Change Management is all about successfully handling or managing the entire change that has to be implemented. The change can be taking place somewhere or else is expected to take place in day to day applications, corporate strategy, or even in the people as well. Change management's importance cannot be emphasized in excess. Change Management is an IT Service Management discipline. The main aim of Change Management is to ensure that there are standardized methods and procedures to toll out change to the IT infrastructure in any organization. This helps to reduce the impact of any related incidents upon service. A well implemented change management process should highlight the levels of risk caused by any change to the IT infrastructure and helps change planning so that the implementation is successful.
Let’s look at some of the industry best practices that define a good Change Management Process
1. Policy Communication: One of the first steps for any change management implementations is to ensure that all change management policies, procedures and standards are clearly spelt out and communicated throughout the organization. Also lay out the roles and responsibilities for all the personnel that would be a part of the change management process.
2. Issue Management: Enhancement requests and bug reports (for development projects) should be captured and submitted to the business for reviews. All enhancements must follow a pre defined change management process. As simple as it may sound it is really the basics that often get ignored that can lead to large scale repercussions.
3. Request Analysis: All requests for change should be analyzed. The analysis should be done by the Change approval Board (or more popularly known as the CAB). While analyzing any change request the CAB should take into account the significance of the change to the business as well as the cost impact of the change. Also the likelihood of a successful change implementation should also be taken into account.
4. Change Planning: However crucial the change request may be it is always advisable to plan for any change roll out. It is advisable and also standard industry practice to conduct emergency CAB meetings for crucial or high priority changes. Once approved document the input and output parameters as well try to identify the owners affected, business impact reason for change, success factors, testing results as well as a back out plan in case change implementation is not successful
5. Post Implementation review and closure: Changes rolled out would not close the change request that came in. It is also essential to monitor the change over a certain period of time in order to ensure that it has stabilized and has well and truly been embedded into the IT infrastructure as part of ongoing operations.
Though a change management process may sound pretty simple, most organization falter in getting the basic right. Ad hoc and random changes made to the IT infrastructure can cause more harm and grief than even worms and virus attacks. A well designed change management process can actually help the organization support team respond faster to customer requests. It helps organizations control and mitigates the impact of any changes and also reduces the negative impact on day to day operations.
Change planning helps reduce organizational downtime and unsuccessful implementations. Importantly it encourages a best practices thinking within the organizations and can complement the organization in meeting its strategic objectives.
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