Change Management - Jeffrey M. Hiatt and Timothy J. Creasey

Decided to read this book for a few reasons. It is related to one of my upcoming projects, and I also realised that many of my current work in HR deals with change management, in both big and small ways. It is an under-rated skill and discipline.

This is a short but useful book. Key insights:

1. Buy-in is essential, the "right answer" is not good enough. Everyone in the organisation has to be brought on board before or when the change is made, for it to be successful. And this cannot be done by simply reiterating the "right answers" about why change is needed. And resistance is always to be expected - it is the norm, rather than the exception.
   
2. Preferred senders for different messages. Employees want to hear from business leaders the business rationale for changes. However, for how it impacts them at the individual level, the Whats In It For Me (WIIFM), the preferred sender of the message is their supervisors.
3. Business leaders have to be present and visible throughout the change process - they need to be personally involved rather than just delegating it to a team.
4. The ADKAR model - Awareness, Desire, Knowledge, Ability and Reinforcement - is a very useful way to understand how we need to impact individual officers when implementing change.
5. People adapt to change at different speeds. As the organisation transforms, we need to be aware that different individuals may be at different stages of ADKAR. As such, be prepared to support people who are not moving as fast as the rest - change is n0t uniform.
6. Need to link ADKAR to comms plans, which should not be seen simply as say A, then say B, then say C, etc. They should be linked to the higher order messages to bring about ADKAR.