514 Managing Change

Unit Overview

514 Managing Change is a unit within the CMI Level 5 module that aligns the change process with the needs of the employees and the organisation in general. The workplace experiences a significant change that arises due to the changing external environment or the need for the organisations to adapt internally effectively. Change is inevitable, implying that leaders within organisations must be always prepared to effectively handle and implement change within their areas of operation and responsibility. This is a process that ensures the organisation is able to succeed and adapt to the disruptions that may arise within the change.

The process of managing and implementing change requires the managers to be able to effectively conduct an organisational and environmental analysis to understand the areas that need to change and understand the capability of the people they are leading to effectively handle the change. It also involves being able to effectively implement change and provide support to the organisation in the process. The leaders must understand the principles of change, including the theoretical models that are designed within the organisation to coordinate the process of change in their areas of responsibility.

514 Managing Change within the workplace is a unit with the aim and purpose of increasing ability and awareness on approaches to manage and implement change to ensure it is successful within the workplace hence improving the managerial performance of the leaders. The unit is taught in 19 hours of guided learning and contributes to 5 credit values in the completion of the CMI Level 5 module.

Suitability of the Unit

All leaders must be able to effectively implement and manage change in their areas of operation. This involves being able to introduce new methods of handling activities in the areas of operation and supporting the people that are being led into effectively adapting to the change. As such, 514 Managing Change within the workplace is highly applicable to different types of leaders within the organisation. The leader is the organisation must be prepared to ensure that they provide relevant support that includes both technical and informational support to their employees and individuals within their areas of responsibility. This makes the unit highly suitable for building these capabilities.

The unit is designed for middle-level managers. This is a group of leaders who are actively involved in making tactical decisions that adapt the organisation to different environments. As such, they are more suited to the unit since, in the process of fulfilling their managerial roles, they have to handle different changing aspects within the organisation regularly. The unit, however, is also suited to the executive management who make critical strategic decisions that align the organisation to the industry-level change. They must be able to understand the nature of the change being experienced and the needs of the subjects before implementing the change. First-level managers and team leaders can also pursue the unit to help them build skills that will be useful in future career and professional engagements.

Learning Outcomes

Upon completion of the unit, the learners should be able to:

• Analyse the environmental and internal factors that drive the need for change within the organisations

• Identify the impact of change within the organisations

• Evaluate the theoretical models that are used in the process of change management

• Understand the role of leadership in improving the commitment of others to the change process

• Understand the reasons that leaders can use to engage the stakeholders through the process of change management

• Understand the reasons for initiating change within the workplace

• Develop an effective plan for change within the organisation

• Identify the tools that can be used to implement and monitor change within the workplace

• Understand mechanisms that can be used to overcome the barriers and risks to change, as well as methods of supporting individuals through the process of change

• Understand approaches to monitoring and measuring the impact of planned change within the workplace.

Key Learning Areas

514 Managing Change is a unit that focuses on building ability and skills for effectively handling people in the process of change and ensuring that the change is consistent with the policies and objectives of the organisation. It covers critical areas of learning that are related to these aspects. Some of the main areas that are covered include:

Understanding Reasons for Change

This area of learning focuses on ensuring that the learner is able to understand the context of change. it introduces them to different environmental and organisational analysis tools such as PESTLE and SWOT analysis, which build their ability to evaluate the need for change in the organisation and their specific cares of operation. The area of learning further helps to identify the types of change which are being experienced within the organisation. There are different types of change that require different adaptability methods to ensure they have been achieved. The types of change could include developmental, transitional, ad transformational change. The learner is guided in identifying the characteristics of each type and hence ensures that they are able to effectively overcome the challenges that may arise in the process of implementing each type of change within the organisation.

Managing Change

This area of learning is important in ensuring that the learner builds the ability to diagnose needs for change based on environmental and organisational analysis and identify the context within which the change is applied in the organisation. They are also able guided to build the skills required in assessing the risks and uncertainties associated with the change and create effective strategies to mitigate the risks.

Implementing change comes about with the need to use different models that have been established to support the decision-makers within the organisation. In this case, the system theory and process design models are effective tools that can guide learners in the process of developing and implementing the desired change within the workplace. The Bridge’s transition model or other models of managing the people within the changing process are also introduced to the learners to ensure that their theoretical knowledge is significantly improved hence supporting their ability to effectively implement and manage change.

Evaluation

A written assessment is used to ensure that the learning goals and objectives are achieved. The learner is required to complete a written assessment where they provide responses to questions within the template that indicate their mastery of the theoretical information that has been taught within the unit. They are also gauged to ensure they can implement the information in a practical setting using case studies and simulated situations or supervised practice where the assessor examines the leaner in the practical organisational context to ensure they can apply the information learned in boosting their professional capabilities.