When it comes to product management, certain skills stand out as highly sought-after: product management skillsets, we may come across product design, data analysis, product strategies, product discovery, great communication and project delivery skills. These competencies, demanded by businesses and organisations of all sizes, undoubtedly contribute to a product manager’s success. However, there is another essential skill that deserves a prominent spot on the product manager’s skillset radar: change management. This skill arguably distinguishes a product manager from a product leader. Change management becomes an indispensable skill when managing and implementing an internal-facing product. As your end-users are also stakeholders in your product, change management empowers you to consistently and effectively bring together the entire organisation to deliver the best possible product and experiences to your users.
Change often accompanies the introduction of new initiatives, products, or processes. For example, you might introduce a new data analytics tool developed with your team to enhance product operation efficiency as part of an internal digital transformation. To facilitate successful product delivery, you, as a product manager, need to grasp the dynamics of change management within your organisation and its impact on stakeholders. This understanding will enable you to better prepare product users for the transition and manage their expectations.
In this post, I will briefly introduce the change management framework to use when you plan to initiate the change in your organisation during the launch of your internal-facing product across the business.
Step 1: Understand the Current Operation Process
Conducting a situation analysis should be the initial step. Gaining an overview of the current state of the business operation process will not only provide you with product intelligence to comprehend users’ pain points, issues with the present process, and product opportunities, but it will also enable you to anticipate the potential impact of your product’s introduction from the perspective of key business stakeholders. Focus groups, user interviews, and a review of process flow documentation can be used to gain insights into the “as is” state of the business process.
Step 2: Define Change Scope and Communicate with Stakeholders
The situation analysis should enable you to identify the change initiatives and objectives you aim to achieve. When defining the change scope, I would caution you in using the word “problem” as it may convey to stakeholders that their current activities have fundamental flaws requiring urgent repairs. The change scope consists of two parts: first addressing the identified opportunities and the second focusing on potential solutions and the positive impact they will have on the launch of the new product. It’s important to remember that many change initiatives fail at this stage due to inadequate stakeholder engagement and ineffective communication to a wider audience. Influencing stakeholders to accept change is arguably the most challenging aspect of change management, as people are generally resistant to change if they feel comfortable with their current daily routines. The uncertainties and potential impact of change initiatives on their established behaviours can trigger anxiety and unease. Communicate initiatives early and transparently regarding their impact on stakeholders’ work. This will also help minimize the likelihood of backlash from stakeholders upon product implementation.
Step 3: Design the New Process and Find Key Stakeholders to Champion the Change Initiative
Rather than re-inventing the wheel to completely re-make the current process, it’s more prudent to focus on filling in the gaps and addressing the identified improvement opportunities. With the introduction of the new process automation tool, certain adjustments will be necessary to streamline the overall operation. For instance, some existing procedures may become redundant as the new product provides real-time access to the required information. Additionally, securing the support of other decision-makers and key stakeholders, in addition to the change initiative sponsor, will give you an edge over effectively managing changes throughout the product delivery process.
Step 4: Plan for Change Initiative
You will normally need a project plan to manage the changes. I don’t want to cover too much about this account and you can find more details about project management in my previous posts. Before implementing any change initiative, it is crucial to conduct multiple “seeding” sessions with your stakeholders. These seeding sessions serve to raise awareness of the change initiative and educate your stakeholders so that they are both physically and mentally prepared for the upcoming changes. Expect to receive a lot of feedback during this process, and it is worthwhile to document all of it in your product operation guide. This will be a valuable resource for end users to refer to after your product is launched.
Step 5: Implement Change Initiative
Two major aspects to consider when kicking off change implementation: Defining a clear action plan with a timeline for stakeholders to follow through. A clear action plan containing concrete steps, implementation timescale, possible impact, disaster recovery procedures and follow-up training session sets the right expectation and creates the ownership for involved parties. Communicating progress and milestones in all types of internal communication channels. Celebrating small wins and staging progress in project regrouping, team meetings, newsletters and even all-hands calls will also help manage stakeholders’ expectations and collect feedback.
Step 6: Monitor, Adjust and Normalise
Setting up key metrics to monitor the performance of change initiatives before you start scaling up is crucial. Since feedback is collected from multiple channels, you can loop it in your product development and operation activities, which will become part of your product iteration, or process refinement. You have probably noticed that there is a lot of work involved in managing change as a product leader. It’s not about delivering the product only, but you also need to consider the impact on your internal end users and drive changes and additional activities required to make the product successful.
