For Harvard Business Review
Illustration by Maria Galybina/iStock
Summary.
Change management is having its moment. But when you think about it, isn’t all management the management of change? If sales need to be increased, that’s change management. If a merger needs to be implemented, that’s change management. If a new personnel policy needs to be carried out, that’s change management. Leaders should view change not as an occasional disruptor but as the very essence of the management job. Setting tough goals, establishing processes to reach them, carrying out those processes and carefully learning from them — these steps should characterize the unending daily life of the organization at every level. More companies need to describe their work in terms of where they are trying to go in the next month or next quarter or next year.
Change management is having its moment. There’s no shortage of articles, books, and talks on the subject. But many of these indicate that change management is some occult subspecialty of management, something that’s distinct from “managing” itself. This is curious given that, when you think about it, all management is the management of change.
If sales need to be increased, that’s change management. If a merger needs to be implemented, that’s change management. If a new personnel policy needs to be carried out, that’s change management. If the erosion of a market requires a new business model, that’s change management. Costs reduced? Productivity improved? New products developed? Change management.
The job of management always involves defining what changes need to be made and seeing that those changes take place. Even when the overall aim is stability, often there are still change goals: to reduce variability, cut costs, reduce the time required, or reduce turnover, for example. Once every job in a company is defined in terms of the changes to be made (both large and small), constant improvement can become the routine. Each innovation brings lessons that inform ongoing operations. The organization becomes a perpetual motion machine. Change never occurs as some sort of happening; it is part of everyday life.