Businesses are spending substantially on new systems and change projects only to find their triple bottom line isn’t moving. Change management, once a vital discipline to guide organisations through complex transformations, has now become a buzzword that is used to tick boxes.
How did we get here? Large consultancy firms have systematised the process, relying on methodologies that assume every organisation is the same. The result is predictable: businesses are failing to achieve real change, at least not at the speed and scale required to keep them competitive, and these “change projects” are costing them the “big bucks” when what they should be doing is paving a path to assist an organisation to rationalise spending and save money.
Most organisations are failing at change management because they misunderstand what it really is, and cookie-cutter approaches have muddied the waters to the point where businesses don’t even know what they’re buying into when they hire “change managers”. It is time for a wake-up call: change management is not about templates, methodologies or checking off tasks. It’s about managing disruption, saving money and driving real, measurable performance improvements.
The pink and fluffy myth
Too often, change management is mischaracterised as the “soft stuff” – helping employees feel comfortable, addressing what makes them “mad, sad, or glad”, or providing emotional support. But this misses the point entirely. The big consultancies have done a great job selling this narrative, but in truth, change management is about managing disruption. It’s about getting your organisation to perform better after a change than it did before.
If you compare implementing a new ERP system to the grief of losing a loved one, you fundamentally misunderstand what change management is. While emotional support is important, that is employee wellness, not change management. Expecting HR to handle an organisation-wide transformation simply because it involves people is totally off the mark.
Methodology: the one-size-fits-all fallacy
The biggest failing of large consultancies is their reliance on methodologies that assume every company, every culture and every leadership team is the same. These firms come in with a set of steps, following a rigid sequence. But organisations don’t work like that. Change management is not a linear process, and applying the same methodology across the board is a recipe for disaster.
Here is the truth: the methodology approach is easier for large firms to sell because it creates an illusion of control. But real change doesn’t fit into a neat package. Each organisation has its own challenges, potential impacts, politics and culture, and those must be understood and addressed to drive effective change.
To use an analogy, you can’t train every person to run a marathon the same way. Some people might have a heart condition; others might have breathing issues. You need to understand the unique challenges of each individual before you can create a plan to help them succeed. A rigid methodology might work for the odd company, but most are left floundering.
The template trap
Many large consultancies rely heavily on templates. They can spend hundreds of hours developing newsletters, stakeholder management plans and training schedules – all of which look impressive on paper. But none of that guarantees real change. Templates do not measure whether employees are adopting new systems, whether productivity has improved or whether costs have been reduced.
Effective change management should be about outcomes, not activities. It is not about how many hours you have logged or how many workshops you’ve run – it is about how quickly and seamlessly the change is adopted into business-as-usual operations. If you are still talking about stakeholder plans and newsletters, you are stuck in the wrong conversation.
Why big firms fail: it’s not their shoulder
One of the most frustrating aspects of the big consultancy approach is that they are not personally invested in your organisation’s success. They come in, apply their methodologies, generate a lot of paperwork and leave. But once the dust settles, you are the one left to deal with the fallout.
Conversely, change management also cannot be handled by someone who is too attached to the internal workings of the organisation, which is why it often fails when assigned to internal HR. Real change managers need to have an external, objective view. They need the freedom to tell hard truths, challenge leadership decisions and make tough calls without worrying about office politics.
The measure of real change
True change management is measured by adoption. It’s about how quickly a new system or process is integrated into the business without disrupting operations. If your performance is still dipping six months after a change, you haven’t managed it properly. Real change management reduces the time it takes to get from “disruption” to “improvement”. It turns what could be a steep decline in productivity into a shallow dip, followed by a swift rise to a new level of performance.
Analytics are key here. You need to measure productivity levels, cost savings, error rates – anything that quantifies the impact of the change. If you have implemented a new system, are you processing more invoices with fewer errors? Are you reducing costs while maintaining service quality? That is how you know change management has worked.
Stop the insanity
Change management isn’t about what makes you mad, sad or glad. It’s about managing disruption, driving performance improvements and ensuring that changes are seamlessly integrated into your business. Stop ticking boxes – and start focusing on the outcomes that matter.
Learn more at changelogic.co.za.
- The author, Anton Hingeston, is director at Change Logic
- Read more articles by Change Logic on TechCentral
- This promoted content was paid for by the party concerned
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