The only constant is change. – Heraclitus of Ephesus
Think back to the last time your office had to manage a major procedural change like FAFSA simplification or maybe you created a combined student services office. Having to completely overhaul a program is challenging since it requires far more than updating your policy and procedures manual. The more moving parts there are, and the more people involved, the more you need a well-thought-out change management plan.
A good change management plan incorporates all the steps needed to transition from point A to point B including notification, the people impacted, newly created skill gaps, and risk assessments among other things. Here, we share our proposed outline for a workable change management plan when the change is mandated by a federal agency. See how your plan matches up to ours.
Step 1: Write an executive summary that includes a summary of the mandate; a description of anticipated changes to all facets of your office (technology, staff, processes); a statement of urgency and compliance requirements (meaning how soon is implementation required and what are the regulatory requirements); a timeline for completion and the expected outcome, particularly how your students are impacted.
Sharing your executive summary with those responsible for providing resources needed is necessary, but it should also be shared with anyone impacted by the change, so everyone can be on the same page.
Step 2: Define the specifics of the mandate and its scope. This is where you provide the detailed description of the regulatory change, the deadline(s) for completing the change, what the end-state will look like, and the cost of non-compliance (risk). Additionally, you will make a list of all impacted offices, systems, processes, and external service providers.
Continue to update this information as you move forward — it’s impossible to think of everything on day one. The other critical purpose this document will serve will be to keep you on point. As you make decisions to get ready for the mandated change, you are likely to identify other areas that can be improved and that’s great but create a separate project to address anything outside the scope of the mandated change or you will be spreading yourself too thin.
Step 3: State your strategic objectives. Define the goals that the mandate supports, and the tactics required to fulfil those goals. Describe what the post-implementation state will need to look like and how you will measure success.
Sometimes it’s foggy, but each regulatory change has a purpose (other than to make more work for us!) Once we make the change, what is the outcome supposed to be? What steps do we need to take to make that happen? And finally, how can we tell if we did it well? These are the questions to be asked at this stage and the answers are then turned into the objectives of your project.
Step 4: Identify the stakeholders. Internal stakeholders are the staff members of various departments on campus who are impacted by the change. External stakeholders are contractors, oversight agencies (like Federal Student Aid), and, of course, students. As part of this process identify which participants are decision-makers and in what capacity. For example, your IT director may know nothing about Pell grants, but they should be the ones vetting technology requests.
Be thorough in your analysis, particularly regarding internal stakeholders as it may not be apparent at first how other departments are affected. For example, you need to implement a change to how you process federal loans for graduate students. Your team in the financial aid office and the student accounts staff are obvious stakeholders in this type of process change. But what about the admissions office or the dean of the graduate school? They need to know what’s coming to determine how their goals and processes are impacted. If you leave out impacted peers, at best they will be annoyed, but more likely they will be making decisions based on inaccurate information and probably giving students inaccurate information as well. You cannot over-communicate change, so if you’re on the fence about whether to include an office or staff member in the project, offer the invitation and let them decide if they want to participate.
Step 5: Conduct a workforce analysis. What is your team’s current capabilities and are they sufficient to support the future state? This is where you identify any skill gaps in your current workforce and where you determine if additional staffing is needed for the implementation period or permanently to support the new process. You don’t have to get into a training curriculum or start writing job descriptions at this point, just identify what the future needs are likely to be.
Step 6: Imagine all the potential outcomes of the project and assess the risk involved for each. What would happen if you could not implement the change fully in the timeframe mandated? Is there some hybrid process that will allow you to continue to function while moving the project ahead and what are the risks associated with delaying full implementation?
You will, of course, strive to complete your implementation ahead of the mandated deadline, but there’s always the potential that something will go wrong, and you won’t be ready. A recent example is the change from EFC to SAI as part of FAFSA simplification. Let’s say you use a home-grown financial aid management system, and your programmers were unable to get the calculation to work properly. Continuing to use EFC was not an option and you probably couldn’t just stop processing financial aid, so what were the possibilities between no production and full implementation? Perhaps you outsourced the need analysis to a third party or printed ISIRs and did hand calculations. Each option you identify will have some associated risk and the best way to mitigate it is to document it ahead of time.
Step 7: Execute your plan. At this stage you will begin making the actual changes needed for compliance whether that be purchasing new technology, hiring staff, migrating data, etc. Since this is a process change, you will also be updating your policy and procedure manual accordingly. You should have all the required approvals and buy-in from stakeholders at this point.
Determine how you will roll out the change. Are you able to phase-in the changes so most staff members are using the status quo process while others are piloting the new one? Can you implement the changes in phases, so the effects are incremental rather than all at once? Regardless of how you roll it out, don’t forget your evaluation criteria created in step 3. Even the most carefully planned projects wind up with some unexpected results, so have a plan to ensure you are getting the desired ones.
Step 8: Communicate with your stakeholders as your plan is executed. Some of your stakeholders may not have been directly involved in the implementation plan. Now that you are executing it, make sure they are aware of the impacts that they may feel as a result. For example, your office may be closed for a half day while new software is being installed, or you need to decline meetings for a week to oversee staff training. Use all media available to you, especially if your students are affected.
Step 9: Execute your training plan. Once all the changes are in place, it’s time to make sure your team knows how their work is impacted. The mandated changes may require new office policies, procedures, and technology. Appropriate training will bring your whole team into the future state even if they were not involved in the project.
Step 10: Monitor and evaluate results. Once your implementation is complete there may still be room for improvement. Monitor the results to assess whether you hit the mark in all aspects of the plan. Pay particular attention to adoption by staff members to make sure everyone is following new procedures and to new automation to ensure it is calculating/processing accurately. This is also your chance to ask, “Could we have done this better?” Maybe you’ll need a ‘phase 2’ to tweak your new process to make it more efficient.
Change is hard and the bigger the change, the more challenging it is to implement. Having a well-thought-out plan that addresses any contingencies will make the process quite a bit easier. But sometimes it’s hard to know where to start. The Higher Education Assistance Group offers support with Business Process Review and Title IV Technology System Analysis to support you and staff when the winds of change start blowing. Learn more on our website or email us at info@heag.us.
Sources:
U.S. Office of Personnel Management (OPM), Guidance for Change Management in the Federal Workforce.
Management Concepts, A Federal Manager’s Guide to Change Management.