Lessons Learned from Change Management

Through the unique application of concepts in this course, I have gained valuable insight into the inner workings of change management and what is involved in evaluating and implementing change on many different levels, I learned about methodologies, the tools used, and the principles applied. Below, I will outline 10 of the lessons I learned that have already applied in my job as a manager at Staples and will apply in my career moving forward as I look into working in HR or Project Co-Ordination.
Lesson 1:
One of the most impactful clarifications I received is from the principles of Total quality management (TQM), which is a comprehensive and large-scale intervention that aims to focus all organization systems on the continuous improvement of quality. This system covers all bases to ensure a comprehensive application of the intervention reaching all levels of management. Gaining long-term senior management’s commitment is something I will make sure to evaluate whenever I experience or apply a company wide change initiative. I realized that having management understand the importance of long-term commitments to TQM through clarifying of goals, and asking for manager inputs, direction and support through the change process will help create new policies and adjust strategic orientation to help maintain TQM as a long-term commitment that has a high priority. The second step in the system involves training members in quality methods; this is where I learned about providing the tools for actual change (like problem solving skills and simple statistical process control). I have personally experienced the failure of a change initiative on the long run because no transfer of knowledge (tools) was done and the initiative was soon replaced with a new one. If given the opportunity to implement a TQM intervention, I will be sure too follow through with the third step of starting quality improvement projects, then measuring progress against the quality standards and then...