The Personal Side of Change

The Personal Side of Change

Many times, there are underlying reasons why someone in an organization resists change. I had an interesting situation a few years back that illustrates why it's important to remember how a change will affect your staff not only professionally, but personally as well.

A company I was working with wanted to computerize its bookkeeping system. The woman in charge of the department had worked there for many years and was viewed as the expert for anything associated with bookkeeping. This woman was used to keeping the books the old-fashioned way, on paper, and saw no need to change. Management felt that computerizing the bookkeeping system was more time- and cost-efficient, but she didn't see it that way.

As we dove deeper into the issue, what we realized was that she felt threatened by the change. She had always been the company expert on bookkeeping issues and since she wasn't comfortable with computers, she would feel out of control if the bookkeeping was computerized. So, to make her feel better and get her onboard with the change, she was the first person trained on the new system. That way, she would continue to be viewed as the company expert, which was important to her, and she would support the change, which was important to the company. Tom Long, SolidOakConsulting.com.