Insights

‍‍

Change Assessment Plan For Law Firms or Legal Departments.

‍

When you start a change in your organization, two types of assessments need to be done.

First, you do an organizational assessment, so you understand your audience and its characteristics. For this type of assessment, you need to focus on:

• Capacity for change
• Culture
• Value system
• Residual effects of past changes
• Leadership styles
• Management’s predisposition toward the change
• Employee readiness for change

The second assessment you need to work on is the change itself. The assessment of the type
of change you are seeking to implement is critical to plan your strategy and determine the impact of the change in the organization as well in the process.

There are four steps in change assessment:

• Scope
• Complexity
• Time Frame
• Openness

Scope

We need to rate the change from small, medium, or large. Small involves only one area in the organization, medium will affect at least two departments, and large will be for those changes that involve more than two areas or departments.

Complexity 

In this section of the assessment, we will rate the complexity as simple, moderate, and complex. 

1. Simple Complexity. 

We need to take under consideration the following: 

• Is there a single aspect to change? 
• Will the change involve minor changes to processes? 
• No technology or systems changes 
• Job roles will not change due to the change

2. Moderate Complexity. 

In this stage of complexity, we are looking for values that are between simple and complex complexity. 

3. Complex Complexity.

To determine if the change is complex, we will be looking for the following: 

• Are there many aspects to change? 
• Will the project involve complex processor technology changes? 
• 50% plus of changes to job roles will be made 
• Will it affect the look and feel of the day-to-day work? 
• Is the change radical? 

Timeframe 

Changes in the firm will take time to achieve. Depending on the complexity and the scope of the change, the time-frame will be determined. Therefore, we will rate the timeframe in terms of quick (change should take less than one month), medium (change will be performed between three to twelve months), and long term (change will take more than twelve months). 

Openness

Our goal with the openness assessment is to determine and rate whether the employees are open and ready for a change. We need to review the mood among the stakeholders involved in the change process. We will rate the openness assessment on: 

1. Open

• Is the employees’ dissatisfied with the current state? 
• Have past initiatives succeeded and have been seen as positive? 
• Are there very few initiatives underway? 
• Is there a clear and unified vision for the stakeholders? 
• Are stakeholders open and responsive to change and innovative ideas? 
• Are employees rewarded for risk-taking and embracing change? 
• Does management demonstrate effective sponsorship on projects? 
• Are middle managers competent at managing change? 
• Are employees qualified at managing the change? 
• ‍

2. Moderately Open 

We will review and consider the situations between the open and the resistant assessment

3. Resistant 

• Have past initiatives failed or been seen as unfavorable? 
• Are the employees satisfied with the current state? 
• Is everything changing? 
• Are there many different directions and shifting priorities?
• Are stakeholders closed and resistant to innovative ideas?
• Are employees rewarded for consistency? 
• Does management lack sponsorship skills on projects? 
• Does a middle manager lack the skills to manage change? 
• Do employees lack the skills to manage change? 

The assessment data helps with change planning. Specifically, you use the information to prepare a change management strategy. The areas to focus on will be the resources needed to perform the change, the schedule of the process based on the type of change, the skills required to complete the change, the cost, and the risk that we could face during the process. 

‍

‍

Impact of ChangeAssessment 

‍

Conclusion  

Performing these assessments using a change management framework will be essential when planning your change management strategy, and it will help the team make informed decisions about the approach to be used. One needs to understand that a change management assessment is a planning tool, not just the bulk of the change management effort. However, the assessment tool should not take too much time of the change management process, only enough to collect the data necessary for good planning decisions. 

‍