Organisational change and transformation

0:00Sara: Welcome to Project Management Exam Prep.

0:02This episode is about organisational change and transformation:

0:06helping people use what a project delivers.

0:09Every project management exam tests it, because the benefits depend on it.

0:14Leo: You will learn how the three bodies frame it, why people resist,

0:18how to read a culture, and how to lead a change that lasts.

0:22We finish with a drill, so keep a pen ready.

0:25Sara: Let us start with the three lenses. What does IPMA® say?

0:29Leo: IPMA®, the International Project Management Association, sets out its standard in

0:34the Individual Competence Baseline, the ICB4.

0:38Its element on change and transformation asks you, in our words,

0:42to judge how ready people are, build a change strategy with them,

0:46and make the new behaviour last. A second element asks you to read the culture and

0:50values around the project.

0:52Sara: And PMI®?

0:54Leo: PMI®, the Project Management Institute, publishes the PMBOK® Guide,

0:59its guide to the project management body of knowledge.

1:02The eighth edition says projects create value by moving an organisation to a future

1:07state. The outline of PMI®'s Project Management Professional exam,

1:12the PMP®, has a task to support organizational change.

1:16You assess the culture, and judge how changes in the organisation affect the project.

1:21Sara: And APM?

1:23Leo: APM, the Association for Project Management, publishes the APM Body of Knowledge.

1:29Its section on change covers culture, change management and transformation.

1:34The syllabus of APM's Project Management Qualification, the PMQ,

1:39covers transition management and benefits management.

1:42Sara: Where do the words differ?

1:44Leo: In three places. First, the word change.

1:48In the PMBOK® Guide, a change modifies something under formal control,

1:52such as a baseline, and the people side is change management.

1:57The ICB4 and APM also use change for the organisation.

2:02Sara: Second?

2:04Leo: Transformation. For the ICB4 and APM, it is a deeper shift than change,

2:10led by a vision. PMI®'s outline says only organizational change.

2:16Sara: And third?

2:17Leo: Culture. The ICB4 gives it an element of its own.

2:22PMI® lists it among the enterprise environmental factors, the conditions the team

2:27does not control. APM calls it the unwritten rules that shape behaviour.

2:33Sara: What is the core, whichever exam you take?

2:36Leo: Three ideas. One: a project delivers outputs, but benefits come only when people

2:42work differently. A system nobody uses saves nothing.

2:47So plan the people side from the start: who is affected, how much their work changes,

2:52and how earlier changes went.

2:54Sara: Two?

2:55Leo: Resistance is information. As the ICB4 puts it, "People usually do not object to

3:01change they object to being changed." Ask what people fear to lose:

3:07a skill, status, control or certainty. Their objection may reveal a real flaw.

3:13It often comes from the managers of those affected.

3:16Sara: And three?

3:18Leo: Culture: how things are really done here.

3:22Edgar Schein, a psychologist, sees three levels.

3:25Artefacts are what you can see, such as forms and reports.

3:30Stated values are what people say matters.

3:33Shared assumptions are beliefs that nobody questions.

3:36To read them, watch what gets measured and praised, and how bad news travels.

3:41A change that fights the assumptions stalls.

3:44Sara: Does that change in agile work?

3:47Leo: Yes. A linear project often changes people's work in one step near the end.

3:52Iterative work changes it in small releases that users help shape,

3:56so benefits start earlier. But pace it: too much change too fast causes change fatigue.

4:03Sara: How do people react over time? The first model sheet, free in the description,

4:08shows a change curve.

4:10Leo: The idea goes back to Elisabeth Kübler-Ross, a psychiatrist.

4:14In nineteen sixty-nine, she described stages of reaction in dying patients,

4:19but drew no curve. Later writers turned her stages into curves for change at work.

4:24Ours is our own design. After the announcement, many people doubt that the change

4:29is real. Then come frustration and loss, because the old way was theirs.

4:35Performance falls to a low point. Then people try the new way,

4:38until it becomes routine.

4:40Sara: Can you avoid the dip?

4:42Leo: No, but support makes it shallower and shorter.

4:45On our sheet, a group left alone falls by forty percent.

4:48A supported group falls by less than twenty, and is back above its old level within

4:53six months. Support means honest facts early, training close to use,

4:58and help on the spot. And the stages are not a timetable: people skip them,

5:02or slip back.

5:04Sara: And how do you lead a change?

5:06Leo: Two classic sources, summed up on the second sheet.

5:10Kurt Lewin, a social psychologist, wrote in nineteen forty-seven about unfreezing

5:15the old way, moving, and freezing the new one.

