to build a successful roundabout from a design perspective? What does the contractor need?The design became aware that the level of detail with 3D modeling has changed and therefore allowed the design of the roundabout to become more efficient and remove much of this data noise that no longer is required”.
Simply involving a different department’s perspective in the change gave everyone a sense of shared investment while reporting a better final delivery.
Oberdiek emphasized the importance of communication, to the point of overcommunicating. Because many transportation agencies deal with relatively isolated departments, information can travel through an agency like the old game of telephone, where meaning and intent is slightly distorted each time it travels from person to person. another. “Constant communication to clarify and make sure everyone is on the same page,” is something Oberdiek considers a best practice for effective change management.
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