by Susie TaylorTraining is an integral part of the journey to organizational competency, and for every person that you need to train, Prosci has the change management training courses to help you. But how effective will these trainings be if they fall on deaf ears?
Before building knowledge, it is essential that there is an awareness of the need to change, and the desire to change.
The good news is that once these milestones have been achieved, building individual change management competencies through training is easy! Of course a well-rounded change management strategy does not stop at training, it continues on to build ability and offer reinforcement. For this reason, many organizations internalize their change training capability by attending Prosci’s Train-the-Trainer program.
To make the most of your education efforts, this article explores the five roles you need to train and how you can walk them through every step of the ADKAR® Model, including suitable trainings for building role-specific knowledge.
Start building awareness and desire with senior leaders by
engaging them in one-on-one meetings and short, quick presentations that focus on the ROI of change management. Plant the seed for change management early with conversations focused on research, project ROI and the impact of the people side of these initiatives. In doing so you prime your sponsors to be great advocates of organizational change competency!
Once you’ve gained your executives’ buy-in and whetted their appetite, you can move on to building knowledge with Prosci’s half-day Change Management Sponsor Briefing where executives:
Executives will achieve ability with the help of the Sponsor Roadmap (part of the Prosci 3-Phase Process). The reinforcement of an executive's sponsor competency will depend on your level of access to that executive, but it will usually involve some reiteration of the key messages from the Sponsor Briefing, and coaching from the change managers who attended Train-the-Trainer.
The process of walking managers through the ADKAR® Model is similar to that of the executives, but the content is now different. Appeal to managers by focusing on how change competency will make them better at their job, more personally successful and able to bring success to their team. Managers may be too busy to read a whole ADKAR® book, so consider quick presentations or tutorials to start building awareness and desire.
For building knowledge, Prosci has a high-impact one-day Change Management Program for Managers, where participants:
After the Coaching Program, remember to continue through the ADKAR milestones building ability and reinforcement.
With so much going on, managers are unlikely to retain everything they learned in their Prosci Change Management Program for Managers. Reinforcement for this group could include six weekly sessions following the program, or a monthly brown bag lunch to review the key modules and discuss current difficulties managers are facing.
Awareness and desire building with employees usually begins by acknowledging that employees are being impacted by a lot of change, and are probably experiencing some frustration or anxiety. If an employee is not aware that any changes are needed, they are likely to resist. However, if for example someone takes the time to explain to our employee that the new software is necessary to meet the needs of the customers and improve efficiency, their reaction (based on this is awareness) will likely be very different. Now let’s imagine that the employee has awareness, but no desire to participate in or support the change, what then? To help our resistant employee, the best response is to actively engage them in the change, so they can see for themselves the benefits. Visible sponsorship would be key here. Once awareness and desire are achieved, we can move on to knowledge.
For building knowledge and ability, Prosci offers Change Management Employee Orientation, a one-day program where employees:
For frontline employees, ability could be ongoing coaching from their manager who has been through the Change Management Program for Managers, and reinforcement for this group could be a monthly check-in.
Senior executives, managers and frontline employees - those are the three core roles you need to address to reach organizational competency. All three roles have their own one-day or half-day program that you can learn to teach through Prosci’s Train-the-Trainer Program. But there are other people you need to train as well: change managers and project managers.
Train-the-Trainer also enables you to teach the 3 -Day Prosci Change Management Certification Program. This is the program you would want to give to anybody with change management responsibilities, where participants:
While the 3-Day Prosci Change Management Certification Program is ideal for change management and project managers, Prosci also has other resources available for these roles. Talk with a Prosci analyst to discuss what would work best for your company.
In many organizations, directors play a blended role that is part manager, part sponsor. Take a look at your organization’s structure and the roles that directors play, and decide which change management training programs are most appropriate for them - the Sponsor Briefing versus the Change Management Program for Managers. With Prosci’s flexible license options, you can also create a blended program that meets the exact needs of this audience, depending on the roles and responsibilities they have in your organizational structure.
Whatever you do, remember that although building knowledge (training) is an integral part of the change capability build, you can not start with it - you must begin with awareness and desire. By walking sponsors, managers, frontline employees and everyone in between through the Prosci ADKAR® Model, you help everyone to catch the vision for their own change competency. Then, when each role is ready and keen to gain knowledge, remember Prosci - we are here for you and ready to deliver!
Learn more about Prosci's role-specific change management training programs.
Susie Taylor is a passionate advocate of personal and organizational change. As a Change Advisor for Prosci, she partners with organizations to implement change management strategies that drive adoption and results while fostering a positive employee experience. She has a master's degree in applied positive psychology from the University of Pennsylvania, where she has also served as an instructor.
