Is Change Management Just a Growing Pain?

Today's guest blog on change management comes from Shawn McCray, Partner, TPI. 

Things don’t eventually come around.

Problems that occur during implementation of outsourcing are primarily caused by poor change management and lack of governance, and they’re not just natural growing pains. We’ve seen situations where initial implementation went so poorly the entire business case was degraded such that recovery was almost impossible.

But when change management and governance are proactively deployed both parties achieve expected results. A miracle of miracles!

So why doesn’t this happen every time?

Based on multiple interviews with clients and service providers, it’s clear that implementing and sustaining change is one of the more difficult aspects of organizational leadership. Change in outsourcing is not a one-time event but a continuous process.

The initial switch from internal to external service delivery is the first and most obvious. Over time, additional changes are driven by organizational strategy, leadership, talent and skills, technology, business processes, and regulatory requirements.

It is challenging enough to align multiple stakeholders within the same company who already have different priorities and agendas. Outsourcing introduces additional complexities as stakeholders don’t belong to the same company, can include different nationalities and cultures, and may be separated by distance, time zones, language, and commercial interests.

So in an effort to improve outsourcing efforts, TPI put the spotlight on existing problems in outsourcing implementation and developed recommendations.  You can find the “Top 10” list of the problems and recommendations in a white paper on our website.

Our findings point to the critical need for clients and service providers to cooperate and make change management and governance a priority. If you’ve already done that, you can rest easy. Otherwise, wake up and smell the coffee!

Comments

[Victor Norman]

Shawn,

Your comments regarding the need for solid change management and governance are insightful. But I’m not surprised since I know your insight is based on deep perception resulting from considerable experience. And that’s really what is unsaid here. Companies need assistance and lots of it if their outsourcing projects are to be successful. You folks helped us through a multi-billion dollar deal and it worked out fine. These things are enormously challenging but I know they can produce sustainable benefits for all involved. I enjoyed your article!

Vic Norman (an old outsourcing acquaintance)