There is currently a hot, sexy tool in technology all companies seem to want to implement. And that is…drum roll please…SharePoint!
SharePoint is a Microsoft tool which can build both intranet (internal employee sites) and internet (public) sites for companies. Honestly, I don’t know how we did our jobs before SharePoint was born. Yes I do...inefficiently. As you can tell, I’m a HUGE fan of SharePoint.
In my Change Management career, I have helped several companies implement SharePoint. Although SharePoint is a great technology, the implementation is simply going to fail unless the employees understand what it is, how it’s going to better their work lives, and support the change. Change Management is crucial to a successful SharePoint implementation. Why, you wonder? It’s because with SharePoint, you are asking employees to do their job differently, to change their behavior. And any time you are asking employees to do things different, you need to incorporate Change Management activities help guide them through the change so that it can become a part of their every day process.
From the SharePoint projects I have been involved in, here are some Change activities I think are crucial.
Change management strategy and roadmap: This can be created for a SharePoint implementation to identify the communications and change activities needed to ensure stakeholder readiness and support. The strategy also identifies governance, adoption plans, communications and training plans, and leadership and organizational alignment, and an understanding of the client’s culture. Change resources can also ensure that the project is aligned closely with the overall business strategy/goals of the organization.
Create a sense of urgency: In order for SharePoint to succeed, the whole company really needs to want it. No, not just the IT department, the WHOLE company! If there is a company-wide urgency, it will be easier to move the project along. A lot of the activities involved in creating urgency are having candid conversations….especially coming from leadership. The more people talk about it; the better. And this needs to start happening in the very beginning of the project. A key activity I usually conduct when the project kicks off is a stakeholder analysis. This is when I help identify which influential individual/or group either support and do not support the project. I then build a communications plan keeping this information in mind. It is crucial to understand who the non-supporters are and help move them to being supporters. However, these non-supporters are never going to become your die hard enthusiastic fans. But with the right communications and change activities, you can help them become supporters. Also, keep in mind it’s just as important to have solid communications and change activities to ensure the supporters stay supporters throughout your project. If you neglect your supporters, they can soon become non-supporters.
Gaining Support for the Project: This is hard to do unless you have strong, visible leadership championing the change. I usually form a Change Network with the identified leaders to work together to champion and communicate about the change. By the way, it’s usually good to put a couple of naysayers into the Change Network. Usually, the naysayers will end up becoming supporters when they are involved in the process. One thing to keep in mind though, your Change Network should have a good mix of people from leadership, to directors, to managers, to front line workers. When choosing members for your Change Network, make sure you pick influential people who are able and willing to communicate about the SharePoint project.
Tie it back to the overall business goals: For the SharePoint implementation to really stick, you must tie it back to the company’s overall business goals. If the SharePoint implementation somehow doesn’t line up to that, it’s going to be difficult to find support for the project. In order to do this well, SharePoint projects need to have a solid vision which needs to be communicated well.
Communicate, communicate, communicate: Most of my clients always want to wait until it’s too late to communicate….usually they start communicating right when deployment begins, but this is too late. Awareness messaging needs to be sent out months and months before deployment occurs. And usually, employees avoid reading all communications, so you really need to communicate the same message ten different ways. Whether it’s by including it in e-mail communications, in a newsletter, a Town Hall, Leadership presentations, etc. We should be talking about SharePoint every chance we get.
A lot of people also have trouble describing what SharePoint is. I like using this short video to easily show end-users what SharePoint can do for them.
Walk the talk: Leadership support is key, and they usually do a great job communicating about SharePoint. But, they need to go a step further and SHOW the employees by actually using SharePoint as a vehicle in their communications.
Customized training: When implementing SharePoint, most companies use the out of box training provided by Microsoft or other vendors. In my opinion, this training is great for end-users, but I rarely see it work for Site Administrators and Site Owners. I think for the later group, developing a customized training is key. One of my previous clients initially wanted to use out of box training, however, it just didn’t work with their Site Owners…they were too confused. So I ended up creating a 7 week training program called Jump Start that all Site Owners and Site Administrators were required to go through in order to publish their site. The program taught them literally how to build their site from scratch. It went over publishing features and customizations we had made to the client’s SharePoint environment. In addition, I also had weekly Office Hours where Site Owners could come and ask questions or simply sit in the room and work on their site. This program worked really well. It energized the Site Owners and they soon became champions for the project.
Engage Change resources early: Most clients automatically assume Change Management is just communications and training, but it’s so much more than that. Engaging the Change resources from the planning stage is key. Having Change resources on the project can bridge the gap between the functional and the technical team and ensure that a system that meets the needs of all audiences are built. This leads to better requirements gathering and a better end-product for the client. Change resources can also help implement, integrate and institutionalize the SharePoint initiative by minimizing business disruption.
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