Integration of organizational change management and project management is a leading best practice in enabling organizations to effectively deliver transformational projects – like an ArcGIS Utility Network (UN) implementation – when it involves significant technology and/or business process changes.

Until recently, much of the responsibility for organizational change has rested in the hands of project team members – if addressed at all – but delegation of this responsibility to specific organizational change managers is now commonplace. This is in part due to the widespread understanding that transformational projects can significantly impact employees required to use this new technology and the associated business process changes that often accompanying these types of projects.

The disciplines of change management and project management both contribute to the success of a UN project. By integrating these disciplines, from the initiation of the project through to completion, we connect the people side of change with the technical side of change and ensure that the organizational benefits of the change are achieved.

The Integrated Change Management and Project Management Model illustrates that project management and change management are complementary disciplines that share a common set of goals for meeting or exceeding project objectives and realizing organizational benefits.

The “Technical Side” of the change focuses on developing and deploying the solution that solves a set of business and operational needs. The discipline of project management provides the structure, processes, and tools to make this happen.

The “People Side” of the change focuses on engaging the people impacted by the solution and supporting them to adopt and use the change in their daily work. The discipline of change management provides the structure, processes, and tools to accomplish this outcome.

To help quantify the possible benefits, Prosci benchmarking research shows that 47% of participants who integrated project management and change management reported meeting or exceeding project objectives, which was notably greater than those who did not integrate those two fields of practice.  As reference, Prosci is a global change management organization focused on conducting in-depth change management research and developing best practices and tools for over 25 years.

At the intersection of the Integrated Change Management and Project Management Model, there are five value propositions that we consistently see resulting from the integration of change management and project management.  These include, but are not limited to:

• Governance: Integrating change management and project management enables continuous practice that generates better decisions, more alignment with project priorities and more buy-in from stakeholders. There needs to be an understanding of the project’s environment and structure to ensure that there is a right fit within the established governance of the organization.
• Project Alignment: When we integrate technical activities and people activities, the right actions can be taken at the right times over the course of the UN project lifecycle to ensure people are ready and able to adopt the change and produce successful outcomes.
• Shared Objective: When we integrate project management and change management, we enable both disciplines to focus on a shared objective: improving the project’s performance by effectively implementing the needed changes that deliver the intended results and outcomes.
• Communication and Coordination: Integrating change management and project management activities improve the flow of communication over the lifecycle of a project. Early in the project lifecycle, the integrated approach helps ensure that impacted people receive the information they need to understand why the change is needed and the personal benefits of adopting the change. Later in the project lifecycle, the integrated approach helps ensure overall coordination and that the stakeholders receives feedback on adoption, usage, and functionality of the UN solution.
• Risk/Resistance Management: Integrating change management with the steps of project management enables us to proactively identify and mitigate risks, anticipate, and address obstacles and stakeholder resistance, and build commitment to and adoption of the change.

Bottomline, your UN project is more likely to be successful when you integrate the disciplines of change management and project management. An integrated approach increases the probability that project objectives will be achieved and that the outcomes of the change by the UN implementation will be sustained. An integrated approach also enables project managers and change practitioners to work towards a shared definition of success, more effectively align and sequence activities, and avoid duplicating efforts by integrating common tools.