5:19It is often taught as unfreeze, change, refreeze.

5:23Sara: And the second?

5:25Leo: John Kotter's book Leading Change, from nineteen ninety-six, sets out eight steps

5:30in three groups. In our words, four steps loosen the old way.

5:35Make the need felt with facts, form a leading group, give a clear picture of the

5:40future, and tell it often. Three steps bring in the new way.

5:44Remove what blocks people, plan early wins that people can see,

5:48and use their credit to go further, without declaring victory too soon.

5:53The last step makes the new way part of the culture.

5:56Sara: How do you make it last?

5:58Leo: Change what holds the old way in place: roles, procedures, measures and rewards.

6:04Switch the old way off. And name who sustains it after the project:

6:09the benefit owner, the manager who answers for the benefit, keeps measuring use,

6:13and the sponsor holds benefit reviews. Neither model is a recipe,

6:18so watch and adapt.

6:19Sara: How does this change between Mid-level and Senior?

6:23Leo: First, the two levels. They are this series' own labels.

6:27Mid-level means leading moderately complex projects, the level of IPMA® Level C and

6:33PMI®'s PMP® exam. Senior means leading complex projects and people,

6:39the level of IPMA® Level B and of APM's chartered status, Chartered Project Professional.

6:45At Mid-level, you lead the change for the groups your project touches.

6:49Take Parking Permits Online, a city project that moves resident parking permits

6:54online in eight months. The project manager, Anna, maps what changes for eighteen

7:00service-desk staff and forty wardens, who will check licence plates on handheld

7:04devices. The warden supervisors help design the new checks, and one parking zone

7:10tries them first.

7:11Sara: And at Senior level?

7:13Leo: You design change across an organisation, and lead others through it.

7:17Take One City Account, a thirty-month city project that brings fourteen online services

7:23under one login, led by Anna some years later.

7:26Customer-service roles move from counter tasks to digital help,

7:31so the consultation with the staff's union is timed with each wave of services.

7:36The Head of Customer Service co-leads the change with Anna.

7:39And the steering board agrees that a short dip after each switch is expected,

7:43not a failure.

7:44Sara: Now the drill. A city has moved resident parking permits online,

7:49and the project hands over next month. The business case expected seventy percent

7:53of residents to renew online on their own.

7:56After the January renewals, the share is fifty percent.

7:59Service-desk staff kindly fill in the online form for anyone who walks in.

8:04And the desk's monthly report still ranks staff by visitors served.

8:08What do you do?

8:09Leo: Pause and write your answer. You have forty-five seconds.

8:58Sara: First, the gap.

9:00Leo: Seventy minus fifty is twenty points. The city issues about twenty-six thousand

9:05resident permits a year, and twenty percent of that is five thousand two hundred

9:09counter visits, which the business case counted as saved.

9:13Sara: And then?

9:14Leo: Read the culture before you act. The staff are not against the change.

9:18They value personal service, and the report rewards a busy counter.

9:23That report shows an assumption: a good day is a busy day.

9:27So, with the sponsor, ask the desk's manager to count residents helped to renew

9:32on their own, not visitors served. Train the desk staff as digital helpers.

9:38And share early wins.

9:40Sara: What lifts that to Senior?

9:42Leo: Tolerance, ownership and people. Agree a trigger with the sponsor:

9:47for example, below sixty percent at the three-month review, the benefit owner acts.

9:53Name that owner before the project closes.

9:56Keep assisted service for residents who cannot go online, even at some cost to the

10:00saving. Involve the staff; do not blame them.

10:04And add measures and rewards to the city's readiness checks.

10:08Sara: How do the exams ask this?

10:10Leo: IPMA®'s written exam asks for open answers; at Level B it may be oral.

10:16IPMA®'s certification also includes an interview, where assessors ask about your

10:20own projects, so note one change you helped people adopt.

10:24The PMP® exam uses scenarios, and questions built on a case study or a chart.

10:30APM's PMQ asks for short written answers, for example how benefits are realised

10:35after handover.

10:37Sara: Let us recap.

10:39Leo: One. Outputs bring benefits only when people work differently.

10:43Sara: Two. Resistance is information: ask what people fear to lose.

10:48Leo: Three. Read the culture at three levels: artefacts, stated values and shared assumptions.

10:56Sara: Four. Support people through the dip, and lead in steps: loosen,

11:02move with early wins, make it stick.

11:06Leo: And five. Make it last: change measures and rewards, switch the old way off,

11:12and name who measures the benefits.

11:15Sara: The two model sheets and the study handout are linked in the description.

11:19Next time: critical path and resource levelling.